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O'fest Live Report

Greetings from Oktoberfest '96. The National Capital Chapter has done a
real nice job. We're enjoying the best $85 hotel room we've seen lately,
and the services, restaurants, and receptions have been very nice.

Yesterday's driving school at Summit Point was almost too much fun.
Moderate to heavy rain lowered the track speeds down closer to my comfort
levels. Summit Point has a well-deserved reputation for being slippery when
wet. More than a few drivers found that out, as I had a great seat for
observing a number of spinouts in front of me. They ran a real good skidpad
off the track, too.

For those of you who wanted to know how the Yokohama AVS Intermediate tires
acted on the track, I can tell you that in wet weather, they gripped very,
very well. I would rate them very close to the MXX3's, which I consider a
very good wet weather UHP tire. Unfortunately, I can't yet judge the AVS-I
on a dry track, but I've been happy with them on dry off-track roads. More
rain is predicted for the second day of autocross today, so the AVS-I will
get another wet workout this afternoon.

The usual gang of suspects showed up in the vendor area, and it was nice to
see so many friendly, low-pressure, helpful merchants and technicians
again. I replenished my Zymol stock, but I didn't see anyone giving an
Oktoberfest discount on Bon-Ami.

Other than meeting so many nice people, watching the variety of so many
pristeen BMW's is, as usual, an O'fest highlight. There are some really,
really nice models here. I would hate to try and choose the nicest looking
E30 M3. There are simply too many to choose from. But I guess that's what
Friday's concours is for.

Well, it's off to Manassas for the autocross and my date with ignominy.

Scott Blazey
Driving one of many, many white E36 M3's (Little Fish in a Big Pond
Syndrome, for you psychologists out there.)