Driving – Dejan Murko

Track Day: Grobnik 2022/10

This was the second Grobnik track day this year, after the first one in June. In June, it was already 30c, so the tires and brakes were always very hot, and I could only manage half a second better lap time than last year.

Last year I also bought Garmin Glo 2, which easily connects through Bluetooth to iPhone and makes time tracking 100% reliable (compared to iPhone’s GPS, which regularly misses the finish line).

This last track day, it was perfect weather – sunny and around 20c. My goal for the day was 1:45. On the first session, I hit 1:45.99 and then had issues getting below that.

Driving: Katarina Hillclimb 2022/6

Katarina Hillclimb is an open event that anyone can join and I only noticed it this year. It was not a cheap drive – €160 for a total of four rides of about 2 minutes each. But it was also such a unique experience that I see it repeating sometime in the future.

Driving: Grossglockner opening 2022/5

GP Ice Race which is known for the ice race in Zell am See organized the Grossglockner pass “opening” for the first time this year. Even though it’s one of the better-known passes, I haven’t visited or driven it yet. So when I was invited by Jure, it was a big yes.

Track Day: Silverstone 2022/4

As part of my birthday celebration in London, we visited Silverstone and booked their Head-to-Head Experience where the plan was to drive the latest Vantage V8 and F430. The price was very good but it was a bit of a pain to get to Silverstone, a lot of it due to a bank holiday.

Track Day: Grobnik 2021/9

After more than a year, I was back to a track day on Grobnik, this time with a new-to-me 987.2 Boxster S. It was a learning experience all over again. The car is clearly on a different level than the GT86, and it’ll take some time to get used to it to take full advantage of it on the track.

The track day was a success as there were around 40 cars. Most notably, there were two brand new 992 GT3s, a 991.2 GT3RS, two 991 GT3s, a ton of other Porsches, and also two Yaris GRs. Even so, I had more than enough driving and multiple empty laps. Awesome fun.

Driven: Mazda MX-5 (ND)

In January we took a trip to Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands. I was told there are amazing roads and the preliminary research confirmed that, so I decided that a Miata is a perfect choice to rent. I haven’t driven any version of it before, and it’s another one of the sports car benchmarks that I feel I need to experience to broaden my horizons.

Driven: Porsche 718 Boxster GTS

Besides getting better at drifting this year, the other thing I wanted to do was to rent a sports car to broaden my driving horizons.

This last weekend was perfect for this. My GT86’s clutch died after a dynamic session and I was stuck at home. So on Thursday, I opened a local rental car app and booked a 2019 Porsche Boxster GTS. To my pleasant surprise, the car was free and I had it booked from Friday noon to Sunday.

Track Day: Grobnik 2020/7

Oh my, was I looking forward to the first track day of the season. I made some changes to the car setup in the spring, more specifically, added the Gruppe-S UEL headers (should’ve done it sooner), and camber bolts for setting negative camber on the front wheels. I also bought a tire set specifically for track days. Unfortunately, not everything went as I hoped.

Drift Practice: Racegasmic 2020/6

It’s been a long break because of COVID-19 but June was then full of automotive fun, from twisties to drifting. After a few sessions, I started to get a nice rhytm and can almost connect the whole track in one direction.

Drift Practice: Racegasmic 2019/9

Racegasmic is a drift track in Ljubljana and it’s one of the few, very welcomed, places where enthusiasts can play with cars in Slovenia.

It’s on a track used by driving schools over the week, moonlighting as a drift track on Saturdays. You can also rent drift-prepared cars there which is what I’ve done yesterday.