It’s Canada Day and you’re anxious for fireworks in the evening, but what do you do during the day? You could have a BBQ…

…or you could go racing!

Needless to say, I went with the latter. Unfortunately, my crank pulley decided to give out just days before the event which meant that I ended up with nothing more than a very broken car; not exactly the safest thing to be driving at a track event.

“Oh well” I thought to myself. That’s the cost of racing, as others were about to quickly find out.

As soon as I arrived, one of my friends wheels fell right off his S2000 while going 160KMPH! I can only imagine how scary that was.

Thankfully he was ok and the car was not seriously damaged. It’s hard to see in this photo but there is a huge dent on the bottom of the fender.

Due to this little mishap, things were halted for a bit so I thought that this would be a good time to talk a walk around the paddock.

We saw this Impreza last year at Rev For Le Cure and now it’s sporting a few new additions such as a lexan windows and a full roll cage. Interesting enough the factory dashboard has been put back in place.

There were plenty of S2000’s out there that day, after all it is a perfect track car!

A huge wing, huge stickers, and big red wheels? Because race car.

This S2000 is sporting a full HKS supercharger kit and is pushing 375WHP!

Right next to it was a turbocharged S2000…

…and right in front was the naturally aspirated Spoon Sports S2000!

Although this Z32 wasn’t the twin turbo variant, the owner was still having a blast with it.

It’s a shame that Honda no longer makes the Integra anymore, I mean just look at how good this thing looks!

James Chans was also out with his crazy K24 powered EK Civic!

On a side note, I was driving my sisters Civic that day and happen to park next to James. Quite the contrast wouldn’t you say?

I’ve always said that you don’t see a lot of EM1’s in the scene anymore, so it was great to see this one out on the track stretching its legs.

Another car you don’t see a lot of at all is the AW11 MR2, and on the track no less!

Well that wasn’t something I was expecting to see that day.

I used to see this car every day at work, only that I wasn’t allowed to really drive the life out of it. Glad to see that someone else is doing it now!

In fact I’ve never see so many Porsches out at a track day before.

There were even a few GT3 cup cars present, like, what?!

That is quite the colorful livery.

A full track prepped G35 complete with a huge trailer being pulled by an even bigger RV. Baaallin’!

Although the popularity of the new 86/FRS/BRZ has grown so much since it’s release…

…there was only this one lonely FRS out running that day. Still pretty quick though!

A Ferrari 458 Italia for the man, and an Audi R8 V10 for the woman. Yup, these two cars belong to a married couple who even brought out their kids to enjoy the day! Talk about living happily ever after.

Probably the biggest surprise for me (and I’m sure everyone else) would’ve had to have been this NASCAR that was also out participating that day. Boy was this thing LOUD!

This car is so loud that some of the other drivers were telling me that they had to roll up their windows as this beast blew by. VTEC ain’t got nothing on this!

After a quick lunch break, it was time for everyone to get back out on the track.

Recently I’ve been getting a lot of people asking me about what it’s like to participate in a track day, so I’m going to take a moment here and give some insight to those who are interested in it.

I’ll start by saying that I am by no means a professional; this is a hobby for me and this is just some basic advice to help those people who are interested in coming out to the track one day.

First off, we’re not racing. While many people (including myself) may call it “racing”, we are in fact just “lapping”. We are indeed pushing our cars as well as ourselves to the limit, but we’re not reaching for first place. Instead, we’re out here to have fun and to improve our skills as a driver.

Also, for people who are just getting into tuning their cars, this is a great way to feel how different modifications have an effect on your car. Sadly we’re not all rich so we just end up doing mods little by little, but this way we can slowly learn the car more bit by bit.

Lastly, it doesn’t matter if you come out in a Civic…

…or a Ferrari. Once again, we’re all out here just to have fun!

Now let’s get back to the action.

This is my first time seeing this car out on the track and boy, does it ever look good out there!

Interestingly enough this fully track prepped G35 is an automatic.

This GT3 Cup blasted its way through the corners like nothing. Simply incredible.

Look, a NASCAR turning right!

I should also note that there were a fairly limited amount of spots to shoot from. With the track laid out the way it is, it meant that I would pretty much only be able to shoot from turns one and two.

I just love how aggressive this Impreza looks.

Unfortunately it was plagued with what appeared to be cooling problems all day, but the team was still able to get it back out there!

Who says FWD is slow?

That’s right, this RSX was chasing down the Porsche’s one by one that day. Madman behind the wheel!

Epic battle between the supercharged and turbocharged S2000’s was about to commence.

Both cars looked great on the track and were especially quick.

In the end, the “Lord Vader” S2000 proved to be the faster of the two force-induced roadsters, but at a price.

A blown motor would put a premature end to the day for this car, sending it sideways and leaving a rather long trail of oil out on the track. I guess VTEC just kicked in yo!

The Zero Sports kit looks so menacing with that gigantic opening in the front.

Imagine seeing that thing hunting you down in your rear view mirror! An interesting thing I saw on this car was utilizing the hood scoop to feed air into an oil cooler. I’m not super familiar with Subaru’s so I don’t know if this is a regular thing or not, but for me at least this was something new.

Some top-down fun.

I only just recently learned that this FD is naturally aspirated. I guess that explains the lack of flames!

One upside of not being able to run that day was finally being able to shoot James’ Civic in action.

I mean it just looks so good!

The owner of this GTR seemed to be taking it easy all day; after all, that’s a lot of car to handle!

This FRS is owned by a friend of mine and is deceivingly loud.

200HP and R-Comp tires means that he was stepping on the gas all day!

Caterham’s are made for this!

Like I said earlier, there were many different Porsches out that day ranging from the newer style Boxter…

…to the 997…

…and my personal favourite, the 993!

As fast as they are, Porsche’s aren’t exactly known to be the most forgiving cars on the planet, and I quote, they have such a “fearsome reputation for not tolerating fools”. Top Gear viewers will know what I’m talking about.

MR2’s are notorious for handling overly sensitive so the owner of this AW11 was taking it nice and easy.

I used to drive a BMW 528i around and I must admit, sometimes I do miss the nice quit comfy ride. I think these M3 drivers don’t however.

We’re already halfway through summer, so hopefully we’ll at least be able to get one more track day in. My Integra is slowly coming back together, but only time will tell!

-brandon.

Click HERE to view the full photo set on Flickr.