This Sunday, I’m heading south of the border. Down in Ensenada I’ll be strapping myself into an off-road buggy on an adventure led by the Wide Open Baja crew. I played around with these machines a few years back when BFGoodrich invited Hooniverse to Baja to sample the then-new KO2 tire. Now I’m heading back because I’ve had these buggies on my mind ever since that trip. I believe this might just be the best driving experience event you’ll find.
Others exist, certainly. If you’re itching to rip off a few laps at a race track behind the wheel of a supercar, a number of outfits exist that allow you to do just that. Maybe you’re looking to learn how to drift? We can personally vouch for the quality of the Drift 101 driving school. There are stunt driving experiences, sports car drives, and a number of other events out there to satiate your desire to drive something different.
For me, Wide Open offers a chance to truly experience something a real competitor in Baja goes through. Well, a taste of it anyway. These are the same trails, and you’re driving a fully legal class of vehicle. You will never experience Le Mans and the Mulsanne Straight. You might get to the ‘Ring, but you won’t ever drive it at night. With a Wide Open buggy though, this is pretty damn close to the real thing… the dust is the same, the glory is what you make of it. (Yes, I’m likely to use a similar line in the video we shoot while down in Mexico)
If it were your money, which driving experience do you think ranks amongst the best out there?
Hooniverse Asks: What's the best "driving experience" out there?
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6 responses to “Hooniverse Asks: What's the best "driving experience" out there?”
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You may not be able to drive the Nürburgring Nordschleife at night, but you can drive it. For only 29€! If you ever find yourself in western Germany, I highly recommend taking the time to do so. It’ll be an experience you never forget.
Also, bonus points if you take your boss’ car while he is out of the country and only tell him afterwards.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/engineerd/shares/NXP1k0 -
You may not be able to drive the Nürburgring Nordschleife at night, but you can drive it. For only 29€! If you ever find yourself in western Germany, I highly recommend taking the time to do so. It’ll be an experience you never forget.
Also, bonus points if you take your boss’ car while he is out of the country and only tell him afterwards. -
I flew right-front seat in a blimp and the captain let me steer it a little when we were safely away from obstacles. Technically, that’s a flying experience, but the blimp was Goodyear’s.
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I had a chance to ride, not fly, in the Sanyo blimp in the early 2000s. I remember the pilot saying that there were more astronauts than licensed blimp pilots.
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The best for those of use who are not automotive journalists are the ones that are free! Somehow I answered the survey questions right at Petit LeMans or something and got an invite a few years ago to drive the then new Cadillac CTS-V at Road Atlanta. I jumped at the chance. Little did they know that I couldn’t even afford a base ATS, let alone a CTS-V. I was one of the few in the group under age 60. We did get a chance to go basically flat out around Road Atlanta with an instructor riding shotgun. I’m talking 120+mph down the back straight in the rain. The instructor kept telling me I was braking too early into turn 6, so on my next to last lap, I waited for him to tell me to brake. He waited to late. I put it in the gravel trap and had to finish my last lap slowly. Overall it was a blast.
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Porsche & AMG ran track days after the Bathurst 12 Hour this year. Not something you can do everyday, they don’t close the public road very often.
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