Ring Trip Report 13-16th October 2007

Loads of pics (85 odd) – 56k, go make a cuppa…

Bit of a read, but I hope you enjoy – having read Stu’s, Chip’s and others Ring Trip reports I thought I’d get off my arse and do one so grab a cuppa (you’ll prob need a few if you read all of this ) and some biccies and read on….

I kept a record of money spent and fuel used as well, so those of you thinking of going may like to see what this place actually costs!!!!

This is my 3rd trip to the Ring, the first 2 being the last 2 Easter trips with loads of you guys on here. Can’t wait for Easter 2008 for more of the same!

This time round though my rapid but troublesome Cossie was left at home (having run over a dear, broken 1 turbo, split a boost hose and oil hose and snapped the inlet camshaft all on the 1st trip I really shouldn’t have used the damn thing a second time!) and the new toy, my Evo 8 260 was brought into service. I was hoping for a hassle free trip this time…

Saturday 13th October 2007

2:30am Woke up, having got to bed at midnight . Showered, cuppa & toast
3:30 am Hit the road at 3:30am, car already fuelled up and packed.
3:45am Got 5 miles out of town and my friend and co driver for the trip, Phill (Phill2400 off here) felt sick having been rough for the last 12 hours or so. We stop at a local Petrol station.
I fill the Jerry can with 20 litres of Super (£20 spent) while Phill leaves his stomach behind

5:45 Stop at Clacket Lane Services, 144 miles in and put £37.81 / 35.70L of Super in the tank. 18.3mpg running at a steady 100 with a few puke stops for Phill

6:30am Arrive Dover, another petrol top up: 64 miles, £17.44/ 16.16L 17.8mpg. Do the Customs thing, grab a tea and biscuits at the Ferryport



7:30 Jump on the Ferry, obligatory slow as fook driving over the massive ramps, followed by ragging up the slope / tunnel to the upper decks, everyone hears me coming and runs for cover. We’re on a MINT Norfolk Line ferry, crossing takes 75 mins, cheapest crossings at around £68 return, car plus 2 People. Enjoy a very nice full English while Phill eats 2 cornflakes and continues to feel rough as! Both meals for £13

Land in Dunkirk, head off up the Autoroute to meet Gareth (Silverfox999 off here) who has come over on the Tunnel as he’s a rich git! Find him loitering in a layby, take some pics and then hit the road at a steady 85.



12:45pm Cross into Belgium, fill up with more fuel. 182 miles, £35.50/ 33L 25 mpg

14:35 Arrived at the Ring, checked into our hotel (known by loads of us on here as Edgar’s), it’s called Gasthaus Muhlenhardt in Herschbroich, and is really close to Adenau and the Ring itself, and just a 5 minute climb up the hill to the main Ring entrance. Said hello to the security guard that would be looking after my car for the few days we were there. Bearing in mind she tried biting the owner’s son when he took a photo of my car I was quietly confident any baddies would be suitably munched if needs be.

The hotel:



The village behind the car is where our hotel can be found:



View from the hotel to the castle:



The security:



Went down to Adenau to meet the rest of the gang who were staying at Hotel An Der Nordschleife.



We’ve got JJ off here with his very smart 2wd Saph (380-400 bhp). Chip was riding shotgun:



Gareth in his E36 M3 (321bhp)



Anthony in his AMG Merc (was 507bhp, now with a wee tickle to the supercharger is nearer 580 bhp)




Ian and his minty mint M5 (300 ish bhp)



Beemer 335i (forgotten the lads name already )



Andy and his Skyline R33 GTR (340 odd bhp)



Rich’s BMW M3 (343bhp) No pic, but looks like every other one!





Had a Sausage and Chips snack at the restaurant beside the Adenau Ring entrance, cost £3.30



Popped back to the hotel and swapped my 19” BBS wheels for the 17” Mak wheels complete with sticky Toyo R888 rubber, showered and headed back down to Adenau to the Schnell Restaurant for a few beers, a thick Steak, chips and ice cream, all for £14.70

20:30 Hit the sack as it had been a long day, Ring opens at 8 and I want to get out there as soon as possible!

Sunday 14th October 2007

7:30 Wakey wakey. Munch continental brekkie – boiled eggs, rolls with ham and cheese. Head off to the petrol station for more go go gas. 110 miles, £24.53/ 23.85L 21mpg

9:19 Hit the Ring, do one lap “Sighting” and trying to remember some of the 100s of corners. See 1 car crash and another on a tow truck.

