Renato travelled to the famous Nordschleife on a recent trip to Europe. Like most drivers he has grown up dreaming to one day drive the famous “Green Hell”, and has done many laps of both circuit variations on simulators such as Grand Prix Legend, Gran Turismo and Assetto Corsa.
With interest from European VLN and GT teams, Renato took a detour from Spa Franchorchamps to visit the famous Nordschleife and get some laps under his belt. The 2-Hour twilight “Touristfahren” sessions are open to the public and allow modified road cars to experience the “Bridge to Gantry” section of the Nordschleife. Renato went to the team at Ring Garage to supply him with a couple of cars to learn the layout. On the first day Renato used a VW Scirocco to complete 4 laps of the circuit (2 dry, 2 wet) and on only his third lap, in the wet, with two passengers, he broke the 10-minute barrier in the FWD. The following day he returned, and with the sun shining and no chance of rain, Renato stepped up to the BMW M3.
The following video was filmed by a couple of lucky Australian’s Renato met in his travels (at Spa Franchorchamps 2 days prior!). The video starts about 3km into the lap, as they’d been stuck behind a motorbike for about 1km. The rules for the “tourist” sessions are simple, overtaking can only be done on the left. The motorbike wasn’t looking in their mirrors so Renato couldn’t take any chances passing them. Regardless, the rest of the lap was pretty clear with only some minor delays in the last couple of sections with the Porsche GT3RS and the motorbike.
Despite the traffic delays, on only his 6th lap of the Nordschleife Renato clocked a staggering 8:34 in the BMW M3.