Saturday

Then it was time to introduce Euan to the new, temporary (the springs are the wrong colour), suspension. I think it was a decent lap, and not too slow. Definitely faster than last year anyway :)

In the car park I ran into Bren who had just smashed off a slider on the Brünnchen kerb. Bren stuck the remains of the slider back on with the help of some of my gaffa tape. Some more gaffa tape was used to tape a piece of wood onto his helmet to avoid it fogging up.

As Bren had never been in my 964 before we did a lap together. We came through the gates right after Christer and Jocke. Jocke was weaving to get some heat into the tyres, wheelied up Döttinger Hohe, and did a credible imitation of a kangaroo at the diversion at T-13. Somehow I managed to keep Christer in sight most of the way. I was about 8 seconds behind him at Breidscheid. Which was very satisfying, as usually I completely lose sight of him by the time we get to Fuchsröhre. After the Ringers dinner Christer told me that he wasn't going extremely slowly, which was very nice of him :-)

I'd never done a passenger lap with Niek before, but that was about to change. Until that plan too went out the window when Sir B. pulled up in the Silver Barge a.k.a. The Bus, asking me if I wanted a passenger lap. A delight as rare as that can't be turned down, even when it means missing a passenger lap with Niek in a hired BMW. Sir B. showed me some of the "local" lines (summary: turn in early and forget about the apex) while taking me round the Ring in comfort. The Barge squealed like a SquealMobile in most of the corners. In some of the bends it even squealed more! The best part of the lap came when Sir B. had parked the Barge on a slope, got out, saw it roll back, jumped back in and ripped the handbrake up only to have the drivers door smash closed whilst his legs were sticking out. Hilarious!

Fortunately I had gotten out before all this excitement. It almost necessitated a change of underwear though because I was having some trouble stopping laughing:-)

Sometime during the day Tijs called to say that Easter in the Air (the hot air Balloon flight) had to be cancelled due to the weather conditions. It would certainly be nice to be able to do that one another weekend.

There was still some time before the Stretch Limo was scheduled to arrive, and Tom kindly offered to take me round in his green M3. Which is a very nice car. It's almost too civilised to go Ringing in, while providing lots of feedback and turning in crisply at the same time. Nice, and quite a bit faster than the 328i it succeeded.

Time flies when you're having fun, so before I knew it it was time for the Stretch Limo. A quick dash to the Zur Burg, and there it was: a very white very long Mercedes. The body of an old S-class combined with the new nose and new rear end. It looked a bit silly, but that was nothing when compared to the inside...

There were tiger-print cushions, a mirror in the ceiling, interior lighting that changed colour from green to yellow to red and back again, and slightly tacky Mercedes-Benz logos embroidered on the seat backs. Christer broke the news to me that Jeppe, Søren, myself and anybody who showed up later were relegated to the second division: the 3 happy couples would make up the first load. This enabled me to grab my Audio Documentary Device and follow the Limo round the track whilst doing a commentary (serendipity again) and hoping that the Limo wouldn't be banned after a single lap.

The lap behind limo was the most fuel-efficient lap I've ever done. Nearly the entire lap was driven somewhat above idle in second and third gear. Once or twice I even managed to use fourth for a few seconds :) Søren was following me, and Christoph was following him. The cones that blocked off T-13 didn't deter the determined Limo-driver: Christer hopped out, moved a cone or two, and let the Limo through. I figured it might be a bit too much to do the same, so I took the diversion behind the armco, did a hard left at the end just before Bastard-Bend and reversed (hehehe) onto T-13 to wait for the Limo. TrRRish took some pictures of the Limo and its entourage:

My Audio Documentary Device somehow took some pictures too:

During the entire lap people kept passing us as we were doing about 90km/h top speed (on the approach to Schwedenkreuz; scary, that). Ex-Muhle was done with 40km/h on the speedo. It was very funny to see almost every Ringer present pass our little convoy, waving and honking their horns. The esteemed Limo passengers shared their experiences with the crowd by toasting them with champagne. The gantry was reached after about 23 minutes. At that point Søren decided to have a little fun and accelerated flat out. Of course I couldn't resist going after him at full bore :-)

Parking the 964, removing the Audio Documentary Device and walking back to the VIP parking slot caused me to miss the second lap. Yet again it was time for serendipity to hit, as someone had had the brilliant idea of inviting Sabine to come for a lap. Which she (and her partner Guido) did on lap three. My lap. As a result I got to practice my German some more. Quite a bit more actually, as first the driver got a dressing down for ignoring the T-13 diversion. This dressing down/discussion lasted long enough for the track to close in the meantime. Which wasn't entirely bad, as I had managed to secure a seat next to Sabine. With great enthusiasm she recounted her experience of doing a pillion ride on the Nordschleife with champion Jörg Müller. If you're ever in the Fuchsröhre, ask her about it. The short version: it was very fast, the footpegs snapped up leaving her without much in the way of support, and it was very fast :-)

After a wait of about 45 minutes in airconditioned comfort (airco operated by Søren) we could start our lap. Unfortunately Sabine and Guido had decided to leave by that time. This left Esther, Ben, Søren, myself, Birgit and Tony. Tony was wearing a race suit as a compliment to the driver, who was definitely faster on this lap than on lap 1.

Maybe that race suit infected our Limo driver: on Döttinger Hohe he was weaving to put some heat into the tyres :-)) This worked so well that he managed to overtake Keith in his 968CS at Pflanzgarten.

My mate Adri (who manages to get the back of a Golf diesel to step out in the wet) had arrived on his TDM by then, and I took him round for a lap too. Just before Metzgesfeld we overtook the Stretch Limo.

After the fantastic Limo Lap it was back to Sliders for a change of clothes and a quick shower. The evening's entertainment was another Ringers dinner featuring the Stretch Limo video laps. First up was the first Limo Lap, filmed from an anonymous blueish greenish dusty 964. The filming effort caused some hilarious commentating from the assembled Ringers, such as "he's having a look on the inside", "he's trying to psych him out" and "the Limo is really moving now" (when the limo managed to hit 40 km/h up Kesselchen).

The footage clearly showed some alcoholic salutes at Lovejoy Lane, and the toasting of various spectators (most notably at Breidscheid and Brünnchen) with champagne.

Next up was a video made by an anonymous biker nicknamed after a certain brand of battery bunny who rides a boik with lots of RRRR's in the name. He shot some nice footage from inside the limo, and topped it off with shots of the limo arriving back from its third lap.

Right before leaving I had a quick chat with Ulf about his borrowed GT2 and promised ThoRSten to be there when the track opened at 8.00...

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