GGR kicked-off April with the Easter drive on the 1st of the month. April 1 was also the Autocross School, followed by a test and tune event (both at Salinas Airport). For the 2nd weekend of the month the track team held a DE and Club Race at Thunderhill, this time on the East course. For the 3rd weekend, we teamed up with LPR and held a 2-day autocross at Crows Landing, our last at that site until the fall (too hot); we “Summer” at the Salinas Airport and Laguna Seca. To finish off the month we held our monthly Cars and Coffee Event!

May is just as busy and we’ve already had another Track day this time at Buttonwillow, an autocross in Salinas and drive event and it’s only the 10th of the month!

For once, I’m going to spend the rest of my column relating my experience at a non-PCA event I recently attended. I’ve heard a lot about “Luftgekuhlt” over the years, and this year I actually attended (because it was in the Bay Area as opposed to past events that were held in LA).

Luftgekuhlt 9 was held this year at Mare Island in Vallejo, a place I’d driven by many times (mostly on my way to Thunderhill) but never actually stopped to check it out. It’s one of those old military bases, now shut down to come back with various commercial enterprises like breweries and such (much like the Alameda Naval Air Station). It was an interesting and fun backdrop to 5-600 display cars.

Saturday was Luftgekuhlt (aircooled cars only) and Sunday was a new concept called Air | Water and focused on the more modern Watercooled cars, but it was a mix.

Cars were displayed both inside and outside. Street cars and race cars. I heard 10,000 attendees on Saturday and 7,600 on Sunday. I also ran into friends from Track as well as Autocrossers. Should you have the opportunity to attend, do so by all means! 

Hope to see you at a GGR event soon!

Ed Hunter

PCA-GGR President