NorCal UFO Miata Performance Driving School
March 21-23, 2008
The 2008 Miata Performance Driving School hosted by the NorCal UFO club at Thunderhill Raceway Park on March
21-23 was a huge success for organizers Dennis and Peggy Hale, and a fantastic experience for the 20 BAMA members
who participated. The school draws entries from all over the West Coast, and no one goes away disappointed.
Friday started early for several club members who joined Kaitlyn for a spirited (what else?) backroads run from
Napa to Willows, CA, home of Thunderhill Raceway. Tech inspection at the track on Friday afternoon was followed
by a delicious fajita dinner and classroom discussions until 8:00 p.m.
Saturday morning, Miatas heading for the track before dawn were treated to a spectacular full moon settling
over snow-capped hills. Ten minutes later an equally-spectacular sunrise broke over the quiet Thunderhill paddock,
and soon after Miata engines roared to life as students practiced threshold braking and tail-out cornering on the
skidpad. After lunch they hit on the track, finally putting their car-handling skills to the test.
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Thunderhill Raceway has a mix of high-speed corners, long straightaways, elevation changes,
banked and off-camber curves, esses, and a pair of blind turns that crest a couple of hills. You can learn
where the track goes in a few laps, but learning the fast line takes a bit longer. To help with this, coned "gates"
were placed on the track to guide the cars along the proper course.
On Sunday all the gates were removed. Cone chicanes were left in place at the entrances to turns 1 and 8, where
high speed mistakes could be costly, but as the day wore on the chicanes all but disappeared as cones were
"rearranged" by hard-charging drivers looking for a little extra speed on the straights.
By the end of the weekend tires were worn, brakes were spongy, and Miatas were covered in bugs and dirt. Sally
Johnson picked up some infield grass with a spin in 7, and Mike Trott scared everyone in the paddock with a spin in
5 (a blind corner--we could see the cars flying out of 4 headed straight for him), but despite the spins
and off-course excursions, nobody broke down, no one hit anything, and everyone drove home happy.
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