Last weekend a friend and I entered both our cars as two-driver non-comps. We drove my Z first in the morning and then his RX-8 in the afternoon. It was a very valuable learning experience for me. First off was alot of enjoyment for the time invested: Drive 8 times and ride 8 times, benefit from him driving my car while I ride along, and benefit from driving his car and then riding along while he drove. I learned alot. All along I thought I'd been at the edge and I found out I wasn't even close. I learned that when I thought my car was already sliding, it was just settling in. I've been 'correcting for a slide' that was never there. A 'thump' noise that I thought was my hitting a cone was some suspension settling noise instead. All along I've been leaving some serious performance on the table. I'm not very good at this point, but I have to say that for the time invested its a good way to learn alot more about my car and where I can improve. Most of the day for me is usually shot anyway so it only makes sense to pay to run twice, work twice and make a complete day of it. Its what I'm there for anyway. I'm not competitive so I get to maximize my learning so that some day I may be.

The RX-8 was a much easier car to drive fast, it seemed alot more forgiving and willing to tolerate my mistakes. My best times in both cars were within a half-second which is very good for me considering I'd never driven an RX-8 this hard before. So if you're already competitive maybe you don't benefit as much. But, if your not competitive I highly recommend this as a way to maxmize both the fun and learning factors! Rich