400 Miles to Clear My Head: A Northern California Rally

I’ve never seen the moon set before.

And the first thing I saw pulling out of my driveway at 5 AM was the moon setting over the Santa Cruz Mountains. Nearly full, sitting low over the ridge.

What followed over the course of the day was more than 400 miles in my 911.

A lot of those miles were spent on roads I had never driven, following friends and soon-to-be-friends, and trying, mostly unsuccessfully, to keep up. There were long stretches of good pavement, elevation changes, tight corners, and views that occasionally made us stop and remember to look around.

It turned out to be a very good way to spend a day.

I had been spending too much time behind a computer screen, anxious about things that felt increasingly important because they were always directly in front of me. A recent layoff. Some real estate investments in not-so-great condition. Trading that screen for the view through my windshield felt good, like having a project car start on the first try after letting it sit for far too long.

There was no inbox on the other side of the glass. And that felt fucking great.

Doing something new and getting outside my comfort zone became the theme of the drive for me.

Part of that came from the roads. Part of it came from driving with people who were considerably more experienced than I was.

It is easy to feel like you know how to drive when you are alone. You learn your usual roads, settle into a pace that feels good, and start believing the car is the limiting factor. Then you follow someone who actually understands weight transfer, lines, and timing, and the gap grows faster than the list of things I still don't understand about how this car actually works.

At one point, the more experienced guys pushed ahead. I watched them disappear and continued at my own pace. That may sound obvious, but car culture, especially today, has a way of turning another driver’s drive into a challenge.

There was nothing to prove and nothing waiting for me if I closed the gap (which I couldn’t). No timing sheet. No podium. The only meaningful goals were to have fun, enjoy the roads, make some new friends, and get home with the car and myself intact. And that was enough, as it should be.

In the meantime, the 911 was doing some humbling of its own.

One of the lessons from the day was that I had been trying to drive my 911 like my E36 M3. In the E36, I knew the limits well enough to huck it into a corner and figure it out along the way. The car usually tolerated that.

The 911 did not.

My habit had been to finish my braking before the corner, huck it in, and then rely almost entirely on the steering wheel with a little bit of throttle. If the road tightened, the only thing left to do was add more steering. Then understeer showed up, and the front tires yelled at me in German.

Far too late did I come to my senses and accept how much more important the brake pedal was in the 911. The thing’s just got so much ass. And that ass’s weight has gotta transfer. I needed to trail brake like a maniac, keeping some weight over the front tires long enough to help the car rotate. I am not a smart man, and it turns out I am also impatient (which I already knew).

In the few times I got that right, the steering made more sense and I didn’t need to keep adding lock halfway through the corner. From there, the throttle would settle the car. 30,000+ miles into ownership and I’m still learning to drive the thing.

A Cayman GTS, S2000, and delicious flavors of Boxster were part of the group. Anyone that knows ball understands that the Cayman/Boxster platforms are the superior Porsche. And the S2000 might be the funnest of them all.

I found myself focusing on the entry speed of the other drivers. They could arrive at a corner quickly, turn in, and carry momentum like they were driving feathers.

The most intense section of the day was Stewart Point-Skaggs Springs Road, running roughly 35 miles through the hills toward the coast at Stewarts Point. Google Maps estimates around an hour and sixteen minutes for the route. The group covered it in less than that, which probably says enough.

It was relentlessly fun. Corners arrived one after another, often with little indication of what was ahead, with constant splits between one-lane and two-lane sections. It demanded attention and punished the bad habit of not looking through the corner wherever possible.

On a familiar road, it can be easy to rely on memory. Roads like these reminded me that I had to leave myself options.

I have done plenty of stupid things in cars, particularly when I was younger (like wrecking my BRZ). So I am in no position to preach. And maybe that’s why I felt comfortable putting my ego aside and driving my own drive. The consequence of getting it wrong is much larger than a bruised ego.

We stopped for coffee. We stood around parking areas talking about cars, and life. We pulled over near bridges, reservoirs, and stretches of coastline that made the early alarm feel worthwhile. We ate by the water. We chatted. There were photographs (really good ones - thanks, Chris!). Then we got back in the cars and continued.

I came home tired, but it was a much better kind of exhaustion than the one I had been carrying recently. And I loved that I got to spend some time with people who I wouldn’t have otherwise met if it weren’t for these lovely things called “cars”.

By the end of the day, the strange part was that getting out of my comfort zone had taken me somewhere I felt completely comfortable. With the people, the car, the scenery, even a meal by the water. None of it was familiar, and none of it felt forced either.

I don’t know that there needs to be some grand lesson in it. Get out and drive. Nothing beats the real thing.