That’s right folks, it’s that time of the year and I really lucked out this time by winning a track day raffle for a day at Mid Ohio Sports Car Course and School. I had a spot for Novice class at the track day school. I then proceeded to talk two of my good friends that always go to the track into taking off work and going with me.
They had been to Mid Ohio before and ran several times. I on the other hand had never even seen the track. I knew it was quite technical compared to Putnam Park but, the school that they put on for first time attendees receives nothing but excellent comments and reviews. Since I didn’t know what to expect I of course went straight to their website and then to good ole’ Youtube. I started my research and talked with a few other people who’d been there and was completely amped about going. A map of the track is below.
My nerves were on high alert and I couldn’t wait to see this historic race course. As we pulled in I noticed a bunch of large factory sponsored trailers, the track day just happened to be the day before the AMA Superbike Races started. Because of this we got the luxury of not only pitting on hot pit, but also we go to watch all the pros get setup in the garages and even see a few of them.
Once we got the bikes ready we went to the morning riders meeting where I found out there were only 6 people total in the Novice class. This was unheard of, normally there would be 20-30 people, Because of the small numbers we divided up into two groups and each group had a coach rider. My coach rider was a gentleman by the name of Dennis Myrwold. He took us through the basics and each session we practiced different aspects of riding the track. At lunch time he approached me and commented that my lines were looking good and lap times weren’t bad either. He asked about why I had blown a few turns, I gave him my answer, then he said you should step up to Intermediate. I was amazed, I had never been commented to by a Coach rider before let alone told I was good to step up my first time at a track.
Needless to say, I declined and stayed with him and the two other people he had under his group. By the end of the day I was dragging knee on the freshly painted curbs and passing people on bigger bikes on the back straight. My two friends and I were all packing the trailer and loading up the bikes when I saw Dennis walking down pit row. He came up to our trailer and once again talked to me about my riding ability stating that I would really benefit from stepping up and that I should definitely come back. My two friends were both standing there saying we told you that you’d have no problem with this track. I thanked Dennis for everything he had taught me that day and told him I’m sure I will be seeing him again later in the year. At this point I went straight to cloud nine, not only had I gotten to do a track day at Mid Ohio which I never thought I would get to, but I had been told by the instructor after my first time to the track that I should step up. I realize that I am no where near the fastest rider but it took a Coach rider telling me I should do something in order to get me to do it.
The moral of the story is even though my friends and my peers were encouraging me to do something I had to have a person with technical expertise in the field in order for me to listen. This is the case in a lot of areas, if you go to a car dealer and the salesman tells you the car has zero maintenance issues you may or may not believe them. On the other hand if there is a service person there and you ask them the same question, if you are like me you’ll take his expert opinion over a commissioned sales person.
This is why when you call EXAIR and have a question on a product or application you speak directly to an Application Engineer. We are not commissioned sales people and we are all experts in our field of efficient compressed air usage. We are going to be up front with our recommendations and also back our recommendations up with a 30 day guarantee along with a 5 year built to last warranty on all of our compressed air products.
P.S. The track day video footage is still being processed. I’m sure it will makes its way to our Facebook or Twitter feed.
Brian Farno
Application Engineer
BrianFarno@EXAIR.com
@EXAIR_BF