The track was not very crowded at all (heck, even 100 cars on a 13+ mile track is “not crowded”) – maybe 20 cars out there total. We could really focus on driving the track properly and I can guarantee that I am going back there at least several times in my life to drive it again. It is a great, great track.


(3) Hockenheimring – 5 June 2003

Hockenheimring is more of a spectator stadium configuration as you can see from the pictures below. It is about 100km outside of Frankfurt, but you can get there in about 30 minutes if you have a car that will take it.

In one word, it was a scarynightmare. I’ve had my share of on-track hours (I’m no racer but have had over 60 HOURS of high speed on track experience in the driver’s seat, and at least another 30-40 hours in the passenger seat) and this was downright scary. Anything goes – no helmets or safety check required. Cars passing 3 and 4 wide. We saw two of them nail each other on the very first lap (what happened to a warm up lap?). It was totally out of control, nuts. We went out for about 10 minutes and had enough – I wanted to return the rental car in one piece and come home uninjured. We came in and sat in the stands and watched from there, and then it was a lot more fun. Here is a video taken from “Sachs Curve” (AKA “Showoff Curve” as you will see in the video):

Driving fast on the autobahn (WMV format, about 11MB)


Now here are a few photos I took from the stands and walking around the paddock. It was very hot that day – over 90 deg. Farenheit.








(4) Summary

Overall, we had an awesome time overseas. I can’t wait to go back. We met 2 other Corvette owners – one from my C5Forum site and one from Z06Vette. We met the first one in Munich and had dinner with him and his wife, which was great. We met the second at Hockenheim where he had his Z06 (you can see it in the pictures) out on the track.

If you have any questions about Europe, the tracks, driving, etc. just let me know. It was a blast!

Cheers.