Due to circumstances beyond my control on the morning of Driving School/track day my MINI decided not to work.
Quickly I had to decide on what to do. Cancel, spectate, share a car, or participate in a stock car or rental car.
I waited a year for this opportunity so I didn't want to cancel and I felt I should attend. For car control clinic you can share a car but for the track it doesn't really work as you'd be on the track only half as much. So that only leaves using a rental or spare stock car unless you belong to a dual modded MINI family.

So I grabbed my helmet and a few extras and dumped them in my 95' Nissan Maxima SE with 108,000 miles and original stock everything. Mechanically it's been kept up and is very reliable. I had a bit worn (36,000 miles) 215/60-15 Michelin MXV4 plus tires and a newly cleaned K&N drop in filter but sadly regular 87 octane gas Premium is great in the maxima. Oh well.

I usually think of my maxima as being pretty good when it was new but over time the suspension has softened a great deal although the engine is plenty powerful at 190 HP and 205 ft lbs. of torque and the weight is good at about 2300 pounds. Compared to my MCS with H-sport springs I feel like I am floating along in my Maxima so I leave it for the kids or use it as backup when my MINI is in the shop or getting more upgrades!:P

So we get out on the track and my instructor who has Solo 1, Solo 2 and wheel to wheel experience and drives a Porsche 911 starts going around the track easily catching up to the instructor driving the MINI in front of us.
Later in the day in another session he was trailing one of the most modded MCS (19% pulley, Alta intake with hose, full Milltek header/exhaust, full H-sport springs/control arms and Centerline RPM 17 wheels with Bridgestone S-03 215/40 tires) in our area with a student driver. In a flash we caught up and passed the MINI. The whole time the car seems to move effortlessly using all of the track. Not much noise from the tires. Pretty neat.

Anyway having a stock car is all about learning how to maintain the balance of the car, focusing on improving driving skill and being smoother each session. That learned skill is transfered back to any car driven. I think there is plenty to be learned in a stock car or modded MINI. It might be a bit more fun in a MINI. There is always next time.

Several of the instructors told me that it was a good thing to drive a stock car for driving school. You have to be more precise and the performance envelope is not as broad but there is plenty to do and the experience can be worth the cost of the school.

I'm glad I didn't cancel. I would have missed out on some good fun and alot of learning.

 

Actually, isn't that what I've been telling all of you all this time? Master your car in its stock form and then slowly modify it. Master that and then make more changes.

As I have said before. The new cars are so good that they are the ones taking credit for the performance. If you take an older car with less technology, you really have to work it to get the same performance. Case in point was your Maxima and the instructor behind the wheel. Now that was skill! Was your instructor Lindsey or Ron?

 

Yeah minihune!! I'm glad you didn't let your non-working MINI stand in the way of improving your driving skills. Wasn't it an awesome experience?!?

I am fortunate enough (or crazy enough) to have 2 MCS's. One stock, one pretty well modded. I took my stock MINI to my first 4 track days and would still consider taking it to the track depending on the track and the weather. I've heard the same thing, learn to drive with less of a car and you can become more of a driver.

 

>>Actually, isn't that what I've been telling all of you all this time? Master your car in its stock form and then slowly modify it. Master that and then make more changes.

I know that is what you said but it's so darn fun to mod the MINI. If you really got to be good at driving you really wouldn't need to do any mods. Just go to driving school enough and then it wouldn't matter which car you had.

>>As I have said before. The new cars are so good that they are the ones taking credit for the performance. If you take an older car with less technology, you really have to work it to get the same performance. Case in point was your Maxima and the instructor behind the wheel. Now that was skill! Was your instructor Lindsey or Ron?

My instructor most of the day was Wes I. Just before lunch I had Mike and he was very helpful with instruction while I did all the driving. Wes was scary fast and very precise but I got to get better with each lap and could do my own critiques by late morning. Knowing that my car could go that quick was nice but we were hammering the right front tire pretty bad by end of the third session so I took the long course pretty easy and didn't push it as I didn't need to have two cars out of action in the same day.

Now I can plan ahead for the Aloha 500 and maybe consider driving the Maxima both days. Since I wore out my tires I'll call tirerack tomorrow and see how some nice Yokohama AVS ES100 tires would do. Maybe I'll take the Maxima to autocross and run it in stock class.

 

Since you already have the Yoks on your MCS, why not try another tire? BFG KDW2, Kumho Ecsta MX, Bridgestone S03s, Yok Parada Spec 2, ...

 

The problem is that the stock rim is 15x6.5 so the tire size is 215/60-15 and many of the good tires are not available in that size. The Yokohama ES100s are and they are relatively well priced. I could consider other tires in the same size like the Falken Ziex ZE-512 , Bridgestone Potenza RE950, or Hankook Ventus HRII H-405. Michelins are overpriced.

The Potenza S-03s are not available in my stock size. I could get 205/55-ZR15 but the cost from tirerack would be about $185 each which would be really more than I would want to invest in.

The Kumho Ecsta MX comes only in one size for 15 inch rims, the 205/50-15 at $79 per tire. The load rating is lower at 86W compared to 94 for the stock sized tire.

The Yokohama Parada Spec 2, BFG KD-W2s and many of the other good Falkens are not available in 15" sizes.

 

Then you'll just have to get bigger rims and tires.