Performance car rental in Munich

[reardriven]

Hi Brothers,

Anyone had experience with above in Germany? Me and my mate are thinking of renting a performance car (e.g. M5, M6, C63, Granturismo) for about a week, we also intend to visit Nurburgring. 911s, R8s and other two seaters are out as we intend to co-pilot and the car needs to be able to take two cabin-size suitcases. M3s and RS6s are out too cos these are our daily drivers - so no novelty, hee..

Couple of questions:
- any recommendations for car rental companies in Munich? any idea on rates per day?
- are rental cars allowed in the Nurburgring?
- is the Ring Taxi still operational?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Racebred]

Re: Performance car rental in Munich

i've read that you cannot drive rental cars into the ring (actually i dont see why not) but I've had friends who have done it.

Ring taxi is not possible unless you are booking now and planning to go germany next year or later. It takes that long to wait for your turn.

However for maximum ring enjoyment (and maximum safety) i would suggest u rent a proper converted track car at ringside. I rented mine from www.rent-racecar.de. Trust me it is way better than renting a street sports car. It comes with roll cage (for your own sake), fire extinguisher, fully stripped out interior, suspension tuned specially for the ring, electrical and fuel kill switch. If you budget 1-2k euros you should be able to get a pretty decent car. The insurance excess will burst your credit card though hehe, so keep it safe. A hot hatch will do if this is your first ring track day. Also, I dont remember needing a helmet for tracking in the ring.

 

[reardriven]

Re: Performance car rental in Munich

Thanks Racebred, will definitely bear below in mind. Ya, renting a track prep car for the Ring is definitely safer.

Do you recommend that we put up for a night at Nurburg?

Any good sources for car rental outside of the Ring to get around the country?


Cheers bro

i've read that you cannot drive rental cars into the ring (actually i dont see why not) but I've had friends who have done it.

Ring taxi is not possible unless you are booking now and planning to go germany next year or later. It takes that long to wait for your turn.

However for maximum ring enjoyment (and maximum safety) i would suggest u rent a proper converted track car at ringside. I rented mine from www.rent-racecar.de. Trust me it is way better than renting a street sports car. It comes with roll cage (for your own sake), fire extinguisher, fully stripped out interior, suspension tuned specially for the ring, electrical and fuel kill switch. If you budget 1-2k euros you should be able to get a pretty decent car. The insurance excess will burst your credit card though hehe, so keep it safe. A hot hatch will do if this is your first ring track day. Also, I dont remember needing a helmet for tracking in the ring.

 

[Racebred]

Re: Performance car rental in Munich

Yeah man, if you want the complete ring experience, as a trackkie and as a tourist, it'll be awesome if you can put up at the ringside hotel. You can go to the one beside the GP track. And during track days you can hear zoom zoom zoom sounds giving you wake up calls in the morning. Shiok right. What is even more shiok is if you can get a room in Sabine's hotel. That's the house she grew up in, which's converted to a small boutique hotel. Dont forget to visit her parent's restaurant just nearby. It's got amazing decor, filled up with car parts, real engine blocks hanging from the ceiling, autographs and pictures of the illuminaries of racing past and present. THE BEEF IS SIBEH SHIOK LAH!! If you can, eat all your meals there. In the evening, when the engineers get off work, they all gather there and discuss the development of their prototype cars, and the majority of them are super friendly. You can even get some spy news of new cars off them. Hang around the pit areas like a tourist and just take pictures of all the track day specials brought there by regular trackkies, and you may even see black taped up prototypes undergoing testing. Some crazy dudes drive in trailers and buses and vans. It's really quite fun. Try not to buang into the motorcyclists, and REMEMBER to keep right if you are slow. Many people adhere very very strictly to overtaking rules over there and if you keep left, even the faster cars will not overtake you and you will ruin their freaken lap. Not a crime, but not very nice..

Visit the Nurberg castle if it is not too foggy, it's steeped in history, and is the source of the name for nurburgring. Visit the Nurburgring gift shop and buy everything from there like a tourist will. They have pretty nice Nring stuff, decals, tshirts, shoes, key chains, etc. Go hang out at the petrol station where people go to refuel between laps. Talk to the trackkies there, bio their cars, make friends. Buy more Nring merchandise... Hahaha its damn fun. Drive around and try to peep into BMW, Aston Martin, Porsche etc.. official N-ring-side development factories. Most time they are closed but if you can sneak a peek you can see them either prepping their prototypes for a blast in the ring, or prepping their racecars for more testing. Very fun.

As for car rental, I'd just pick one up at the airport. Hertz et al. simple. Just remember the autobahn is not delimited all the way. At constructions, entry and exit points they have strict limits and they always like to put a camera right where the delimit ends and the limited stretch comes along. Chao kuan, but thats how they do it. If you're travelling at 300kmh and a faster car comes along, remember to move away keep right early early!

 

[reardriven]

Re: Performance car rental in Munich

Woah Racebred, now you have me all "psyched" up liao!

I am not a good track driver as I have limited exposure as far as track driving is concerned, having driven only in Sepang F1, Pasir Gudang and Shah Alam (before it folded) - so Sepang is really the only "FIA standard" track I have driven in. Even though I hv watched those flying laps on YouTube, the Ring is quite a massive piece of kit compared to Sepang and it (the ring) having a scenery makes it rather difficult to fathom where exactly one is, unlike say in a normal track when you normally can "glance across" a few turns ahead.

Perusing the track car options, I think I might want to go for a DSG/automated gear shift. I think driving with Stick using my right hand seem rather unnatural and I really do not want to take up precious "limited bandwidth" that my non-racer brain has already to cope with a new car and new track.

Later..