Wrapping-up the first year of ownership

TL;DR Nürburgring part deux

February 24th marks the anniversary of the first year of ownership. Probably 500 hours spent driving, for a total just above 25 000 km. As far as I know, that's the Caterham 170 with the highest mileage and the most performant engine (to date).

The blog now contains 95 posts, that's 300 pages in print form.

To celebrate and make the most of a nice warm week-end, we went through all of the best places nearby : Northeastern part of the Belgian Ardenne on Saturday afternoon then the Vesdre valley and East Cantons down to Visé in the evening. On Sunday, the High Fens, Eifel area, Rursee then down to Nürburgring. That's again 500 km and 10 hours in the car over a single week-end. 

A good opportunity to get accustomed to the limited slip differential fitted two weeks prior. The Quaife ATB is a good match for the new ECU and stage 3 turbo, the setup is much more cohesive. Gone is the rodeo-like experience of the last month.

In a word : resolute - you have to try one and not beleive the naysayers.

As it seemed that some infrastructure was open for business at Nürburgring, we stopped for a quick visit. It was a nice surprise to see that Caterham Nürburgring was open on a Sunday. We had a nice chat with Kurt Hoffman, who was happy to see some life around the circuit with the end of Winter.

We visited the Ring Fanshop that was open too; I got a T-shirt.

On the way back home, superb roads but the setting sun made the experience uncomfortable. After that it got rather cold, it had been a while that I did'nt have had to don my driving gloves.