Stavesacre21

So who all here has had the honors of taking their 8 down to southern Tennessee to slay the dragon? All I can say is OMG...talk about bringing out the 8's strong points! It just rides like it's on rails the WHOLE way!

I just got back from a trip to Tennessee, and natually had to make the hour drive just to drive the dragon AKA HWY 129. TOTALLY worth it to anyone who's considering. Ironically, a cop from Florida was killed on it only 2 days before we ran it, so that made it a little more creepy.

compliments of killboy.com, i've got a few pics to show from the run. Check them out! pictures are around the lower half of the page...VR red 05.

I've also got some really choppy video taken by my GF in the passenger seat with her digital camera if anyone wants a little more detailed feel for it.

Raptor75

I'm jealous, how did the RX compare to some of the other cars there?

Clavius

I'm Hate you !!
In a wish I was you kinda way so its all good!...
I heard about this hwy on Superbikes and its notorious for claiming lives and vehicles. I think one of the quotes was "Take your eyes off the road for a moment and your dead"

9291150

Always planned to go, but never got around to it. Also heard from several biker buddies that solid lines & blind corners combined with heavy traffic saps away at the fun. Did you encounter this?

Also, any cops?

portero23

Haha, how'd the Dodge Ram towing the trailor do?

-P23

9291150

They do have a "tree of shame" with fairings and bike pieces on it. But it's not a killing ground, most that fall walk away, we're not talking 140mph sweepers here...unless you get oncoming traffic. If death rates get out of hand they'll patrol the crap out of it, which I heard hasn't been the case.

Clavius

^^ Yeah they shown that "Tree of Shame" on the show. Man thing looked morbid. Well I know its claimed plenty of vehicles but they did say some have died on the road. I gotta find a reason as to why I should travel down that way one day hehe.

Oh also someone posted a few weeks back about this road and a few stated that durring the week its not that bad but Fri/Sat are usualy the busiest.

cwadster

I've run The Dragon on my bike, but never in a car. Monday thru Wednesday you can go just about fast as you like; Thursday on it gets more and more crowded to where it's scary on the weekend. Nothing like coming around a blind corner to find a RV blocking the entire road or a hotshoe in your lane.

Personally, I like faster sweepers. Deal's Gap is too tight in my opinion.

DemonRX-8

I haven't driven it with the 8, but I've done it twice on my bike now. While I loved it both times, and it's definitely the tightest most techinal road I've ever been on (including racetracks!), I agree with cwadster - prefer faster sweepers too. I'd still like to hit it in the 8 tho . . .

There are ton's of great roads in that area that you can ride/drive for weeks without hitting the Dragon. Unfortunately we had too much fun and festivities one night on our trip and no one was up for the Cherohala Skyway run (this is supposed to be and incredible run!) early the next morning, so we went straight to the Gap instead. It was surprisingly not crowded when I went this year though.

Sea Ray

I had no problem keeping up with some tricked out Mini Coopers, and that was on my very first run. They ran it a lot and said follow us if you can, so I did

Elara

The Dragon is amazing. And the RX-8 Brotherhood of the Dragon is going again this year, in a few weeks- sadly, I'm probably not making it again, but it is truly on hell of a trip. If you, like me, can't go this year, you should definitely consider signing up for it next year. Some pictures from when I went 2 years ago with the group from here...

http://www.elysianplains.com/album/T...gon/index.html

Stavesacre21

yea, that scared the @#$% outta me too, because we were FLYING around a blind turn when we came head to head with that truck...and check out HOW friggin far those mirrors stick out. Even when that dude was in his lane, those mirrors were stickin out at least a foot, if not more onto my side of the road!


Fortunately, we didn't run into too much traffic. However, at the last couple miles, we were stuck behind a SEMI truck. OMG...after anout 3 minutes, the brakes on that truck were reaking pretty freakin bad.

We went on a thursday, so cop traffic wasn't existant. However, in my honest opinion, I couldn't IMAGINE many cops ever being in the 11 mile run....it would just simply be almost impossible to pull into traffic at any safe place. EVERYWHERE seems like blind/suicide turns.


We saw the tree of shame too...it's kinda erie to be honest. I'm gonna try to find a place to post the videos cause i've gotten a few PM's to check um out. Like I said, nothing fancy, but just a feeler. Its kinda odd though, because immediately after watchin the videos, it felt like a LOT of the speed and excitement were toned down! Anyone else ever experienced this? Hope you don't mind my GF's corny shrieking noises though...their kinda funny.

And by the way, on the first video, I didn't wreak...just made an extreamlely sharp, high speed S-bend...and she dropped the camera. LoL.

swerver

I've done "the tail of the dragon" twice; both times in my Miata (there's a huge Miata meet up there every year.

hehe......I remember a very somber looking trooper informing everyone that as long as we were there, there was one rule and one rule only. STAY IN YOUR OWN LANE, PERIOD!!

it is a great run, and I wonder how the 8 would fair compared to the go-cart Miata....................

Razz1

One of these years I want to go out and runs with boys in the South East on the track.

This would be a great ride to do on the way out there or on the way back.

Endor

Oh hey, that's me in the background!

Not as cool as an old porsche, or 20 Solstices in a row, apparently, so I don't get my own cover page on Killboy.com. Had the greatest time driving through the Gap on my trip from Michigan, to Florida, back to Michgan though. It rained for 4 hours from Atlanta to Tennessee, then the skies miraculously cleared up for an hour, as if just for my own personal heaven, then after clearing Deal's Gap I was hit with another hour of rain for penance for crossing the yellow line.

http://www.photoreflect.com/pr3/Thum...406&g=0Z&s=150

Several pics of me in the 4th row there.

Oh, and I got passed & burned by a goddamn DHL truck in the chattahooche national fforest passing zones. In my defense, it was raining and I had a car-sick passenger, and I didn't want puke all over my interior. At least I kept pace with the 944 and only got passed by one sportbike on the northward-route.

Stavesacre21

Just got the first video up...more choppy then i'd thought after uploading to a website though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wL12Dvg8Rbc

DaveT

Been doing this for 3 years now.

4 day event starts Sept. 6th.

Check it out HERE

Stavesacre21

dead link...i'd like to see it though!

DaveT

Try it now. HERE

Sorry 'bout that.