We have two 25 laps passes from Sketch and Andy R, one card has 5 laps, 1 has 8 laps. We decide to get using them and do 2 more laps. On lap 3 we pass Andy in his Skyline.

We do another lap following JJ this time around filming him and generally titting around behind him. He’s driving hard and the back of his car is twitching around as much as his ass probably is! Makes me realise how far technology has moved on as the ride in the Evo is far easier for me, not nearly as much as a handful as a powerful 2wd Saph can be !

6 laps and 85miles on the Ring later and I’m low on fuel, fill up again. 85 miles, £43.21/ 42L 9.2mpg

We see Sabine filling up the M5 Ring Taxi




Head out for another lap and the boost hose blows off the throttle body, easily fixed by pushing it back on and wedging it in place with a water bottle. Pull off at the half way point at Adenau, drive to Edgar’s and refit new hose clip.

Drive back to Adenau and buy a 1 and half lap pass, allowing me back on the Ring at the half way point. 29 Euros or £21.32. Belt round the Ring to the start finish straight, and go straight on to the next lap.

Change camcorder battery; grab a bite to eat at the Ring restaurant. Chicken nuggets, chips and coke for £7

Back on the Ring and two much faster laps.

6 laps later and fuel is running out again…92 miles, £50.74 / 49L 8.5mpg

Phill takes over the piloting duties and does a lap with me, then takes Gareth/ Silverfox999, and then Chip for laps:



We then head back to the hotel, shower and change ready for food and drinks



Some on track photos, hoping to find some more of us on the various Ring Photo websites:




The main group’s hotel in the background:

JJ overtaking a Golf GTi:




20:00 We’re off to Sabine’s place – Pistenklause. We hop in a taxi, cost £12.50 for the short taxi ride . The place is full but our table is ready – 9 of us pile in for the best steaks I’ve eaten. They basically bring out a mega hot rock with a BIG lump of Fillet steak on it, and you cut it up and cook it yourself to your taste. I reckon I had Rare, Medium and Well done in one meal. We get served by a fit waitress and some bloke who looks like a younger version of Quentin Wilson – Ring regulars will know who I mean!



The food:


We take some stupid Group shots for posterity:



JJ:


Chip, Phill and myself – not sure what’s wrong with Chip… Caption contest anyone?


Cost for the meal, including Bruchetta starter and a few beers comes to 35 Euros / £25.73

JJ runs us home in the Taxi (hate Saphs being known as that, but now I see why!)

22:30 JJ and crowd head to the hotel to watch the Rugby. We hit the sack as we’re lightweights and can’t be arsed to watch lots of men running around.

Monday 15th October

10:00 Pick Chip up from his hotel. Ring doesn’t open till 1pm so we head off to the Off-road track for an hour of fun fun fun bombing around a massive quarry in Suzuki SJ jeeps

2 jeeps for 1 hour costs 70 Euros, £51.47

We set off with Chip driving and me passengering, and Phill2400 driving the other jeep. I’ve never done proper offroading and am AMAZED at what the jeep will drive over . Chip literally drives up and over anything in front of us, including humps, hills, water and drops. I spend the first 20 mins crying with laughter as we bash our way through the terrain. I took a few pics:







One of Chip’s pics, me trying to roll the damn thing:


Then near the end Chip gets his Digital SLR out to take some proper photos, and I drive over a hump / mound faster and faster to get some action shots of the front wheels in the air. Last run and I try going a little faster:



“Yee haaaaaa, up, up and away, Houston we have a problem etc etc”



To say the landing hurt was an understatement. I cut my elbow, nutted the wheel and my shades were half off my face! You can see in the pics of the landing, I’m not even visible as I’m wedged down in the foot well! As I roll away from the landing something doesn’t feel right:




I’d broken the axle, cracked the diff housing, punctured a tyre and flat spotted two wheels. The exhaust was blowing a lot too. Feeling rather stupid and sheepish we drove back to the office and showed the guy working there the damage . He actually seemed fine, but we offered to pay for the damage (as we knew the jump idea was stupid in hindsight). He asked for 150 Euros, £110 which we think is lucky given the damage. He did have a garage full of spare parts, but we could tell they had not seen damage like that before.

12:00 We arrive at the Ring, meet the rest of the gang and grab a drink while waiting for the Ring to open. 500ml Coke for 3 Euros / £2.20



I take Chip for a run, and swing on to the track and pull over in the highly naughty “camera hook up zone”. Camcorders and filming on the Ring is forbidden, but everyone seems to do it. Anyway, we get busted by a Marshall in an unmarked car who goes slightly mad! We leg it down the track to Adenau and swing off there to ditch the Camcorder in case they confiscate it at the end of the lap. They can ban people for the day if found filming, so we don’t want the risk.

