nice write-up Cassie.
my approach was more simple:
drive the snot out of the car and keep it on the track 
I was placed in Group 2 (Intermediate), should have been in 1 (Advanced) - my instructor tried to get them to move me during day 1 but the organizers were not allowing any run-group moves except to down-grade a few people from 2 to 3. GRR, oh well, ran into some trains even in the intermediate group (BMW CCA only does passes on the front, back and turn 3 to bowl unlike SCDA and PCA which also had on the uphill from the bowl and between 10 and 11). It was especially frustrating on the 2nd day in the rain…
I had a freaking blast in the rain, when everyone else was being timid I was enjoying a lower-grip environment to explore the limits of the car and find the places with marginal grip on the track that would also be lower adhesion in the dry. Aside from getting loose on my 2nd lap of the morning in a puddle on 12 (was given an early point-by, got inside, lets just say OMG SLIP ANGLE lol) and a few places where I was counter-steering because of 20-some-degree oversteer on throttle (up the hill after 3, out of the bowl) and a tiny bit of push entering the oval from 2b where the pavement changes, I had an uneventful if damp day.
Day 3, I’d finally gotten comfortable sliding the MPSC’s around, not a very progressive tire, those! Still, dancing on the edge of traction up the hill after 3 and sliding the car around for the first 4-5 laps til they got up to temp/pressure was fun!! The car is handling great, and I was having a fantastic time out there (solo’d again right away, BMW makes you do it every morning, which is fine, I don’t push it when it’s that cold anyway). I got out first my last run of the day, lol people were giving me point bys in the PRE GRID knowing I’d get by them shortly aftew anyway… Ran back into traffic after 3 really fun clean laps, really pushed it on the warm-up under yellow since I didn’t have to worry about anyone in front of me so I got the Cups up to temp right away (by the middle of lap 2 I was driving at near full speed). After I caught and made my way through the back of our run-group (mainly decent drivers there just much slower cars) I caught Luke in his dad’s Boxster who unfortunately was late getting out cuz of his instructor so he was JUST warming up and let me by right away, bummer, I was looking forward to playing … finally ran into about 6 cars, and a REALLY slow e36 M3 and a black STI with ~450whp on 255 r-comps running Hydra and meth injection caught up to me half a lap later. I decided to point him by on the uphill of 3 to have someone to follow and kept up just fine - it was AWESOME watching him spit 3-foot long flames at every shift
All told, a wonderful weekend, I’m tired and sore and it’s tough getting “back to reality” and working today but the car came home clean and I was super happy with how everything worked out!!
(thanks for posting the pics Cassie)