How I became an E30 fanboy...

In many things I'm really something of a hack, sometimes cars could fall under this vague category.  In the last 10 years or so that I've been a mild track addict I've hit it, literally and figuratively, on two-wheels and four quite a lot.  In point of fact my first track experience was on two wheels and did not go well for me.  In the first lap of the first session of the first time I was ever on a track I had an off.  I bent the bike and, worse, I bent myself.  I was back at it a month later--shoulder still recovering from dislocation, broken ankle taped up tightly in my boot--on my patched up SV650S to prove that the track hadn't beaten me...that I wasn't going to let it beat me.

No, the track hadn't be beaten me but it bent me.  Hurt me.  Made me realize that, first, I'd not given it enough respect and, second, that while I loved going fast on the track maybe I was going about it all wrong, approaching it with the wrong weapon for me.  Maybe, just maybe, I'd be better off doubling the number of wheels under me.  Let me clear about one thing, though...this is not an invective rant about motorcycle track days.  In fact, for the remainder of this article that will be the last time I use the word motorcycle.

This is the longer form thought mongering about the track day at Thunderhill this last Friday now that I've had some time to relax, recover, analyze video, and think through some things about the day.

To start, I conned a friend into going along with me this time. In truth, not much conning had to be done.  I won't spent much time speaking toward his experience other than to say that since he had a car with some horsepower to it seemed he had a vastly more entertaining time out than he'd had the last time he was at Thunderhill.