We head back to the Ring, collect Phill and head for the Motorsport Hotel for lunch. Fried potato, bacon bits, onion and two fried eggs on the top, glass of coke for me and Phill and Steak and chips for Chip comes to £30.88.



Get back to the Ring and its shut due to another accident. A Bike comes off on the back of truck totally trashed. Sobering site …

I take some car park piccies – look at the hard wear parked up here, nothing Chavvy, all fast petrol head motors :




























We do another lap or 3, starting to lose track!

17:00 Time is getting on, we need to leave Adenau for Brussels with the gang so we head back to the hotel, pack bags and swap from the track wheels back to the tart wheels

18:30 We head down to Adenau to meet the gang, but they’re not at the hotel so we leg it to the local fuel station for more fuel 42 miles, £13.22 / 13.23L 14.4mpg

The same station sells Super 98 at 99.9p per litre, and even has 100 Ron at 107.2p per litre, handy to know…

We set off on the route to Brussels where we are due to stay the night to break up the journey. We head through a couple of tunnels so it’s window down and foot down ! 50 miles in trying to catch up with Chip and the gang we find out they’re actually behind us.

We crack on with the journey as its really good going – the German Autobahns are often only 2 lanes, but the lane discipline is so much better, everyone stays to the inside unless actually overtaking. Trucks are also banned from overtaking during peak hours which keeps the outside lane free for me and so we press on at 100mph. We decide to pass on the night in Brussels as the journey is going so well.

21:30 225 miles in and fuel is low, so we fill up again. £48.67/ 46.42L 22mpg

22:30 Make it to Dunkirk and head into town to McDonalds for a snack. 2 meals and drink come to £9.92

23:00 Head to Norfolk Line office and change ferry from 12 noon crossing to 12 midnight. No charge. Join queue on dockside – 40 cars and a few trucks. It’s going to be a quiet crossing. We get on board and I get my head down, it’s been a long day and we have another 5 hours to go before we’re home .

3:00 Nearly home, fill up with fuel at Andover. 183 miles £44.65 / 41L 20mpg

4:00 Make it back home. Refill tank to the top. 72 miles £17.33 / 17.35L 18.9mpg

4:30 Hit the sack, trashed but happy with another good Ring trip lodged in my memory .

Now for the stats!

Total journey mileage of 1287 miles. Total fuel used 317.7 litres, at a cost of £333.10

Trip average MPG was 17.51, best was 25mpg (at 85mph cruise) worst was 8.5mpg on the Ring .

Additional costs that need to be born in mind (and based on £1 = Euro1.36)

Ferry £34 (total for 2 people £68)
Hotel £20.58 per person per night (£41.16 total)
Food £60 (Breakfast part of hotel bill, we also took some coke, pasties and pork pies etc with us)
RAC Euro Cover £28.35
Insurance Green card £17
Offroader hire £25.70 each jeep
Offroader repair £110.30
Taxi £6.25 each
Ring laps £140 (plus the car did a few extra laps kindly supplied by Chip and Phill)
1.5 £21.30
4 £47.05
8 £91.17
15 £161.76
Year card £658

My total spend on the 3 day trip including laps, repairs, fuel etc etc: £699.40

Some pics of what I spent most of the time doing during the trip:













I’d like to thank Phill for helping split the costs (he got the ferry, taxi and various lap passes and even chipped in on the SJ repairs even though he didn’t do the damage) and Chip for being his usual funny self .

Also JJ and Gareth and the rest of the gang for being a great company, had a top time .

And the car of the trip for me was my own Evo 8 260 – for not letting me down (bar a jubilee clip), and probably lapping Ring as quick as my old 460 bhp Cossie did :






Comfy fast and reliable, if only Ford made a decent equivalent.

Roll on Easter 2008

Anyone still reading?

Si

 

Awesome report

I really must learn to stop pulling stupid faces when people point a camera at me though

 

I bet I can win the caption competion though, but it will only be funny to people who have eaten at sabines:


I just put pepper on the stone........

 

ACE write up SI! glad you all had a great time

Wheels and plate look s-m-a-r-t!!!!

 

seems like a good trip

 

Cool read I really wanna take my car next year




Love this too! Is it painted, or stickered do you know...?

 

Goood post! Infact is Sabine single?

