"While I was at LOG29..." the update thread

[slaughtr]

Originally Posted by MickOpalak

Speaking of LotusTalkers, here are some pix from out get together. Please try to identify as many as you can.

I need to start doing some pushups. It looks like I'm getting some man-boobs there.

[dasmoofler]

Nah, you were just excited.

[slaughtr]

Originally Posted by dasmoofler

Nah, you were just excited.

[MickOpalak]

The six days flew by so fast after spending 27 months planning everything. Let's see...

Really enjoyed Peter Egan's talk. Lots of good car related humor there.

Seeing 200 or so shiny Lotuses parked at Barber for the Concours. Where else are you going to see this?

Talladega was a lot more exciting than I expected. My wife was screaming through all of the banked corners. She said it was just like a roller coaster.

MCing the banquets was actually kinda fun, but chaotic at the same time.

Helping unload the Evora underneath the hotel while everyone was upstairs socializing felt cool. Seeing it in the flesh for the first time rocked.

The Barber Vintage Motorsport Museum. If you were there, you know how incredible it is. It still amazes me and I've been there dozens of times now.

Meeting a bunch of new LotusTalkers first hand. Hanging out in the hotel bar after the banquets were over was great as usual.

Lee's museum tour was great. He gave insight into each car in the collection.

Actually having the autocross go off without a hitch amazed me. I've never organized one before, but I had the help of a couple of pros, so we were lucky.

Watching the Paul Newman tribute. Not many people know that he piloted an X180R. What an incredible person.

Walking through the parking deck at night just to check out all of the shiny Lotuses parked there.

Giving Richard Parramint the autocross trophy for slowest time of the day was a hoot, especially if you know Richard.

Getting a tour of Mr. Barbers home from the man himself was incredible. Such a nice, hospitable guy. And an incredible house. Then driving back to the Wynfrey at 90 mph on side roads just to make it back in time for the banquet.

Running Barber in the Exige was exciting, almost scary. In the past I've done it in a Miata and an Elise, but this time the extra power made things happen very quickly.

First, getting to ride laps in a Caterham for the first time and then later getting to drive it have gotten me hooked. I want a Caterham before I die.

The long drive from Barber to Fontana Village (5 hours) in the dark with a group of car nuts. My kind of road trip.

Driving the Dragon at night with the windows down and the stereo blasting. So cool.

The beauty of the NC/TN mountains in the summer time, especially with friends who like to drive fun roads as fast as you do.

Clive giving me a signed poster of all of Lotus' F1 cars. Priceless.

Catching up with Rich and Randy and Shinoo and everyone was great. I wish I just had more free time to talk to folks.

One thing I don't remember is sleep. I can't recall a whole lot of sleep over those 6 days.

[MickOpalak]

It is only because of the work of one man that LOG 29 was a success. Mike Pearce was the one who made this happen. He pulled it all together. I was just a volunteer helper like the rest of the LOG 29 committe. Mike truly did everything. He ran all the meetings, created all the schedules, created all the budgets, revised all the schedules, revised all the budgets and sent approximately 650,000 emails over the last 27 months.

If you really enjoyed LOG 29, please take a moment and send an email to kitratom @ aol.com and let Mike know that you had fun.

He deserves it.

[MickOpalak]

1. Chris Beebee and Peter Egan
2. The view from the podium
3. The Evora introduction
4 & 5. Concours pix

[MickOpalak]

1. The cleanest Esprit restoration you'll ever see, and Best in Show
2. Evora
3. X180R
4. Lunch at the museum
5. The Exige TriFuel

[MickOpalak]

Lee Clark of the Barber Museum giving us a private tour of the collection and their workshop in the basement.

[MickOpalak]

1. Randy's Rossion
2. The paddock at Barber
3. Merc SL AMG Black Series
4. Shinoo and R-Soule (Rich Soule or RichS)
5. Jim Roberts and Mike Pearce (and some track dude)

[MickOpalak]

Random pix from the Barber track day.

[MickOpalak]

More random pix from the track day.

[Scott Bowman]

Mick, great shots inside the museum tour. And thanks to Mike for all his work organizing and planning the LOG. It was well worth the trip from Texas, especially for the Barber Motorsports Park track time and the museum. It would be worth a visit to Birmingham for the museum alone; combining everthing into the LOG schedule made it a very memorable trip!

[BruceB]

Didn't see too many track/autocross photos. I took a bunch. These are from the NASA event on Saturday.

[BruceB]

Autocross on Sunday.

[BruceB]

Track day on Monday

[Moto44]

This graphic gives those who didn't attend a better idea what makes the Barber course so exciting.

[Moto44]

Mick is appropriately humble about his role organizing LOG29. However, the poise, leadership, and last minute decision making he demonstrated orchestrating the actual event were first rate. There is no way we could ever thank you and the others involved enough for all you did to make this a superb event.

[RacyTracy]

Originally Posted by Moto44

Mick is appropriately humble about his role organizing LOG29. However, the poise, leadership, and last minute decision making he demonstrated orchestrating the actual event were first rate. There is no way we could ever thank you and the others involved enough for all you did to make this a superb event.

[spectre]

Originally Posted by MickOpalak

One more...

I guess I was caught looking at the camera and sipping a cocktail...

By the way SPECTRE is from the james bond movies and is the evil crime organization. So the Octopus ring and cat are key tells but Im much younger
The Spy Who Loved Me featured the Lotus Espirt.

[Dave111]

ok guys.
I just uploaded close to 200 pictures to Photobucket.







Here's the link to hundreds of photos.






I also have a few videos from the autocross and Barber track day. I still need to convert them to WMV to make the file sizes a little smaller.

~Dave