05/19/2026
Our fearless leader and our shop buddy headed up to in Colorado for Gary’s first event where he started their HPDE program at the beginning stages (HPDE1). After Day 1 and a session on Day 2 advancement to HPDE3 happened followed by a session in HPDE3 starting wheel to wheel exercises!!! Unfortunately after that second session of Day 2 things had to get cut short from running the last two sessions due to the GTI’s Timing Tensioner or something in the timing system which started making a horrible rattle under load on the cool down lap from that first HPDE3 session. No disappointments overall as the GTI had never been pushed to levels in which it seen over the two days!!! Especially after it getting quite a shake down the weekend before at Suika Circuit which it saw over 30 laps of stress testing in two days. Now time to get the car into the shop in the coming days and give it a total evaluation after making us proud that it went into season 6 which has been the most demanding one yet before cutting a day short because of something being to broken to risk chancing things! As of now looks like we will be trying to make it back up again in October for Gary’s continued efforts into getting certified for wheel to wheel racing at the national level!!!
Bonus coolness the Track Manager at Pueblo Motorsports Park is a VW guy himself and runs a MK4 GTI in Super Touring Class of wheel to wheel racing, also had his old MK1 Rabbit Race Car just chilling along side of the concessions stand!