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It was a heavy duty fog Saturday morning, the kind where you can?t see the road
markers and often not even the road. If it were like this at O?Hare or JFK,
the western world would come to a complete stop. Nothing holds me back, as I
weave my way through the gate well before sunrise, straining to find the center
of the road, over (almost off) the bridge topping the straight chute and into the
pits. I found my place (at least I hoped it was my place) between the restroom
and the gas pump. Little did I know that the silence I experienced meant that I
was an hour early, not that everyone was asleep. The coffee in the thermos was gone,
but the sun began to burn through and I began to methodically wipe the dew off just
about everything.
"Take everything out of the car" he said...even my original Roy Orbison "Pretty Woman" tape,
and I don?t go anywhere without Roy. I watched the big boys and girls with
their painted-on numbers for their Turbos and Carrera RS?s, 914s 930s and something
called the White Rocket. With a shoe polish numeral on my windshield reading 224,
my Nomex flying suit from my Air Force pilot days, and my helmet borrowed from a
Harley friend, all I could think was "Hurley Heywood eat your heart out."
It was the fall of 1982 and The Porsche Club of America was taking a big chance
on me and 24 other first time high performance drivers at Laguna Seca east ? the
track at Summit Point West Virginia. After completing the inspection, and the
drivers education class, they affixed a green dot to the windshield of my normally
aspirated 944 (aspirated was very similar to what I felt like when we finished).
As the instructor and I left the pits on the first run and accelerated on the inside
lane, the adrenalin was pumping overtime. "Into the outside lane, foot to the floor
and keep it there till? I tell you to let up" the instructor said. "Does he know why
my mother said this is dangerous", I asked myself? Into the hairpin right turn, brake,
downshift, and put it to the floor again as we track out. Over the hill,
drop "downshift, brake, turn Dammit"..."floor it, get inside now, track out."
Over and over again, and then a break for another class, and back in the seat and do
it all over again.
Do I like this? Have you ever been flying "on the deck" 100 ft above the ocean at
300 knots, passed between two sailboats on the way back from Bermuda, popped the
afterburner and headed straight up? I?d do that again in a heartbeat and I?d do
Summit Point into the hairpin at 125 mph waiting for my heart to beat again. After
the first day of driving I refused to take off the Nomex and then my wife delivered
the options - damn, she has a way of bringing one back to reality.
Halfway through Sunday, I had improved so much I could not believe it
(I marveled at how far I had come; my instructor marveled at how far I had to go.)
As we finished the head and pulled into the pits he said "Stay in the lane and pull
up front. You need another inspection. Of course, you don?t have to have one if you
don?t want to solo", he said. "I thought you said it takes a few weekends",
I countered. "It does, but you?re ready." Stand back Jack! ? Dan Gurney and Phil
Hill are 29 again and you bet I?m ready. The inspection was routine for the inspector.
It was an Olympic Gold for me. When he affixed (placed, stuck, smeared) the second
green dot on the windshield, I was 11 ft tall (Of course I?d been 10 feet tall for
the last two days.)
"Watch the weight shift when you cross over the crest of that hill,
and remember, you can?t eat Turbos." The starter dropped the flag and
I was in afterburner, heading quickly into the turn one hairpin at 110 mph.
Foot to the floor, keep it there, now brake, hard right inside, shift, track out.
The only difference between this and air combat is that in racing the bad guys don?t
shoot back, they just outrun you.
On the last lap, I passed a 928 and he rolled his eyes.
I pulled into the pits and braked to a stop in front of my
instructor, the chief instructor, the fire truck, the ambulance and a
crowd of at least six fans. "How?dIdo (that is one word now), I asked in
anticipation of the contract offer to race factory 911s this season. "How
the hell should I know", he said. "I kept my eyes closed the entire time you
were on the track."
I washed the car 12 times after that cold foggy day in November and
the two little green stickers were still on the windshield. If I had
anything to say about it, they were never coming off.
Ron Sable
PCA - Southern Arizona Region
February 2008
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