996AE

Anyone run with this outfit?

Any experience you can share?

SpeedFreaksUSA

I instruct with them fairly often. They had some issues when starting up as most organizations do- really cheap events tend to draw a younger and more aggressive crowd who generally put cars off track more often and require more sessions to be cut short due to red flags and tows. If you ask me this was mainly an issue of inexperienced drivers in fast cars thinking they belong in a more advanced group when they need much more seat time combined with a lack of policing by OnGrid when these people started causing issues. They received many complaints from customers as well as instructors but have really seemed to turn it around by cracking cracking down hard on anyone causing issues. New rules they are enforcing are:

-Spin or go 4 wheels off on the out lap and you're done for the rest of the session.
-Spin or go 4 wheels off 3 times in a day and you're done for the day.
-If a driver is getting complaints from others about a lack of awareness or etiquette in groups 3,4 or 5 (intermediate and advanced) they will be bumped down and not allowed to return to the higher group unless being checked off by an instructor.

So far it seems to be working well.

BFT3.2

Unrelated to OnGrid but last week in the Advanced group at a NASA event I saw a Vette spin all four off in the rain in first session(45 degrees out) and then a few LAPS later over-gas it through a river and pinball down the armco. I honestly can't say 100% if it was back on track later but I believe it was. No point here really aside from watch out for Vettes going the wrong way.

LuigiVampa

I fixed it for you.

gbuff

If that was last Friday at Mid-O I was out with the HPDE4 Advanced group all day long in the rain and there were all kinds of spinners out there, not just Vettes....MOF I was following a Mustang and a Pontiac and as we all exited the Keyhole the former spun one way and the latter spun the other, allowing yours truly in the Mini to bomb right between them like it owned the place

Kind of like the parting of the Red Sea, both literally and figuratively!

Anyway, this is the first I've heard of OnGrid--where do they run?

Gary

996AE

Westcoast tracks.

I am running with them this weekend at Buttonwillow.

Thanks for the comments.

996AE

Great day at Buttonwillow CW13 with my 1999 Ford Mustang Cobra. Fun day, great group.

85 degrees slight wind. Ran 2:07 consistently on Falken RT615K+ tires. I was the only car in Advance class on street tires. A few cars were running low 2:01- 2;02s something times. Advance class had some very good cars and drivers in it. Not a single incident on or off track in my group.

I did fry my Hawk HPS + brake pads but other than that great day. With the street rubber I didnt think the grip would out last the Hawk Plus (in 20 minutes sessions) but after 4-5 hot laps they were toast. When running C51 rubber I run Cobalt and they never fade. Still learning car and set up...

Ongrid was well organized, well managed and a lot of fun. They had 6 run groups. Full race car class with expert drivers, on down. Due to the large Novice turnout they wisely divided this large group into two. My guess is 100 cars total with the 6 groups.

Advance class open passing allowed track wide. Point by suggested but not required.

Only issue was they run a mandatory drivers meeting that is for first time track guys/gals and expert drivers alike. It is geared to the beginner so it is long and repetitive. In a perfect world two classes could be held. One for instructors and advanced classes and one for beginners and novices.

Overall great experience.

ard

Reviving an older thread. I recently ran the 3-mile course at Thunderhill with Ongrid. This was my first time with Ongrid, but not my first time to TH. I ran in the pink (High Intermediate) run group. I was motivated to run with them by the relatively low entry fee vs. what another org I have run with charges. Here are my observations and opinions.

Organizers

• the driver's meeting was held jointly for all run groups w/o breakouts although the beginner groups had a separate session thereafter
• it consisted mostly of talking about the blend line from the hot pits and briefly going over the flags
• a decent amount of floor time was turned over to TH staff who issued various warnings (dump fluid in the pits - $100 fine; need a tow from going off track - $100 fine) fair enough
• missing was any discussion about the track condition and the off track areas - it had started raining the morning of the event
• there were no run group leaders identified to whom issues could be brought up - I guess all issues were to be brought to the one guy who identified himself as Ongrid organizer (forgot his name)
• due to the generally chilly weather all day long I spent time in between sessions in the TH clubhouse and overheard the organizers talking. I found that their banter appeared to display little regard for drivers who had mishaps; Nothing truly offensive but the few comments I heard did not make me think highly of the organizers
• time management seemed unfair. In the 4th session (of 5) there was a red flag and the track closed for quite some time; instead of pro-rata adjusting the lost time across the remaining sessions, the run group who was supposed to have been on track lost their entire session and the run group who was supposed to be on track according to the original schedule, when reopened, got green flagged for its session. The other org I have run with pro-rates lost time across the remaining sessions for all run groups

Participants

• mostly civilized, with a few ****** sprinkled in
• I encountered one immediately after pulling in and attempting to park under a canopy to get out of the gusty rain - your garden variety Silicon Valley A$#hole in a blue M2 Competition with a super loud exhaust. He had taken the better part of the space b/w 2 pylons and refused to move. PITA to maneuver in and out.
• Most drivers had self-ranked correctly and driving and passing was mostly civilized until the last session of the day. A couple of buddies in beater Miatas, pretty decent drivers actually, went 10/10s, both spinning and going off track multiple times and just pulling back on track in front of traffic at speed w/o looking and spraying a ton of dirt on the track. None were black-flagged. WTH?

Overall

• personal preference but Ongrid ran the bypass for T5; I much prefer the cyclone. I knew that when signing up, so no complaining there
• Ongrid's pricing model seems to be to offer the bare bones at a very good price with lots of optional add-ons, and to be fair, no pressure to buy them. there's a virtual track walk, time trials, and driving slowly behind a dedicated camera car for some professional video footage. I call these out only because they were scheduled in between the regular sessions making for a very long day
• when considering the fully burdened cost (gas, food, insurance, entry fee, estimated consumables cost), the entry fee is not the dominant cost factor and particularly so when factoring in the actual and not the promised on-track time

Nowanker

Thanks for the critique! I was actually contemplating that event...
I'm always tempted to try out the lower priced groups while I'm sorting reliability issues.

OnGrid sounds somewhat like a 'watch out for your own ***' group, like the NASA HPDE 1-3 groups.
Can't handle lax driving standards. Too much time and effort put into the car for some clueless ***** total it out from under me.