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How Fast Did I Go Around Nurburgring? | Coffee With Kenny · Kenny Wallace Media

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  Happy Monday morning everybody and I am finally back back home
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  in the good old United States of America.
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  I was going 16 days and my wife Kim, when she picked me up at
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  the airport, we gave each other a big old hug and she looked at
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  me and Kim said don't you be gone that long ever again.
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  That was too long. I agree with her, 16 days was
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  was a long time for a nice little vacation.
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  All right, everybody, remember this is the big weekend at I-55
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  Federated Auto Parts Raceway Park.
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  The World of Outlaws, the Wings Sprint cars are going to be 15
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  minutes from my house this Friday and Saturday, April 10th
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  and 11th, the World of Outlaw Sprint cars.
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  Go to worldofoutlaw.com and get your tickets.
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  Boy, they pack them in down there.
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  That's a hell of a show. OK?
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  I want to thank my dear friend John Skatoni.
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  John booked all the tickets, made it easy on me, and here we
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  go again, right this Friday. John's going to pick me up in
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  his SR22, his airplane, and we're flying down to Sarasota,
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  can drive on over to Bradenton, to Cletus Mcfarlane's Freedom
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  Factory 500. I think there's 21 of us drivers
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  running a Crown Victoria, going to have the time of our life.
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  Then we're going to spend the night Friday night down there at
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  Cletus Mcfarlane's racetrack. And then we're going to wake up
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  Saturday and we're going to fly on up to Bristol, TN for the big
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  NASCAR weekend. It's a big weekend, big races
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  everywhere and then we will do Trackside Live on Sunday
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  morning, probably around 12. We usually get about 5000 people
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  out there. They love it.
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  Chase Elliott, we're going to have Chase Elliott on the big
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  stage and a lot more. That was a nice little
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  monologue. One thing my wife asked me on
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  the way home last night, when she picked me up at the airport,
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  she said, how fast did you go to Nurburgring?
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  I looked at her. She goes, everybody's asking you
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  that and I haven't, you haven't answered it yet.
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  I said I yes, we did 147 mph on the front straightaway.
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  I didn't think much of it, but I spent the rest of the time
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  coming home telling her all about it.
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  Hell, I had cottonmouth. I had to get something to drink
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  when I got home because I told Kim so much about my trip.
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  Then we walked in the house here and Dee, my mother-in-law, Kim's
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  mom, first thing she said was how fast did you go around?
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  I said, what is the deal with everybody?
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  Want to know how fast? I went around Nurburgering and I
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  said to myself, that's going to be coffee with Kenny.
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  So the reason choosing this subject is because it is really
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  different. It is unbelievable.
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  And it's very hard to tell everybody how fast I went around
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  Nurburgring. And here's why.
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  Drink a coffee. The Nurburgring racetrack, the
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  legendary racetrack is run by the German police.
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  Oh, yeah. I remember years ago when Big
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  Brother Rusty ran Usack, we were up there racing at New Jersey,
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  Trenton, NJ, and they Black Flag Rusty in practice and the the
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  New Jersey Highway Patrol Black Flag Rusty because he didn't
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  have gloves on. And they said, yeah, the
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  Trenton, NJ, the Highway Patrol, they run the racetrack.
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  It's like, what in the world? That was the last time I
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  remember anything like that. So remember that the German
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  Highway Patrol run the racetrack.
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  So what I did was called, it was basically the whole community.
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  You pay the fee and everybody, everybody could go on the
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  racetrack at the same time. You had a husband and wife in an
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  Audi sports car. You look over there and there's
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  a husband and a wife in an Audi sports car just hauling ass and
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  you're like, this is unreal. So when you say how fast did you
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  go around Nurburgring, what was your time?
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  I'll tell you what, the owner of RSR, it was the owner, RSR
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  Nurburgring. That's who we rented our BMW
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  from. That's important.
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  Everybody want to know what kind of car were you in?
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  I was in a nice BMW with good brakes on it, paddle shifters,
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  brakes squeaked a little bit. A lot of people watch some of
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  that video. I can't help it.
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  The brakes squeaked and so did everybody else's brakes squeak
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  just the way it is. I don't know why, but I had good
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  brakes. So Ron Simon, Ron Simon Racing,
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  he said, Kenny, remember this about Nurburgring.
