Tuesday, May 3rd Day – Daytona Speedway 24 Hour Course

We arrived at the hotel at 2 am and again heads on pillow and fast asleep.  We had an early 6 am wakeup call though because again we had to scooter the track.  Again quick showers and checked out. I asked the desk clerk at checkout where the track was.  Yes men do actually ask for directions when they’re late to a track event.  Her reply was, oh, you mean that one, as she pointed across the street.  Last night late arrival in the dark, I had no idea we were right there.  So, how do you know when it’s a short night? - when the same staff is still there in the morning that checked you in.   Breakfast was not provided so we stopped at the 7-11 and picked up juice and coffee.  We had bananas and breakfast bars we bought in a grocery store in South Bend, so off across the street we went to the track.

We were early and the garages were mostly empty.  We found our friends from Lynchburg, VA and unloaded the car, grabbed our trusty scooters and out we went.  We walked up the banked turn at the track’s finish line and began to scooter into turn 1 and all through the in-field course.  Just doing the in-filed course, we began to appreciate how huge the track really was and how incredibly steep the banking really was.  Our legs were sore just traversing entry into turn one from the banking through the infield and back out onto the banking.  We not get all the way around the track to see the bus stop or chicane at the end of the back-straight.  That will just have to wait until our recognizance lap to figure all that out.

So anyway David got a better night’s sleep than I, so he went first.  We have a better routine now to use his in-car video camera and review the video with the debrief form the morning driver to the afternoon driver.  Dave had a good run and was full of excitement from the thrill.  We both reviewed the video at lunch and they also opened the track for lunchtime driving and they set a 100 MPH limit, no helmets, so our we went, me driving and Dave in the passenger seat.  The banking in the turns is so steep that at 100 mph, you have to steer uphill.  Yes that means you have to steer right to go left.  Amazing.

Greg got his turn for the afternoon session and found the top speed of a stock E36 M3 to be 142 mph, that’s where it redlines in 5^th gear.  Many other cars here in the One Lap have gobs of horsepower and some were reaching 180 mph.  There was an Evo behind Greg and on the 3^rd lap, Greg gave him the point on the back straight.  However, the Evo lost it in the bus stop and crossed the track 3 times before getting it under control.  Greg gave him the line and took the bus stop offline, and kept our E36 safely away from idiot.

We learned late in the afternoon session that Wood and Robin were able to get their car repaired in Savanna in the morning and were on their way to Dayton and expected to get their afternoon run in.  They had hit a Armadillo near Savanna on the transit down.  They paid the local dealer form the parts and double the labor expense because they had ot cannibalize a brand new car to get them on the road.  As Woody and Robin arrived, Dave and I loaded up the car and headed toward Gainesville for this evening’s Drag Race event.