Who?

We are a bunch of mates that, in the time-honoured tradition of chatting over a pint, decided to try and raise a decent amount of money for charity and hopefully have some fun along the way.

We are Matt, Jonny, Nat and Greg (with Paul and Doz making up a third team) and whilst we have some experience of, and love, tinkering with cars, we’re not mechanics.  Between us we currently own a 1960′s Morris Minor, a 1980′s Mazda RX-7, a 1990′s Fiat Coupe, Nissan 180SX, 2 x Nissan 200SXs and Peugeot 306 Gti-6 and a 2000′s Toyota Hilux – so you could say we have eclectic tastes!

What?

We have split into two teams and we intend to buy and modify a car each – for a maximum of £500.  Obviously, for that money, we’ll be lucky if we can afford much more than a service, so ‘free’ modifications (such as weight removal) are going to be the order of the day.  At the end of the buying/modifying process though, each car must be road legal.

Once we have our budget racers ready, we are going to drive them to the Nürburgring and complete a lap each before driving them home. Ironically, the Nürburgring doesn’t encourage racing, so the laps won’t be timed – but it should be pretty clear which team has won.  It will probably be the team that doesn’t arrive home on the back of an AA truck.

Once we have made it safely back to the UK, the cars will be auctioned and the proceeds will be added to the total raised.

We are hoping to raise some of the money for the trip itself via corporate sponsorship – we are willing to completely vinyl wrap the cars if somebody wants us to and offers us a fair package!  Click here if you are interested in providing sponsorship and wish to find out more.

This website will be used to make regular updates on every aspect of the trip – details of sponsors; the hunt for cars; modifying those cars; and on the trip itself, we will be posting regular updates to the blog.

Where?

The Nürburgring is a race track around the village of Nürburg, Germany. It features a modern Grand Prix race track built in 1984, and a much longer old “North loop” track (the Nordschleife) which was built in the 1920s around the village and medieval castle of Nürburg in the Eifel mountains. It is located about 40 miles south of Cologne, and 75 miles northwest of Frankfurt. The old track was nicknamed The Green Hell by Jackie Stewart and is widely considered the toughest, most dangerous and most demanding purpose-built race track in the world.

For over 80 years, the Nordschleife has been open as a one-way, public toll-road. While German road law applies, there is no general speed limit.

As long as they are driving a road-legal car or motorcycle, anybody can turn up when the track is open for public access, pay a toll (ie, a fee per lap) and off they go.

Why?

Why not?  It’s a trip we’ve been planning to do anyway, so we might as well try and do some good at the same time. We have the grand aim of raising a total of £10,000 for our chosen charity, The Prostate Cancer Charity.  That equates to us raising £2.50 per mile. Each.

It’s a tall order, but The Prostate Cancer Charity needs every penny it can get.  Every year, thousands of men are diagnosed with prostate cancer and every year, The Prostate Cancer Charity raises over £1,000,000 that, amongst other things, funds research that aims to give us more understanding of the disease.

You can read more about The Prostate Cancer Charity and how your money will be spent on their website.

When?

We’re hoping to leave the UK on Wednesday 8 September, returning on Saturday 11 September.  The ‘Ring is open for public access on the Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, so we’ve got three bites at the cherry.  Hopefully one of them will be a dry day.