All roads lead to Brussels
After my mind bending ride round the Nurburgring the night before my mind was buzzing with things I’d like to do to Madge to make her performance a little less pedestian without compromising her touring versatility too much, so no racing seat and four point harness.
First off before I left England a chap in Portsmouth kindly offered me the opportunity to try the Elise S2 seat he has fitted to his NBFL, if I feel I can do a thousand miles a day in it and that my head will stay clear of the role bar in foreseeable circumstances I will get a similar seat for myself and have it fitted along with a roll bar.
With those to items take care of I can then run an upgraded Madge hillclimbs and sprints, so I’ll be looking at some adjustable shocks and suitable springs, ideally I’d like to keep Madges ride height standard for touring not sure if one can get shocks with adjustable height and stiffness so I’ll have to do some research when I get back.
Then if the ride in the Porsche showed me anything it was that supreme confidence really comes with supreme brakes, that really was the overiding wow faktor from yesterdays ride, it is one thing to go from zero to 280 kph in the blink of an eye but astonishing to be able to come to rest from that speed in the next blink of an eye.
Then finally while I am not in the market to go full Maduar with a Rocket Jagular V6 conversion, nor particularly keen on forced induction, I will be looking to give Madge a modest increase in torque by going the independent throttle body route.
With another 10k spent in my minds eye I detected a faint whiff of breakfast in the air.
As luck would have it the last full day of my holiday was a public holiday, celebrating the re unification of Germany. This meant the 'ring was open for touristenfarten all day.
Mindfull of the fact I really wanted to drive home at the end of the day I decided to stick to my self imposed 2 lap per day limit. I got to the circuit at nine amish when the track had aleady been open an hour and was surprised to find there were relatively few people taking advantage of an empty track.
My morning lap was probably the best I’d done yet, without much traffic passing I could focus on getting a smooth line and also be a lot less aggressive on the brakes, the whole lap seemed to flow which gave me plenty of reason to smile.
Sitting in the car park afterwards my thoughts turned toward getting some tuition on my next visit and maybe after Madges planned upgrades seeing if I could cover 22 laps of the circuit during a trackday, that would be a fabulous way to celebrate Juan Manuel Fangio’s famous 1957 German Grand Prix victory which he reckoned was his best and would turn out to be his last. Something to aim for in 2027 perhaps.
I spent the rest of the morning noodling round the roads that surround the track as I had done the day before. After an another afternoon nap I returned to the circuit for a final lap to find it temporarily closed due to an incident. I parked up for the duration next to a couple of MX-5’s from Bournemouth.
Eventually the circuit reopend and rather than join the immediate rush to get on the circuit I waited 15 mins for a bit of clear track, Not that the tactic did me much good since many of those who had gone out early went straight through the paddock to do a second lap so overtaking traffic was heavy.
Somewhere between Sabine Schmitz Curve and Hattzenbach I managed to blitz past a slow moving ND with a hefty looking wing on the back but most of the rest of the lap was spent giving way to faster traffic.
Back in the car park, see post 44 from Wardy 5 above, I put Madges roof back up as a light drizzle was making it’s presence felt. Before I left the ND I had over taken parked behind me, other than a quick nod of acknowledgement nothing was said. As I dropped my soft top cover in the boot I noticed a plaque in the ND to the effect it was a MX-5 GT3 #001. Something to look up when I get home.
When I arrived back at the hotel I took the opportunity to load up Madge again with tools and all the touring parafinalia, In the process I learned that my fire extinguisher works, I do not have it fitted in the car on track because I keep meaning to procure a quick release strap with which to secure it to it’s bracket.
Anyway while returning the extinguisher to the bracket in the dark I failed to notice the pin that stops accidental extinguisher emissions had dropped out so when I grabbed the handle to locate the extinguisher properly the was a short burst of foam was ejected into the cockpit ! Fortunately the foam was easy to wipe off.
Before I went to sleep I thought I’d set Waze up for the morning and promptly found out phone had been disconnected from the network. After a 150 call I managed to get the connection restored by using a different network, was on Deutsche Telekom, who I was sure was part of EE, and switched to O2 and bingo everything came back to life.
I finished loading Madge before breakfast and while eating it I realised I could very easily get used to having someone make it for me in future.
With Madges roof still being wet with dew I decided to leave it up for an hour or so until it was dried out properly. I said my goodbyes at Hotel am Ring while looking forward to a longer return visit.
At Ardenau I filled up with a last 40 litres of Aral 102, popped round the corner to the REWE to pick up traditional Gummi Baren for a friends kids in Bristol, who are now in there twenties and thirties, fresh orange juice, with bits, some sliced roast beef a couple of bread rolls, one last frikadella roll and a currant bun.
From Ardenau I retraced my steps towards Holland from just over a week earlier on my way in from Vaal. The picturesque route now being more down hill than up. The sun was shining when I got to Kerpen and joined Autobahn A4 headed west and I made a pitstop at Aachener Land Nord Services where I made a terrible cup of Roisbos using hot water from the coffee machine and foolishly added cream intended for coffee.
Luckily I had water and orange juice, with bits, to keep me hydrated. Before setting off again Deutsche Telekom kindly disconnected my phone again but fortunately I remembered the proceedure from the night before on how to select a different provider and while that was sorting itself out I headed into Holland.
I was hoping to avoid Brussels but somewhow I missed the turn off on to the A44 near Aachen so crossing the Meuse I found myself entering Belgium once again. The five or more lanes of Brussels ring road was not quite the nightmare it has been in the past on a Friday afternoon, may be it was the sunshine, maybe it was Madge or maybe it was the vibe from the Wally Lopez remix of David Guetta’s A Little More Love that I have enjoyed listening to for 20 years that was blasting out of Madges Road Angel Stereo or maybe it was the Germans travelling in an old A Classish Merc who kept waving and honking their horn each time we passed and repassed each other in the traffic which helped while away the time.
Photo courtesy Geoffrey Horton
Once out of Brussels I was on a busy E40 / A10, the sun was probably getting to me as it felt a bit like the M25 except the road was straight and flat. I stopped at the Jabbeke Services where for a brief moment I wondered what it must have been like in 1953 when local authorities closed this stretch of road and Jaguar bolted test driver Norman Dewis into this XK120 in which he recorded a two way average speed of 172 mph, a record for any production car, with much of the road lined with spectators without so much as a straw bale for protection.
Once on my way from Jabbeke I was soon entering France and with a couple of hours to spare I was checking in at the Le Shuttle terminal at Coquelles. Being very early I was allowed to check in for an earlier train at no extra cost.
It felt very strange talking only in English with a couple of motorcyclists from Portsmouth as we waited for the call to go through customs. The English boarder guard apologised for having to ask me how many people I had in the car, I saw the funny side and she passed my passport back so I could board the train and complete my 20th border crossing in 15 days.
On arrival in Folkestone, I drove to the local Sainsburys and from there to The Brickfield Cookhouse and Pub next to the Premier Inn for a smashing fish and chips, my first hot evening meal since the Chinese in Ruti six days earlier.
From there it was a relatively quiet 2 hour drive back to Junction 17 on the M25 and 5 mins later I was at the end of this 2500 mile chapter in Madges life.
Thanks for joining me, your likes and comments.
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The reduced economy doesn’t bother me, more the potential for unreliability - including rough running cold etc. And as mentioned the cost for a relatively small gain, as anything will need someting like an ME442 as well as the ITBs themselves plus maybe a less restrictive exhaust and cams etc etc. I think I’ve decided against ITBs for these reasons, but time will tell!
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