A few nights ago, I mentioned I was overlooking the Las Vegas strip waiting to check in at Ron Fellows and I heard back from a few of you wanting to know what it was like.
When I booked to go 5 months ago, I wasn't counting on the Stanley Cup to be paraded by my hotel the night before my return still in disbelief that Vegas actually did win the cup this year after only being around for 6 seasons.
It's hard to know were to start this topic as the past two days have been a quick reminder that it's been too long since I was there the last time when all that was there was the big track and we ran the C5's on it 23 years ago before Ron got involved in 2004.
When you go to this class, you will try things out that you would mostly never try on your car unless you happen to have a wet skid pad on your property.
On day one after the classroom sessions they introduce you to the 1.5 mile track, get you testing the ABS system and perfecting accident avoidance, understanding
car control and fully understanding and trusting performance traction management, stabilitrak and all the driving safety features that are in the car.
You will be taken out onto the skid pad to test both steering the car over wet surfaces with full ABS applied and later get acquainted with what the systems in the car do to save you where you will test them both on and off on a skid pad putting the car into a full spin on purpose then recovering with the systems engaged. Again, not something your likely to do with your car!
After your three exercise warm up your back to class to learn about the importance of visual scanning and the 8 steps to cornering. Braking, turn in, balance and the proper unwind for example helped me shave 8 seconds a lap off my lap time on day two. It took one lap with the instructor to understand how hard they wanted me braking from 112 mph near the end of the straight and how to do a better job trail braking while resisting the temptation to get back on the gas before clipping the apex. They want you to really push hard between corners hitting all the right spots on the track to carry way more speed and set yourself up properly for the next braking zone. The majority of people will never even try what they want you to do here on the first day. You won't be in "D", you'll be using the paddle shifters here, where there's a full review of the PDR and your given an SD card that's installed in your car with the track
overlay installed. You will be given a laptop later sit with one of the instructors who looks at your line, how hard you braked, when, where and how you let off, when you were on the throttle and how much you applied when coming out of each corner to ensure your balance and unwinding was proper to approach the next tricky corner which was downhill, uphill or beyond the dip in the road where you need to let of the throttle for a split second to stay smooth before you shift into 5th.
After each track session your laps times are recorded by the instructors who use them to determine which group you will be put with on day two. There's 18 in each class and they want to keep you in a grouping with drivers of similar performance. The blue group is the fastest, green group is the middle and the red group is for those that had the slowest times. They want everyone to feel comfortable and each group does all of the same six exercises on day two including launch control, a timed autocross where you also get three timed practice runs, and three timed track sessions. There is three classroom sessions where all the car modes are reviewed, early vs late apex is discussed garage talk and a video of how to drive the track to get the best lap times.
The instructors are looking for improvement. How much better are you on day two, compared to when you arrived.? There's a timed autocross competition where you find out how you did during graduation and after your final track session they ask you how you did and want to see everyone's lap time to compare progress.
There is a lot packed into two days over just 16 hours and all your time in the car is recorded for review while there and for you to review later as well.
It's intense but it gives you a sense of what these cars are capable of and no matter how hard your think your driving your car, they will show you how to get way more out of it.
One driver from the red group dropped out of the afternoon lapping session on the final day who was uncomfortable and couldn't keep up. I didn't hear what he said over the radio as I was in another group as each group has a different channel for your instructor to speak to you. Only 3 cars per instructor on the race track.
Registration for the Z06 school is now open as well with two having been completed so far. The Z06's run about 3 seconds a lap faster than we were able to run in the Z51 stingrays.
If you go to the stingray school, you can return for the Z06 school as well which I plan on doing next year. Perhaps we can get a group of us going if we can get our damn cars?
There is approximately 200 Corvettes at the school, 17 are Z06's. All fully loaded 3LT coupes with Z51, magnetic ride control and front lift. The tires last about six days. Oil is changed every 1,000 miles, DCT filters are changed every 2000 miles and transmission fluid every 4000 miles. The cars are kept now until 10,000 miles and are all cycled out each year.
