Its rare for people to take their supercars out on the track for some serious hot laps. If you ask most people, they would say, “why that’s what they are made for!” Tracks are extremely addicting and when you are going for that invisible trophy, the wear and tear to the car can start to add up. I use to be a track junky running every project car we did from the first 2002 Subaru WRX all the way up to racing the Targa Newfoundland in my Porsche 997.2 Turbo S. But as the years past and families began, getting out to a track day becomes harder and more costly. Unfortunately I never got to experience how good the McLaren 12C was on the track. Only a few Targa Trophy journeys helped me see the incredible engineering that goes into the McLaren handling. So when I was invited to do a track day at Inde Motorsports Ranch with the guys from Desert Street Cars of Tucson, I was down!
Inde Motorsports Ranch is located in southeast Arizona as an exclusive private road racing facility. Set up against the rolling desert hills, there is nothing out there to distract you. The event featured 55 cars including Nissan G-TR’s, a couple BMW M2’s, some domestic muscle, your popular Mitsubishi EVO and Subaru STI, and others. The event actually started at 5am for us to make the 3 hour trek down to Wilcox, Arizona via the I-10. With our new Agency Power springs and rear spoiler, the car was styling. We decided to leave our street wheels on which consisted of a set of Zito ZF01 Flow Forme with Pirelli PZero tires. Because this was a new track to myself and my co-driver, we thought we would take it easy and run in the Group 3 (fastest group is 1). After a couple of laps getting to know the track, we started to feel the vibe of how the McLaren 570S feels. With track mode on for both suspension and power, we pushed the McLaren harder and harder each session. The Pirelli PZeros held their own reaching tire temps of about 105F but never got to slippery. With temps in the 50F early morning and low 70F in the afternoon, the car felt amazing with our VR Tuned ECU Flash hitting 140mph down the main straight. Letting the McLaren transmission do its own thing, the back fires from the ArmyTrix race pipes sound insane when we dropped from 3rd to 2nd gear in the hard turns. Going down the start/finish straight, the fast shifting pop sound between 3rd and 4th must have impressed those watching!
Having driven the worlds most desired track, the Nurburgring, the Inde Motorsport Ranch track impressed me. It was well worth the drive instead of lapping something like Firebird Main or the dust and dirt of the East track. Inde has nice elevation changes to challenge the mind and car. The group and organization of the event was impeccable and we look forward to the next one!
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