Budds BMW Driver's Ed at Mosport

[T Bone]

** This was the best spot for this thread....next year there will be E92 M3s so no problem next year **


Budds BMW held a driver's ed day for its M customers. It was a blast. I haven't driven Mosport in about 8 years and they have changed the track a little but for those that are race fans, Mosport is one of the top tracks in the world and one of the trickiest. Most corners are blind and many are off camber with alot of elevation changes.


It was well run and organized and an excellent instructor:student ratio. We spent the morning in the classroom and then did some basic handling / braking skills and then we played follow the leader for the rest of the day.>>

We had 2 M6 Cabs, 2 E60 M5s, 1 E46 M3 Cab, 1 E46 M3 Coupe with Dinan Supercharger, my M6 coupe and the instructor had an awesome E34 M5. We were not going that fast, so much so I didn't bother playing around with the air pressures. Brakes held up well as did the PS2s. The cars held up well and a testament to BMW M's religion on sticking to normally aspirated engines.... Throttle steering is AWESOME!

Fuel consumption was another story. We all had to fill up in the morning because the gas guy had to leave. We all ran out of gas before the day was done….I skipped some of the exercises and had just enough fuel to get a few laps at the end of the day – I had the track to myself!!!! (but my helmet cam was broken and didn’t record some hot laps)…. I got 30.0 l / 100 kms (or 7.8 mpg).

This wasn't about racing or even lapping fast. As you can imagine when you bring in a random group of customers, the skill levels will be quite different so the leash was pretty short.

Some of the rules..... We were not allowed to pass and we were restricted to 180 km / h on the back straight (although some of us violated that at the end of the day ). I will say towards the end of day when I was the only one on the track, I am amazed at how powerful the car pulled..... Back in the day with my 270 race car, it would struggle.....the V10 just feels amazing.

Here are some pics and a video. For those that will watch the video, please do not expect fender to fender racing.... It was a "Follow-the-Leader" exercise and it is also not indicative of how fast these M cars can go! It was a driver’s ed day and you can hear us backing off the throttle a few hundred meters into the backstraight.....Check out the video at the end of my fuel consumption


Link for the Vid:

[Epacy]

Thanks.