 

good read

 

Wow just read the whole lot sounds and looks like you had a great time cant wait to get out there

 

Superb Si! Glad it went well

 

simply stunning report

i think stu@msd will take his hat off to this one

thanks for your time for the thread "must have took a while" and pics

flawless..IMHO

 

I gave up reading after the 4X4 Wright up Still pmsl
And pics of your Evo look stunning Love the plate and them 19's

Ps all going well my Mother inlaws place is SOLD so should be moving into the B&B nr you by Christmas once there all settled in we will be down ever now and then so will have to meet up and have a ride in your Evo if the offer is still open

 

craking write up, very informative and handy.

Your evo is one of the nicest i've seen.

 

Excellent write up and brilliant range of pics

Looked like a great trip

 

Nice write up there fella - Looks and sounds like you had a great time. As much fun as the 'ring is, it's just as much fun getting / being there.
I can't wait to go back as I've a few free laps in a caterham promised to me from the owner of the ringhaus hotel near the main entrance.

 

the first "report" i have read on PF


much much appreciate the costs too, as 650-700 seems a damm site cheaper than the 1000 bills i've seen


really really hoping to do this next year, though not sure when.


great result for reliablility too

 

ive never been before but after reading that i really want to go there now

 

Crackin read mate

 

It loooked painted to me.

properly hardcore to buy a csl and do that to it!

 

Good write up mate....

The EVO looks tasty on the wheels - are they genuine BBS?

Also, no beerage on the bill - disgrace!

 

pmg hommer simpson

 

nice write up

cost of a weekend is surprisingly high when you tot it all up you can have a 2 week holiday for that much when you think about it

 

What a top write up Si! You should be truly proud of yourself for this one!

I will forward a link to the lads so they can see it.

(Lad in 335i was paul by the way!)

Unlike Chip, you managed to get soime snaps of my little cossie as well!

JJ

 

sib your car looks awesome on those rims as does the other with black rims

 

Well in my defence, in terms of deciding where to be to take pictures, I was somewhat at the mercy of whoever I could beg a lift off of, and most of them didnt want to be parked in front a garage watching you piss about with your wastegate etc, next time try spending more than an hour at the ring (5 laps should do it with your driving )

 

Still cross with you for not putting the pics of the car that I know you took during our journey to the ring!

And as for the rest of it - stop being a total cunt. Not remotely amused.

JJ

 

All joking aside, I only got one picture of your car Im afraid as obviously on the way over there I was sat in it so could only take pictures of others, and on the way back I was in Ant's and then realised my camera was in yours, so still didnt get to do it then either

Then when it was out at the ring, I didnt realise how briefly it was there for so simply didnt get round to it as I didnt know there was a rush.

Honestly wasnt intentional!

Have you got the full lap video of it that me and Si took yet, THAT is the momento worth having, it looked awesome

 

JjCoDeX75 did the ticket work?

 

Yes, it had 4 laps on IIRC

 

Good point

As chip said, it had 4 laps left on it. Top stuff. Could you contact your bro and ask him how much dosh he would like for them

Cheers matey

JJ

 

Havent seen it yet, but fear it may be a little slow as far as laps go.

JJ

 

JjCoDeX75 will talk about it at the weekend with him.

 

It was entertaining to watch from in the evo camera car, it was squirming around etc, cant imagine it was your best lap ever, but it certainly wasnt "slow" IMHO

 

Great write up Si - and that Mitsi looked awesome out there (even if that boost controller subtly tucked away betrayed the fact that the mitsi was running a _little_ more than 260bhp!).

Incidentally, I reckon those extra set of wheels and tyres pay for themselves almost immediately - my SL seems to have munched its front tyres in about 20 laps which adds an extra £400 to my bill. I guess that's my fault for trying to throw a 2 ton car round like a go kart.

Thanks to everyone who went, I had a fantastic time and I can't wait to go back.

JJ - are you going to tell everyone how we nearly made a Carerra GT crash or are we going to keep that one secret ?!

 

Hello mate

Thanks for the passenger laps and ride home, much appreciated

 

Brilliant write-up, but I hate you, as I'm not going again until next year and you have made me miss the place even more .

Some video footage of the white Skyline being harassed by a certain PB loon in an MX5 :

http://bridgetogantry.com/index.php?...d=105&Itemid=1

 

I saw the MX5 there if its a blue one with "B2G" stickers on it.

Was putting in some serious miles!
He just kept going out again and again and again!

 

That's the one - Dale Lomas from BTG / Performance Bikes .

 

Great write up

Any video clips ?????

Steve.

 

costs werent as bad as i thought they would be!

I NEED to get out there at some point

Si your plate is a belter

I think a newer type Evo is the ultimate ring trip car