Posted by Laura Keane on Sep 10, 2014
Laura Keane drives the Fast and Furious Nürburgring
Nicknamed ”Grüne Hölle”or “The Green Hell” by Jackie Stewart, sooner or later any serious car enthusiast will be drawn to the Nürburgring, Laura Keane remembers her first time Where to begin…We arrived in Frankfurt at a reasonable hour, feeling sorry for the folks driving over, but not regretting our mode of transport either. Asked where we were going when picking up the rental – it was enough for my friend and I to hold in the laughter while we ‘made up’ some direction. There are some serious roads on the way to Adenau, with crazy hairpins. We were so excited we didn’t even check in to our apartment beside Ex Muhle, and we headed straight to The Ring. Met another arrival and had a chat while we waited for the track to open after an accident. Wandered around the car park for a while, some serious metal parked up – a GT3 RS in green gleaming in the sun to mention but a few… At the end of your trip though you tend to get a bit blasé about all the supercar metal there. I had ‘The Fear’ something serious at this stage, to the point where I was thinking of packing it in. The following morning I bit the bullet and headed down to collect the fully track prepped Suzuki Swift. The guys at Rent4Ring are really nice, I would definitely recommend them. I had never driven LHD before, so I drove to Adenau and back so I could get the swing of it. Thankfully I had it in no time, it wasn’t as bad as I thought; getting used to the correct sides of the road was worse! So I went out for two passenger laps to get used to the track, I couldn’t get over the pace, it was unreal! Some of the Megane R26R’s were absolutely flat out. Then it was my turn, and serious fear set in. Pulled out of the car park and headed toward the first bridge with a bike overtaking me at about 100mph while doing a full on wheelie mid changing gears. After a short time I was flying it too. The little Swift can handle so well, and the Toyo 888s really help with traction. The brakes take awful abuse, as do the gears, but it was very forgiving and I would...
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