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  It kills four to five people a year and it just don't matter.
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  Your lap time and how you go just don't matter.
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  I thought to myself, man, that sounds like Dick Trickle
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  talking. It just don't matter.
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  So we got to look at things through a lens.
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  The fastest time around Nurburgring is 5 minutes, 14
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  seconds, running well over 200 mile an hour, like 240 mph.
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  So I'm not going to pay attention to my lap time in a
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  damn BMW streetcar. I think I went around here maybe
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  10 minutes. But here's the other thing.
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  I think it was Sir Jackie Stewart, the great Formula One
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  racer. After everybody got killed there
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  and hurt in Formula One, you know, they, they stopped racing
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  there because the race track was too dangerous.
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  Now you see the Formula One tracks had big run offs.
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  Formula Ones come a long way. They require big run offs.
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  So here's why my time did not matter to me at Nurburgring
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  because they call it the Lotta Links.
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  Remember Nikki Lotta, the great Formula One racer, he's all
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  burnt up. That happened right there at
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  Nurburgring. Nikki lawsuit coming around
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  there. Now they nickname it the Lotta
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  Links. He's wrecked and the whole
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  racetrack is got blind spots. You're wide open.
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  You come up around this hill and you're thinking you're hauling
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  ass and all of a sudden there's somebody parked right in the
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  middle of the racetrack and you centre punch them.
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  And that's what they did to Niki Lotta.
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  His car burst into flames that burnt him.
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  Horrible. And that's how Niki Lotta got
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  all burned up right there at Nurburgring.
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  The Lotta links Green Hell because they didn't have a lot
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  of guard rails and you would fly off into the woods.
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  And that's why Sir Jackie Stewart nicknamed it Green Hell.
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  Got to get out of this place, This place that kill you.
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  So when we took our safety briefing, they scared us half to
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  death. I'm like hell, I don't know if I
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  want to go on this racetrack. Sure enough, I'm happier than
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  hell though. I'm ready to go because because
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  I'm a race car driver. I get my helmet on.
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  I get in that BMW and I go down the bottom of hill and they give
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  you this little pass and you hit the you hit the little gate and
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  the gate comes up for all of us and we get on the highway, which
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  is called which is the racetrack Nurburgering and hundreds of
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  cars are all lined up and we get on that racetrack.
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  You go flying around and all of a sudden yellow lights are
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  flashing. You go like a mile and you're
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  like, what's going on? This is a 13 mile Rd. course.
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  Sure enough, they red flag it. Somebody in front of me knocked
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  down guardrails, didn't kill themselves.
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  But that's the problem with Nurburgering.
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  It is so unique, so strange. It was so hard for me to explain
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  to everybody. I have so much content that I
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  thought I'd wait till I get home.
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  So they kill everybody to racetrack because you're trying
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  to be you're, you think you're Lewis Hamilton, you think you're
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  Kimmy Antanoli, you think you're Max Verstappen and you're flying
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  around there. And to this day you're, you're
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  like, oh man, I'm going to set a record.
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  You come up over the hill and there's somebody spun out right
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  there and you centre punch them and kill them. 13 mile
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  racetrack. Hell, we left the racetrack.
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  We're like, it's time to go home.
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  We left the racetrack. We got about 6 miles down the
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  road and all these people were gathered on the side of the road
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  and we realized 6 miles away from the racetrack, the
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  racetrack ran over this area and everybody's watching the real
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  race cars because it's a 13 mile Rd. course.
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  Hey, did I tell you it's a 13 mile Rd. course?
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  So as far as my speed, you come around the last corner, it's a
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  big long straightaway, but you can't go but halfway down
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  because the gates down. So I could have gone 100 and
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  8200 mile an hour, but you got to slow down, show your pass,
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  and then the gate opens so it slows you down and you can't
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  help it because once again, the track, I'm just reminding you
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  all, it's run by the German Highway Patrol.
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  So in ending, I ran 147 mile an hour, had a good time, made six
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  laps around Nurburgring green L, and there was yellow flags,
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  there was red flags. And you know that car rented, I
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  gave it back without a mark on it and everything's perfect.
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  Hope that explains everything. It just wasn't worth it to try
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  to set a speed record in a passenger car.
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  Have a great one day everybody.