vintage Road Atlanta vid!!

[zracre]

thanks for sharing! I enjoyed the old course...1996 rolled the GTI there 5 times. What year did the runoffs end?

[Z3_GoCar]

Great video - back in a time that MR2's still roamed the earth. I swear I saw my car there!

BTW - on the subject of Greg's vids, this one is AMAZING!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_pgUUhIjAw
This is why we are into this racing thing. Maybe I'll blow off qualifying next race!
[/b]

I just watched that again, looks like a trip down the Ventura Freeway to me :P
The way some people drive on that freeway, you'd think they're driving for the best race that they'd ever ran. What's really eye opening is when they manuver like that in a Monster SUV. An Escape was pushing my friend in his Z8 around, so my friend let the Escape go.... Five miles down the road the Escape was on the road side, with a CHiP parked behind Nice to have radar

[Mark H]

Having never raced the old track that was an eye opening video!
Even the "hill" on the back straight??!! Did you even lift going down into the dip or just drag the brake hoping to scrub off enough to not hit the bridge?

+ I liked the "80's only" music timed nicely to the racing...good job mate!
Looked like RA was just a wide open, hold on, speed monster back then!?

[zracre]

I remember going down the hill flat in top gear and keeping it there really late and turning in pointed at the bridge...aim for the wall, fly over hill and just hope you are on line not wide and no one there!

[Greg Amy]

I remember going down the hill flat in top gear and keeping it there really late and turning in pointed at the bridge...aim for the wall, fly over hill and just hope you are on line not wide and no one there!
[/b]

Pretty much about it. Whereas today you're accelerating up to and through the bridge, back then you were braking into the apex of the bridge, with the apex basically being a berm/curb at the base of the right-hand bridge abutment...

Exciting stuff.

When I returned to RA for the first time in 2003, I did so with extreme trepidation. I REALLY, really enjoyed that track back then (it was my favorite one in the country), and I was expecting the worst when I learned of the changes. In hindsight, that trepidation was misplaced. Yeah, the exciting roller-coaster is gone, but I'm older and less immortal now; I don't mind it one bit... - GA

[Chris Wire]

My inaugural visit to RA was in 1994 w/ PCA.

After an initial walkaround on Friday eve I was stoked to tear it up on Saturday morning.

Modified 300+ hp '87 Mustang street car w/ big brakes and susp upgrades. Belts but no cage.

Anyway, after a checkout ride with one of their instructors and a discussion of my previous track experience, I was let loose for 2 sessions in the morning. Everything was fine with no hair-raising episodes, and I gradually worked up to going flat through the dip in 5th gear, which was good for 140 and change.

I thought I was just fine until I went to lunch with my bro-in-law and realized after we sat down that I couldn't even drink my soda. You see when I picked up my drink, my hand was shaking so badly that I couldn't get the straw in my mouth!

That track earned my respect that day, and I returned 2-3 more times to run it before Dr. Panoz ripped it up. I do miss the old config from a purely driver's standpoint. However, I think the new version is racier.