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Bucket list stuff today. Porsche Driving experience in LA.
Skid pads, wet track, high speed straights with a banked carousel, amazing road course. Driving the new 911's, still wired with bit of motion sickness!!
stopped in there a couple of weeks ago just to see what it was all about. Pricing seems very reasonable for a 90 minute session with a pro and lots of choices of cars.
Anyone in the LA area should check it out. Very cool!!
was out there over xmas.
had a great time driving, as it's pretty much 90 minutes of wheel time.
my instructor was also great, speaking as little or as much as the conversation dictated. i'm not sure if they are from porsche or contract, but they set a really good vibe.
everything outside of the driving was subpar.
and the dining, that situation i don't understand at all.
didnt make reservations. arrived and inquired at the desk, was told to check opentables on my cellphone...say what?
was annoyed at this, so decided to do the cafe in back.
75% of the menu is unavailable, they just havent updated the offerings yet.
that left me picking between cookies, some salad, and sodas.
i suppose the dining/food isn't why most of us end up at the pec, so it's moot.
mission accomplished on porsche's side...will be putting in my c2s order
Thanks for sharing your experiences, and pics! I plan on driving up in a few months, I only live 1.5 hours away. Figure I'll give them a little time to work the kinks out.
Back in November I posted about my Porsche Experience Center LA experience over on planet-9 - here's what I wrote:
Last Friday I too did the "Master the Manual" course at the new Carson (LA) Experience Center. What an amazing time!
They have the following "modules" -
Handling Circuit - small track with some fun technical sections. They did a great job using the available space for this, IMO.
Skid pad - wet low-friction circular surface. Fun to learn how to hold a drift at 15 mph.
Low friction dry surface - small, twisty polished concrete road section that lets you get the tail out as you swing around.
"Ice hill" - wet low-friction steep downhill with a low-friction turn at the bottom. My least favorite module - couldn't really feel what this was supposed to be teaching.
High-speed straight - what a hoot! Start from a small cul-de-sac (so either rolling or from a stand-still), down a long straight, with a replica of the Nürburgring carousel at the end - major bank and major traction let you pull some incredible g's around it!
Kick plate - another wet low-friction section, this one with a kicker that bumps your car's tail a random direction, and you get to try to recover.
There are a couple off-road modules I didn't get to experience, but they looked like they'd be fun in the right vehicle, too.
I have a similar reaction to Morbo - I'm surprised how amazing the GT4 felt in comparison to the 911.2 S. The power in the 911 was crazy - I sure didn't notice the turbo-lag - but the sound & feel of the GT4 make for such a more intense and and visceral experience.
There is a small "showroom" with various cars. They have a full restaurant upstairs - reservations recommended - and a pretty meager cafe downstairs. There's a gift shop, of course. They have a design center for "Porsche Exclusive" and a couple simulators, but I didn't get a chance to check those out.
I visited PELA on the Friday before Christmas. Here are my thoughts on the facility and experience. Please note that I'm a little jaded. Having driven Porsche's since the mid '70s, and completed most "Porsche bucket list" items already, my perspective may be quite different to that of someone with less Porsche or track experience. I would not discourage anyone from visiting this wonderful new facility.
On a scale of 1-10 (my personal scale) I’d rate the PELA overall a 7. For someone who has never driven a car on a track, it probably rates higher. The facility is first class and only opened the week before we were there. They had just hosted the dealer training for the new Panamera introduction and there were quite a few examples waiting to be shipped somewhere else. In the main foyer there is a nice display of Porsche models:
The new 911RSR with mid mounted engine
A 917K in Gulf Oil colors
A LMP1 race car from Lemans (i think it may have only been a show car and had no drivetrain)
The original 959 Gruppe B show car that came before the 959s were produced,
A current 918 Spyder
A current 718 Spyder (new Boxster)
A Formula 1 Porsche raced by Dan Gurney
and a few others.
The site is also the new HQ for Porsche Motorsport US, and as such had a few cars under construction for the upcoming season and a few former race cars undergoing restoration. There were a couple 962s and the RS Spyder raced by the Penske Team and the 959 that drove the Dakar Rally.
There is a nice Porsche Accessories and swag shop with a large selection of overpriced items. Same as at a dealer, just a larger inventory.
There is a snack bar and a glitzy restaurant that is only available by reservation. The funny thing is, the staff at reception cannot book a reservation for the restaurant that is on the second floor. You must go online to a booking service to make a reservation. Even I know that’s dumb. I felt sorry for the receptionists because even they knew this was a stupid way to run a business, but they couldn’t help a customer who walks in and wants to book a table for later in the same day. Lucky for us, we didn’t want to eat until AFTER the track session, and we could do it someplace else.
