This past weekend was a car guy's wet dream. On Saturday, we were given a close look at the 430 GT2 car (see http://www.imagehigh.com/gallery.php?id=18841/f430gt2meet for more pictures). The GT2 was really beautiful in the flesh. On Sunday, we re-assembled at Franco Valobra's shop at 9am in the morning for the high speed run in the beautiful backroads of Texas. To top it all, we got a police escort all the way with about 10 motorcycle cops clearing up traffic along the way. We stopped for nothing - red lights included. We legally jumped more red lights in 5 minutes than I ever did in my whole life up to that point. The Ferrari convoy consisted of about 31 Ferraris that included - 1 F50 - 2 CS' - 1 575 - 1 612 - 2 550s - 3 430s - 4 360s - 4 355s - 2 348s - 2 328s - 2 308s - 1 Mondial - 2 TRs - 1 512 TR There were more cars but those are what I can recall. But anyway a great mix of Ferraris from the last 20 years. We basically took over one lane of the freeway on the way out - We got exclusive right over the fast lane, the cops were in the middle lane and the peasants were either forced onto the side of the road or were made to take the slow lane. Till we hit the backroads, the speeds were pretty sedate and then the nice roads came, we got a pretty good spread of driving tarmac - high speed sweepers, tight corners, et al. For one stretch of the road, the cops moved over to the side and let us give free rein to all the horses. I was being expertly driven in a 348 spider belonging to a fellow fchatter LSU348 (thanks buddy) - I think we got to about 120mph as we were in the midst of a slowish pack. Up ahead people were hitting about 170 or so. Note: The aforementioned speeds are all fictitious - we never crossed the speed limit .. promise ... On the return run, I hitched a ride on a 355 Berlinetta and we got back on a slightly different route back to Houston. We followed this up with a group lunch at PF Changs. Fortunately for us,everyone behaved themselves and there were no incidents at all. Kudos to Franco for co-ordinating the whole thing and to LSU and Patsy for giving me rides today. I owe you one!! Here are the pics from the run: http://www.imagehigh.com/gallery.php?id=18841/Police_run
I got in just now on the first pics, thanks Sameer, for the great shots of the Art Car! I guess I should change that #55 now, I'll be #185 in this year's parade! #55 was a ridiculous number for the World's Fastest Art Car, although it runs cooler, towards the front! Thanks again.
Brother what a cool time, I esp. like the picture with the cars on the left pulled over & the two motorcycle cops blowing down that lane. That must have been a gas of a time. Congrats!
