I’ve been. It’s an ok course. Personally liked Dunnville better. After the BS the owners pulled in helping to get Dunnville shut down I doubt I’ll ever run there again.
:word:
I won’t run a track day @ TMP after they did that with Dunnville.
It’s an OK track, but :tif: facility.
Nevermind, forgot they had a hand in the Dunnville fiasco.
I agree^ but for $60 wed nights (pre reg required) , and I can shoot up in the afternoon to go have fun for a couple hours.
nelson is definitely a fast track. bumpy but a lot of fun. It is a easy track but I kept me entertained all day. usually I get bored about half way through.
hey guys,
i really really want to catch a track day before summer closes out. i can’t do thurs-sat because I work at night, but this would be my first time doing something like this…if you guys have a link i should check out before I go with newbie shit that’s cool…I used to autox a lot but don’t have the time.
anyways, if anyone figures out a day, i’m down to drive far even as long as it’s not super expensive to run - i assume it kills your brakes/tires which are a pretty penny on the M5 
- PM me and i’ll likely be down to go as long as I’m in town. i’m down to drive a few hours to go, too.
I may be in for this also. I ran one at Nelson on June 11th, wow so cool! We should get a list of interested parties available and push for a group discount. We camped at the track, that was fun and took away the pressure of getting up early…
I’m definitely going on the 11th, unless I get up and the weather is 100% chance of rain all day. Even then, ripping around in the rain might actually be pretty fun since you don’t have work assignments 90% of the day like at an autocross.
As for preparation, you’ll want new or nearly new brake pads all around (and probably something better than stock). Flush out the fluid with something like ATE super blue. Your M5 is a heavy car so brakes are the biggest concern. I’m going to take my car over to a buddies shop a few weeks before hand and have him throw it on the lift just to make sure nothing is loose or worn. Then just before I’ll give it another go over in the driveway at home.
I’m probably going to run a set of EBC yellows again since they held up so well at Dunnville on my high HP heavy pig of a car. Same car with stock pads was going for about 3 laps before severe fade set in.
Nelson is extremely easy on brakes, but I still would recommend taking the extra 5 minutes to put on track pads. There is absolutely nothing wrong with searching around your car specific forum and buying used pads either (Hawk Blue, Carbotech XP8, XP10 … XP16). One thing I’ve been doing a lot lately is running a thick stock pad on one side of the caliper and paper thin race pads on the other just to burn them up in practice *(your results may vary)
We recently tried Carbotech’s “LeMon” endurance compound RP2, 12.5 hours at Summit and 14 hours at BeaveRun and probably 1/4" or more left on them (26 hours = 13 track days). Not a lot of initial bite, which makes them forgiving for a new driver, and good with street tires (where as a Hawk Blue will flat spot tires if you sneeze while braking).
Yeah, forgot to mention that Dunnville is supposed to be one of the worst on brakes. Even still, I wouldn’t try Nelson on stock pads. It’s no fun when you have to do 5 minutes sessions because of brake fade.
dunville was a lot worse on brakes than nelson. Keep in mind my SHO is pretty slow but there was only 2 spots I had to brake hard and I would just tap the brakes into turn 1 to loosen up the rear end. If you want to run a course that will destroy your brakes try black hawk farms :ham: That gave my car one hell of a workout.
JayS is there any way to get brake ducks on your car? I know they make a huge improvements on the SHO. maybe they would benefit you as a temporary solution?
Did you mean you wouldn’t try Nelson on stock pads?
I’ve looked into it and it can be done, but for a car that 99% of the time I drive on the street it’s probably overkill. I was still braking strong after 20 minute sessions at Dunnville on the EBC yellows so that’s good enough for as little as the GTO sees track duty.
Yeah, thanks, fixed. I mean to say I would not recommend trying Nelson (or any track for that matter) in a heavy high horsepower car on stock pads. You need to put on fresh pads for a track day so spend the little extra to get a set of track duty pads.
I’ll also be bringing my stock pads and the tools to change them since I had to ride home from dunnville pretty much on the pad backing plate of the stock pads that were 1 day old before the track day. I really don’t expect that kind of wear at Nelson though.
So what happened with autodrone edenvale? Idea based on hopes and dreams?
Edenvale was all set to go, but then the property owner backed out of a long term lease deal. :tdown:
Thanks for the advice guys. As it stands I am 90 percent sure I can go. I will research and get new pads and I need new front tires as well. How much is admission for the track itself? Do I need to bring my own helmet or anything? My car is stock aside from intake/exhaust, is that okay for the track?
Brake pads, helmet and a healthy dose of common sense and you’re good to go.
What is your definition of “on the pad backing plate” , like 1/8" pad left?
Several years ago my first track day was one that I bought through an auction on the other WNY board that went belly up a while back. Bringing back some good memories here - I’ll keep watching this thread to see whether or not I can join you. I’ll just chime in that there’s room at Mosport big track on August 26 lapping day - $215 for the day sponsored and subsidized through Ontario Time Attack - time-attack.ca and I’ve posted it up in a thread in this forum. Usual price for a lapping day is around $325, so while it’s more $$ than some of you were looking at, it’s a good day at an outstanding track. ALMS is there this weekend.
Ill be at Mosport Monday & Tuesday with Genesee Valley BMW