The first lap was four up with the family; yes I took my wife and children out with me. A couple of points before people start telling me how irresponsible I was. I drove that first lap as if I was on a one way public road with no speed limit, which I was, but I was also driving purely within my site lines, I could have stopped at any point within my visible distance in case there was some thing, or one around the apex. The result of this was a) a huge amount of fun. B) The discovery that my seven year old like to go fast c) this place really does live up to it’s reputation d) I suck and e) the brakes were shot, faded to mush. So, after getting back in my wife and eldest jump out, Andy jumps in and the seven year old begs one more lap. The first thing we did was go and drive about 10 km’s on regular public roads at moderate speed without touching the brakes to cool them down, which worked a treat. On that brake cooling drive we saw not one, but three Porsche Carrera GT’s plus sundry other exotica. Then it was back in line for another go. Wow, it’s amazing having someone next to you who knows the track and the people there like the back of his hand. It’s not like a rally co driver reading from pace notes, it’s far far better than that. We still had the most precious of cargo in the back, but we were going quicker as I had someone who knew what was round the next corner. It’s amazing to have a constant stream coming at your something like this. ‘Roll of the gas here, stay in 3rd and don’t brake, late apex and hold your speed as your immediately going into a right hander after which you can accelerate through the next left hander and change up, after than move to the right as Joe’s coming up on his bike and will blow past you’ Joe being the merest dot in your mirror at this point, but sure enough has caught me in the third corner and Andy waves as he blast past. After that we dropped my youngest off and went out for another couple of now faster laps. Apparently when asked what she thought of the second lap she said ‘it was jerkier and daddy said some bad words’ that would be the missed apexes, woops.
My last two laps were brilliant pure car geek Nirvana. No I can’t claim to recognize more than a couple of corners and I definitely can’t claim to have driven well, the exact opposite in fact, I drove appallingly still turning in too early, not looking ahead and generally behaving like a complete beginner, but it was magical all the same. It’s true what people say, I can’t imagine any track being as much fun or as much of a challenge, it’s quite simply amazing, an absolute must do at some point in any enthusiast. Andy’s polite summation was the last lap was better than the first and he thought it was probably a 10 mionet 30 sort of pace, which I was actually delighted with. I had no intention of going balls out, I deliberately made sure I had no way of timing myself and had avoided any videos’ of the ring for months as I specifically didn’t want to be one of those Brit’s throwing myself at the scenery, yes, I’m an ex-Pat Englishman who’s made himself at home in the US by the way. Only four laps? Yes, just four magical memory for a life time laps, but it was already pushing 7:00pm so we bought Andy a quick beer, gave him my remaining Euro’s as a tip, loaded up the family and luggage that the hotel had kept then it was time to press on to Amsterdam by 10:30 for more beer and sleep.
So, how did the car fare, well after the brake fade on the first lap which was due to extreme caution, absolutely brilliantly, the traction/stability control had thrown a fit and turned itself off with an error code by the end of the first lap, so that was one potential issue disabled (everything was fine after cycling the ignition) . Other than that it was far far better than I could have hoped. For a supposedly staid and stogy manufacturer it was brilliant, yes it understeered somewhat, but really not much, but it’s a bone stock car with stock alignment and tires so what do you expect. The handling really impressed me, it’s not a track car, but for a rear road car it was exemplary, it worked really well in the ever changing track with all the on and off camber turns, all in all I’m very happy with it. Next year I hope to have a good crack at stock class autocrossing so I’ll see then when I have the chance to experience it in a more controlled environment, but for now I’m delighted.
While the Ring was without doubt the motoring highlight of the trip, and my years come to that, there was still some more fun ahead. Once in England the Yorkshire Pennines and Wales provided a magical carpet of twisting, turning, climbing and diving narrow roads with blind crests, trees and yumps that would make any tarmac rally lover cry. They also provided hikers, sheep, traffic and cows to keep you in check, but those times when the road was clear along with the site line allowed me to relive the magic of my early driving days it rose to the occasion and the chassis really came into it’s own. With some of the really tight small roads that are really thousand year old cattle tracks that have been paved over, a stiff low sports car would have been crashing and bouncing off every crest, ridge and pothole, here the C30 allowed rapid, safe and controlled progress, the more I drive it the more I like it. They also provided the realization that the C30 isn’t in fact a small car. Yes back here anything but a Smart car or Mini make it look positively tiny, but over in Europe it’s without doubt a midsize vehicle and could feel quite large at times. I even changed car parks once as I didn’t like how tight the marked sports were!
So that was the end of our European odyssey, having dropped the car off in London for a $400 surcharge verses spending two days and $1,000 in gas and ferries we flew home to Detroit to wait for the car. Over the 2,200 miles we averaged 23mpg which wasn’t bad considering the 130mph blasts, the Ring, all the city driving and playing rally driver on my home turf, $11+ a gallon for gas was a bit hard to swallow, but it made coming home to $4.20 at that time a little easier.
Four weeks later and two to three weeks quicker than we’d been told the car was waiting to be picked up at Suburban Volvo in Troy. Picking it up and driving again is just making me appreciate it more. The lag free instant response is great for getting though traffic; it’s still an unusual site so it turns heads and illicit comments everywhere. As the car was still on Swedish plates at first waiting for my Michigan plate to arrive I spent literally hours explaining that yes you can buy the car here, no it’s not a gray market import, yes I know I’m a foreigner but it is an American spec car over and over again. It’s one thing to do that at a gas station or mall, but impossible in traffic at he Dream cruise, in the end I gave up on cruise nights, and when asked where I was from faked my best accent and shouted ‘Sveden’ back at them, it made the night go by a lot easier.