This is the car I drove while there with my class mates all around me. If any of you have any questions feel free to ask.
When I booked to go 5 months ago, I wasn't counting on the Stanley Cup to be paraded by my hotel the night before my return still in disbelief that Vegas actually did win the cup this year after only being around for 6 seasons.
It's hard to know were to start this topic as the past two days have been a quick reminder that it's been too long since I was there the last time when all that was there was the big track and we ran the C5's on it 23 years ago before Ron got involved in 2004.
When you go to this class, you will try things out that you would mostly never try on your car unless you happen to have a wet skid pad on your property.
On day one after the classroom sessions they introduce you to the 1.5 mile track, get you testing the ABS system and perfecting accident avoidance, understanding
car control and fully understanding and trusting performance traction management, stabilitrak and all the driving safety features that are in the car.
You will be taken out onto the skid pad to test both steering the car over wet surfaces with full ABS applied and later get acquainted with what the systems in the car do to save you where you will test them both on and off on a skid pad putting the car into a full spin on purpose then recovering with the systems engaged. Again, not something your likely to do with your car!
After your three exercise warm up your back to class to learn about the importance of visual scanning and the 8 steps to cornering. Braking, turn in, balance and the proper unwind for example helped me shave 8 seconds a lap off my lap time on day two. It took one lap with the instructor to understand how hard they wanted me braking from 112 mph near the end of the straight and how to do a better job trail braking while resisting the temptation to get back on the gas before clipping the apex. They want you to really push hard between corners hitting all the right spots on the track to carry way more speed and set yourself up properly for the next braking zone. The majority of people will never even try what they want you to do here on the first day. You won't be in "D", you'll be using the paddle shifters here, where there's a full review of the PDR and your given an SD card that's installed in your car with the track
overlay installed. You will be given a laptop later sit with one of the instructors who looks at your line, how hard you braked, when, where and how you let off, when you were on the throttle and how much you applied when coming out of each corner to ensure your balance and unwinding was proper to approach the next tricky corner which was downhill, uphill or beyond the dip in the road where you need to let of the throttle for a split second to stay smooth before you shift into 5th.
After each track session your laps times are recorded by the instructors who use them to determine which group you will be put with on day two. There's 18 in each class and they want to keep you in a grouping with drivers of similar performance. The blue group is the fastest, green group is the middle and the red group is for those that had the slowest times. They want everyone to feel comfortable and each group does all of the same six exercises on day two including launch control, a timed autocross where you also get three timed practice runs, and three timed track sessions. There is three classroom sessions where all the car modes are reviewed, early vs late apex is discussed garage talk and a video of how to drive the track to get the best lap times.
The instructors are looking for improvement. How much better are you on day two, compared to when you arrived.? There's a timed autocross competition where you find out how you did during graduation and after your final track session they ask you how you did and want to see everyone's lap time to compare progress.
There is a lot packed into two days over just 16 hours and all your time in the car is recorded for review while there and for you to review later as well.
It's intense but it gives you a sense of what these cars are capable of and no matter how hard your think your driving your car, they will show you how to get way more out of it.
One driver from the red group dropped out of the afternoon lapping session on the final day who was uncomfortable and couldn't keep up. I didn't hear what he said over the radio as I was in another group as each group has a different channel for your instructor to speak to you. Only 3 cars per instructor on the race track.
Registration for the Z06 school is now open as well with two having been completed so far. The Z06's run about 3 seconds a lap faster than we were able to run in the Z51 stingrays.
If you go to the stingray school, you can return for the Z06 school as well which I plan on doing next year. Perhaps we can get a group of us going if we can get our damn cars?
There is approximately 200 Corvettes at the school, 17 are Z06's. All fully loaded 3LT coupes with Z51, magnetic ride control and front lift. The tires last about six days. Oil is changed every 1,000 miles, DCT filters are changed every 2000 miles and transmission fluid every 4000 miles. The cars are kept now until 10,000 miles and are all cycled out each year.
This is the car I drove while there with my class mates all around me. If any of you have any questions feel free to ask.
Last edited:
