My lack of posting probably went completely unnoticed, but for anyone that did the reason that I wasn't around is because I was at the Nurburgring for the very first time!
It was a proper trackday organised by Bookatrack as part of their 10th year anniversary rather than a normal tourist day, and I'm very glad I chose to do it that way for my first time. Started the day off with a walkround from Ron at RSR, then a couple of sighting laps and then it was full open pit from 10am to 5pm so plenty of seat time along with plenty of cooldown time, which was needed with ambient temps hitting 30deg, track temps at least 8deg above that and me in my racesuit probably a fair bit hotter still! Thoroughly enjoyed the day despite the heat though, and the Zed was perfectly behaved. Well, almost perfectly as I did get a very long pedal at Breidscheid and had to let the brakes cool down but they were fine after that (interestingly they were fine in the afternoon when it was hotter and I was pushing more, never really did get to the bottom of that but I suspect the OEM rear discs gave up compared to the PF fronts I'm running).
After making the effort to get BaT to bring my R888 shod Rays with them I then forgot to check that the locking wheelnut key was on the car, and so I had to drive on the PS2s instead. Luckily they had plenty of tread left and it was only the heat that made them a bit slippery when pushing on, but it would have been much worse on anything less than the Michelins. Neither myself nor the car were particularly quick but then that wasn't the aim, but considering that my car was the heaviest there by some margin (I reckon by at least 200kg, not including the X5 that did a token lap first thing) I felt no shame given that most cars were either Elises, Caterhams, GT3s or F430s along with the occasional 458 and an LMGT2-spec F430! I also came home in one piece without a single track incident, which was more than could be said for the sad owners of an S2K (write off) and 997.2 GT3 (heavy rear damage), so I consider that to be very successful overall. I did have a great play with a boggo S1 Elise which I was delighted to be able to be even stevens with round the Ring.
Quickest time I managed to get was a 9:38 BTG which I'm happy with given it was my first time, the weight of the car and on road rubber along with having to move over for just about everything else! Also topped the car out at 140mph on the main straight, it simply wouldn't go any faster than that and the slight incline just after the bridge saw the speed drop 5mph with my foot flat on the floor.
Very average vid time!
Not sure I'd go again given the cost (I could do four UK days for the cost of that trip) and also that the day was just about perfect, and I think that any future trip would be an anti-climax. Unless I take the racecar MR2 there when it's finished, of course...