We each had a 30 min session on a race car simulator that was programmed for every street or race Car Porsche ever made, and just about every major track you could think of. I opted for a 911 GT3 RS and Road America that I know very well. My only complaint with this or any simulator that costs less than 7 figures is that you get very little physical feed back regard deceleration. You can see that you are slowing down, you just can’t feel it. There a few points at RA were you don’t need to brake, just lift off the gas and let the engine braking slow you a bit. You could not feel this on the simulator. They provide a suggested path for you to follow on the track that’s supposed to be the ideal racing line. There were a few places that had it wrong and if you actually drove that line on the track, you’d be in big trouble. Cost $50 Rating 8
We each had a 90 minute session in a car with an instructor. We had booked 911S’s, and they came equipped with the PDK semiautomatic gearboxes for their own protection. Otherwise they’d be changing clutches every couple of days. I outlined to my instructor what my experience level was both in a 911 and on the track. The track consists of 3 major areas, 1) a winding handling track that mimics several significant corners from tracks around the world. There are probably 12-15 turns in a track thats less than 2 miles in length, 2) slippery surfaces to simulate driving or skating on ice while handling the rear weight bias and pendulum effect of a rear engined car, 3) a long straight for demonstrating the Launch Control capability of the car from a dead stop - top speed at the end about 125mph. I’ll cover each separately.
Handling circuit - first the instructor drives the course pointing out to you the braking points, apexes, and the proper line to take. He uses visual references for these, a change in track color, a sprinkler head, a cone in the distance, even a foot tall weed. Now he has been around this track several hundred times and he knows where the track goes and has these reference points burned into his memory. You’ve never seen this place before and have no idea what comes next. Here’s a hint, place markers track side that the student can see. Make them the same for each corner. A red marker for the braking point, a stripped marker for the apex, and a green green for the corner exit point where you can get back on the gas. This course winds back on itself and one minute he is on you for not looking for cross traffic and the next he’s on you because you’ve slowed to look around the end of a concrete barrier.
Slippery Surfaces - there were three wet surfaces. The first is a downhill straight that is painted with epoxy paint that in combination with water makes this as slippery as anything you will EVER drive on. You’re tasked with slowly, and I mean SLOWLY, driving down the slope and making a RH turn near the bottom. After a few tries, you’re asked to blip the gas to intentionally get the rear end loose and use the gas and pendulum effect to steer the car where you want it to go. Now the instructor is from Southern California and has probably never driving in snow or ice. I told him that in the midwest you don’t drive you Porsche in the winter for fear of some idiot plowing into you, and if it was this slick, you’d find another route or stay home. The second surface was flat, but epoxy coated like the first. You coast thru two cones at 20mph, and a portion of the surface would raise up and send the backend either right or left. It was totally random. Your task is the recover from the skid and then drive around two plastic fences that pop up making it sort of a slalom from one fence to the other. The final surface was a polished concrete circle without the epoxy. It was slippery but not like the first two. It is constantly wetted with sprinklers. The idea is to drive around slowly in the middle and blip the throttle to kick the rear end out. Now hold your drift by using the steering wheel and light blipping the throttle. Its easier said than done. The instructor keeps telling you to get back on the enter of the circle. “Look for the concrete seam and just follow it around.” Here’s and idea, why not paint the seam white so a person can actually see it?” On an overcast day, the crack/seam between the concrete lanes is just about invisible. Just a sea of wet gray.
Acceleration Exercise - They have about a mile long straight with a banked loop at the end. From one end you launch and accelerate. It’s pretty simple. Select Sport+ Mode, hold the brake, floor the accelerator, the ECU brings the engine to the appropriate speed (about 5000 rpm), and release the brake. The engine and transmission computers balance clutch slip, tire slip and shift points. Just hang on as the car accelerates thru the gears running each to redline. It’s a bit like launching off an aircraft carrier. One second you’re still and the next you’re hammering as hard as the car can go. I only did this once in my last 911 and once in my Panamera. I just can’t see putting the components thru all that stress, but they say it’s not a problem (until it’s your problem). Of all the things we did my brother thought this was the best. It took no skill other than steering straight ahead.
Nice review Fred. Did you try the drifting course? I can't recall if it has a different proper name. It is behind the downhill right handed water run if I recall.
Nice review Fred. Did you try the drifting course? I can't recall if it has a different proper name. It is behind the downhill right handed water run if I recall.
Are you referring to the large skidpad? If so, yes I was on it. It was the area where I couldn't see the slight groove or seam that ran in a circle a few car widths from the circle's center. PAINT THE SEAM WHITE so you can see that tiny groove on a gray overcast day!
Are you referring to the large skidpad? If so, yes I was on it. It was the area where I couldn't see the slight groove or seam that ran in a circle a few car widths from the circle's center. PAINT THE SEAM WHITE so you can see that tiny groove on a gray overcast day!
No I'm referring to the "low friction handling course" which is a 4th slippery area. It's a small track with alternating L/R corners which are angled, great to learn how to carry drift and shift weight around, albeit it was a bit difficult at the beginning with a 4S.
Before going out to the cars, my instructor pointed out the areas we would be using on a scale model of the facility. There was one area, a short squiggly closed course that we would not be using because it was not ready or not in service. This is probably what you are referring to. It's just as well that we skipped it as it gave me more time on the driving course.
WTH are those mountains in the background of the CA pics? Those are NOT there! This place is located between the freeway and a former dump :-) Ok there are mountains but they are 50 miles to the north.
01-05-2017, 02:10 PM
Porsche Experience Center LA
