Monza!
The track day ran Monday and Tuesday, which takes away all the pressure of a one-day event. I enjoy them far more that way, it takes the pressure off to get as many laps s possible in the one day and if I’m travelling this sort of distance, I want the journey to be worthwhile.
The drive to the circuit took almost two hours from where we were staying thanks to absolutely torrential rain.
Italian bureaucracy really is something to behold. Dave (the organiser) had driven down two months ago to meet the circuit team, agree how the day would be run, and set expectations. He arrived at 7am, but the promised tables for sign-on? Nowhere to be seen. The staff ended up crouched on the floor to complete the paperwork. Then there were the garage keys, not handed over until the man in the security office received an email from his boss confirming Dave could have them. That email took 90 minutes to appear. 
Sighting laps were completed in heavy rain, the car was aquaplaning in places. The circuit made the right call to red flag the day until things improved.
The track finally opened at 11:30 after we’d hung around chatting in the paddock for a while.
Matt and I went out to start learning the layout. I’ve been told often enough and seen it in the mirror myself, the R8 throws up an enormous rooster tail of spray.
People move aside to let me past, only to spend the next 30 seconds unable to see anything at all.
Lunch was set for 12:00–13:00, but Dave asked if they’d shorten it by 30 minutes since we’d already lost two hours. He said their reaction was as if he’d asked them to hand over their firstborn. How dare he even suggest such a thing! 😳 In the end, lunch stretched to 90 minutes anyway, though nobody seemed to know why.
The afternoon was spent lapping and tweaking lines.
Several corners are quite tricky, and Matt and I did our usual “try this, nope, that doesn’t work” routine.
I also had some superb laps against various 911s.
As the track dried, we fitted the P1s and enjoyed some quicker laps. The last half-hour brought drizzle again, but with the forecast dry for tomorrow, that was fine.
We left the R8 and trailer at the circuit, which made the drive back much quicker. Topped up the jerry cans on the way.
Pizza, beers, and a good evening of chat rounded off the day.
Day 2
Much drier today, and the circuit dried quickly. I took out Matt, Ant, Lou, and Rich, all of whom enjoyed their laps. After chasing a supercharged Atom, I came in and said to Matt the car felt down on power. He replied, “I’ve just been saying the same to Ant.”
We added octane booster to the fuel, cleared any ECU fault codes, and I headed back out. The engine was back to full power. Apparently, poor Italian fuel quality has also caused others similar niggles. The ECU’s had been reducing the power due to the poor fuel available.
Lunch was 12:00–13:00, leaving the whole afternoon free. I took plenty of passengers, including Luca, a local Italian chap we’d met the day before who’d popped along to watch. He climbed out of the car with a huge grin whilst watching Matt and fit some new pads. Braking from 157 to 44 at the end of the main straight then 25 seconds later from 147 to
I also went out solo for five laps while Matt wandered trackside to film some video. I’m now far more comfortable driving the car hard on track, and it feels like everything is coming together. Seeing Porsches pull away from me down the straights briefly rekindled that supercharger idea, but common sense quickly shut that down.
Some circuits just ecourage you to push on and this is definitely one of them, although being a fraction too soon on the accelerator, the rear stepping out lost speed down the following huge straight and it really did help focus the smoothness of power application.
Matt and I continued to tweak the rear wing angle, running as low as possible until the rear started sliding too much. 
By 5pm the track was red flagged. No-one seemed to know why there were no accidents and nothing obvious. Dave eventually discovered it was because “average noise levels were too high”. He was told that if we’d taken a 90-minute lunch, the average would be lower, so we could have run until 18:00. When he finally got the noise log, the average was 63dB. The contract allowed 70. In other words, the officials didn’t like being told lunch should only be the contractually agreed 60 minutes, so they went home early. 
Not the ideal end to the event, but it doesn’t take away from two fabulous days. The R8 got plenty of abuse, wore through a full set of brake pads in a day, but kept lapping without complaint.
We packed up, headed back for a relaxing evening, and reflected on what a great circuit Monza is.
