The Madness of the 'Ring

Us motorsports types speak with reverence and hushed tones about the Nurburgring.

Jackie Stewart christened it The Green Hell and for good reason it would seem. When I told friends (who race) that my first ever laps of the 'Ring would be in an RCN race event, they all said I was crazy. One even said he would never race there - too dangerous.

So as well as a very long and unknown circuit in an unknown car, I also had to deal with a track temperature of around 4 degrees and very changeable weather. And we also had the GP circuit as well!

The RCN events are for teams of 2 drivers - After an out lap the first driver sets a timing lap followed by 3 'fast as you can' laps. Then the driver pits for fuel and a driver change.

I was driver 2 and my teammate for the day set a lap time of 15:39 on a very wet circuit. As the circuit dried he improved his times by around 30 seconds a lap and by the time it came for the changeovers, many teams opted to switch to slicks as the re was a dry line just about everywhere. However, given that I'd never driven the track and the low temp, we decided to go with intermediate tyres for my stint.

The out lap was fine and there was a distinct dry line. I then started my first 'racing' lap of the ring and I arrived on the main straight nearly 4 minutes ahead of my target 15:39 - so it was into 5th and a slow drive back onto the GP circuit where I crossed the line at 15:36. A good start!

And then it started to rain again - not too much but enough to show me how unforgiving the 'Ring can be with numerous cars crashing as the conditions changed. It's such a long lap that some bits were still dry, whilst other were soaking - and it changed on every one of my 3 'sprint' laps as the rain clouds passed through. But I'm glad to say that I kept it on the circuit posting a best of 13:05 on my last lap - the biggest issue was the change in grip levels when the tarmac changed, which it frequently does. It doesn't sound quick, and it wasn't, but given the conditions and the added length of the GP circuit, I was happy.

When I started racing I had a number of circuits that I wanted to do: Monaco, Spa, Silverstone, Nurburgring and Suzuka - So I just need to get to Japan now!