Old Timer Grand Prix: (Nurburgring): 10 Aug 2012 07:00 - 12 Aug 2012 17:30

[retrognome]

Looking forward to reporting this three day event. It's taken me three years to establish the best vantage points around the long Nordschleife circuit and the combination of changing weather and scenery makes for terrific pictures.

[MartinH]

Hi there ; I will be there with the Cortina doing the U2TC type race on the Nordschleife, Friday, then the other pre66 touring car race Sat & Sun.

Yesterday I looked into the entry lists for the event on the AvD website & there are VERY FEW entries for most of the races !!!!!!!! Considering this is THE big historic event of the year in Germany, it's very dissapointing to see so few cars entered - less than 100 in total for all 3 N'schleife catagories & thin grids for Sat & Sun races.

There were many problems with the way the AvD wanted to use an online entry form that never worked, so they went back to a paper type, all be it very late on in the day, so this may have put people off.

I hope the meeting will still be a good event & look forward to meeting any tenthers that are around !!

[terence bower]

See you there,not sure what we'll be using yet though.

[kickstart]

We will be out in the Marathon with a Grantura so really looking forward to it.
It has taken several attempts with our Marcos to get it to survive the ring so we have fingers crossed for the TVR on it's first attempt
Entries certainly seem way down on a few years ago but this is a nasty recession and perhaps this is an event that many competitors are have to cut as it costs quite a tidy sum to run at this event

[Rudernst]

I posted this on Facebook first, but I thought You might want to know....

"ohh allmighty Gods of Rain, Fog and Thunderstorm, I am racing a powerful Eff One car at the Nurburgring next weekend, I have a fresh sset of rain tires for it, yees, but can You purleeeeese go somewhere else that weekend ? South of Spain for instance, very nice at this time of the year and you will really be appreciated there... deal ?"

I have entered

March 721 in GPM
Brabham BT2 in the Lurani, my first race in the thing
aaand we wrangled our way into the sports car race wit the Kieft

Rudolf

[Peter Mallett]

With the Gold Cup, Goodwood and Spa in fairly close order, coupled with the recession, I guess the entry levels are not surprising sadly. Good luck to you all.

[Rudernst]

The online entry form for the OGP was a loony idea,
I nearly apologised for it here in this forum on behalf of the German Historic Community.

Amazing that they would not listen at first when it was pointed out to them that entries would suffer from the online crap.
very high handed behaviour

And what good was the online entry system anyway when You had to still had to put a signed form and a copy of Your HTP into the post.

BTW: the online form worked, provided YOU NEVER EVER presses Return, just used the mouse, took me an hour though...

On the other hand, they manged to get the class structure and class allocation of the entry wrong for GPM who did not have to use the online form.....

I think that the OGP is run by some old hands who fail to grasp that the OGP was THE top event decades ago but times have changed and now it has to compete against other Historic events that just did not exist 20 years ago,
think Goodwood, LMC, Monaco
They dont realise that nowadays historic racers have a wide choice and need to be wooed to a certain extent

The Germans themselves seem to drift more towards exhibtion runs,regularity runs and suchlike, less and less outright racing

Anyway I am going, wheather promises to be ok.

And not all races are undersubscribed
- Lurani is oversubscribed
- Grand Prix Masters 18 entries seems average
- Sports car race, 44 entries seems ok
They turned my Kieft down first (wanted to get D-Type Jaguars and suchlike, dream on, 44 cars of that calibre) but in the end accepted it

I know why I commute to England to race....

Rudolf

[grantp]

Interesting comments Rudolf. It occured to me (again) last week that we are rather lucky in the UK for the number of race circuits that are still available even though many have been lost. Also Hill climb venues but I am aware that much more spectacular Hill Climb venues are used in parts of Europe.

I was talking to some people whilst 'oop north' at the weekend and the subject of travel to races came up a few times. There are not so many full time circuits in the north of the country as there are further south.

But living as I do in the middle of the country there is quite a wide choice. So I wondered just how far each of the circuits was frmm where I live. The AA route planner seemed a reasonable way to get some idea although I am fairly sure that some of the routes could have a few miles shaved off them.

Here's a list of all of the realistically vaguely usable circuits I can think of. I have added the distances (Miles) I would need to travel. Can anyone add any that I have missed?

 
Donington            2
Mallory Park        23
Rockingham          48
Silverstone         64
Oulton Park         73
Cadwell Park        80
Croft              136
Castle Combe       140
Snetterton         142
Brands Hatch       150
Thruxton           151
Llandow            166
Goodwood           173
Anglesey           174
Lydden Hill        195
Pembrey            205
Knockhill          322

How do other countries compare?

[MGDavid]

there's a very strong argument in favour of quality not quantity; how many of those circuits have an all-tarmac paddock with water and hook-up freely available to all?
How many more circuits per country does one need beyond Nordschleife, Spa, Zandvoort, Dijon, Monza?

[delta]

Well Im looking forward to all the free food.. And the beer, and the apple strudle.

[Mike Bell]

Originally Posted by delta

Well Im looking forward to all the free food.. And the beer, and the apple strudle.

What more is there to life.......

Grant- you need to get out more!

[Peter Mallett]

Merged into calendar thread.

[john ruston]

We were asked but its last weekend of Olympics!

Got to put things in order of priority.

[midgetman]

Originally Posted by MGDavid

there's a very strong argument in favour of quality not quantity; how many of those circuits have an all-tarmac paddock with water and hook-up freely available to all?
How many more circuits per country does one need beyond Nordschleife, Spa, Zandvoort, Dijon, Monza?

there has to be an entry level, a training element. It's thanks to the wide diversity of circuits that we in the UK can have e.g. MGCC events where you got your five signatures before heading to Europe. Without the wide choice of tracks the MGCC would find it harder to put on race meetings, they would be shouldered aside for the bigger events. Think of the way the MG Live date is never fixed until Bernie sorts himself out.

Most race tracks have got a kart track, they encourage the next generation of racers to keep the industry working. Local race tracks inspire local racers to start. The more the merrier!

Electric hookup? Pah, a few years ago you would have called it namby pamby. Buy a generator!