The trip to Germany Part II

(Day 5)

ore cars, ore speed, ore tuners and Power!

The Nürburgring From Hartge the race was on: First to der Nürburgring. I happened to drive together with one of the Danish M5 participants in his 2001 M5. Following us were two journalists from the Danish car magazine V-Max in a 520d. With 137 HP it's a tough competitor to the 400 HP M5 and 338 HP M3... So we fueled up at a gas station when I saw a big patch of cans which looked like beer, which I as a Swede thought was perfectly natural to buy in Germany since it is better and cheaper... until he started pouring it into the M5 before he filled up... Hmm, after a closer inspection I noticed it was this: Aha, octane booster. OK, a couple of cans in the tank. Intersting, but at the same time, almost cheating. Also, we promised to take it easy on the 'Ring so the journalist could keep up with us. But we instigated each other all the time and went full thottle most of the time. But we all gathered at the 'Ring later on. Look, an enemy: The RS4! Oh, and the 520d to the right also! Turned out that AC-Schnitzer was trying out their M3 E46. No engine tuning though. But I was passed quite fast on the 'Ring so they seemed to tune the suspension and aerodynamics right and they seem to drive a lot better than me on the 'Ring too. Oh my, what has happened here? It's no wonder that accalaimed car magazine Evo says this in their May 2001 issue test of RS4 vs. M3: "It might feel like driving with a pair of heavy boots and a thick pair of gloves..." Here is the fate of the Audi A8 also equipped with Audi's quattro system: So the King of the Ring is in fact the BMW M5 which is the Renntaxi which is usually booked half a year in advance. But it'll gurantee you that you will lap the Ring under 9 minutes as a passenger! It can have up to four passengers. The driver is Sabine Reck is a professional racecar driver. She is pictured below, enjoy :) Here she is in action: Thanks to Thanks to Fanprojekt Nürburgring for the pics of the ringtaxi in action! We stayed at a hotel near Wesel and had a good-bye breakfast and security check for all of our cars by Kellener Sport. The service included some new tyres, new clutches, new stabiliser bar mounts, among other things. The end of a clutch to the right :) THE END!

Linguistics Editor: Angus McComb