Europe 2019: Nurburgring

Europe 2019

Nurburgring

Nurburg, Germany

This one was a bucket list item for me. I like cars, and I like racing. The Nurburgring is one of the most iconic tracks on the planet, and they let you drive on it from time to time in whatever you want to lap it in. I didn't know a whole lot about how it worked, but here's what we did:

If you check the website, they have a schedule of how the track is being used. Occasionally they open it up for what they call "Tourist Laps", which just means public driving. I noticed that it was open from 5:30pm to 7:30pm on a Thursday when we were going to be in the area so I made sure we'd be there. You buy a ticket for a certain number of laps or a whole session and then just head to one of the places you can get on and wait.

The main Nurburgring area was much bigger than I expected. They have all sorts of things to see and do there...none of which was open when we showed up. It seemed like a really fun place to hang out but we just had some ice cream and waited until about 5:00 to head to the gate where you enter the track.

When we got to the staging area it started to get a little intimidating if I'm being honest. What we saw were a bunch of people who clearly do this all the time and know what they're doing with a bunch of cars that were clearly made for this. It was basically a bunch of weekend racers hanging around their Porsches, Lambos, and hot hatches checking tire pressures and setting up their GoPros while putting their helmets on. 

Not us! This is what we brought to the party - a rented Volkswagen Touran 1.6-liter loaded up with four people (one in a booster seat) and three weeks worth of luggage driven by a guy who doesn't know the track.

The part of the track we would be driving is called the Nordschleife (North Loop) and is about 21 kilometers long and eerily know as "The Green Hell" because of how wooded it is and how dangerous it can be. This is the track that nearly killed Nikki Lauda and has claimed over 200 lives. Our goal was to not make it 204 and to avoid joining the Bongard Club - named after the company that operates the flatbeds that have to come get you if you crash.

Below you will find links to two YouTube videos from our lap. It's two because our GoPro decided to split the video in half for some reason and we really don't know how to use it. 

I feel the need to preface the videos with a few comments. For what it's worth, I've done this stuff before...lot's of times and all over the world. I've done track events in and rented Lamborghini's, Ferrari's, Porsche's, Audi's, etc. I love driving fast and racing. We own some very fast cars now. That said, this was terrifying! Our Touran was easily the slowest car on the track. It was grossly underpowered for this, didn't have a clutch that could handle the hills or pace, lacked any real braking ability, and the tires were as tiny as they could put on it. It was a car built for economy and we weighed it down and tried to go fast. The results were comical as we hugged the right side (per the rules) and got our doors blown off by just about everyone. I wish you could hear our daughter a little better because her childlike honesty was hilarious.  

While we were waiting for 5:30 my wife kept asking me if I wanted to rent a car and guide for my lap or laps. There are companies there that will rent you everything from a Ford Fiesta ST to a Porsche 911 GT3. I thought about it hard, but I decided to go with our VW because I didn't want Branelle, Samantha, and Nana to miss out on the fun and have to just wait around on me. I'm guessing they wished I had gone with the 911 about mid lap. 


Anyway, for your amusement:

Nurburgring Lap Part 1

Nurburgring Lap Part 2

There is a lot more elevation change than it seems when watching the vids and we are going a lot faster than it looks. We got about as much out of our Touran as we could considering we had to drive through our rear view mirrors and stay out of everyone's way. If I ever go back, I'm renting something for sure!