Just spent an awesome weekend in Leipzig and thought to share it with you guys.



After driving off in Switzerland in the middle of the night and roughly 650km, we arrived in Leipzig around 11.00 on Friday morning just in time to join the factory tour. 2 1/2 hours of impressions of the Cayenne and the Carrera GT production line. That factory is stunning. It is so silent and clean, you could eat off the floor and take a nap without being disturbed by any noise. Very impressive. The Cayenne bodys are coming from the VW plant in Bratislava by train, are unloaded and transported through a tunnel directly into the factory, with almost no manual intervention. The interior is already almost complete when they arrive. In Leipzig, they "only" complete the marriage, add some panels on the outside, the audio system and the steering wheel and fill in all the fluids. Afterwards a couple of quality checks are done before they drive each and every car on the test track for a couple of kilometers (roughly 20 minutes if I recall correctly). Afterwards, the cars are washed, some more quality checks are done and then the cars are "packed" for shippment. Unfortunately, they wouldn't let us take a closer look at the GTs being produced than from 4 meters away. But still, very impressive to see that this beast is produced at just 8 or 9 stations by the snowmen (so called by the coworkers because of their white dresses). Afterwards, the small museum was shown to us and a little snack was served. The whole tour took about two and half hours.



The other morning, we had to be back at the factory at 8.00 in the morning for the start of the driving course. I had made a reservation for 911 and got a 996 Targa for these two days. I must confess that I would have preferred a 997 but they just didn't have enough of them and I was obviously to late with my registration. The whole saturday consisted of 8 stations with different driving situation to train (oversteering, understeering, braking, high speed lane change, slalom, offroading in the Cayenne, etc).



Unfortunately, the weather was just crap and made the briefings at the start of each section a pain as we had to get out of the car for instructions. On the other hand, it made most of the execises even more interesting.



Shortly before lunch time, they offered as a special treat to take a closer look at the Carrera GT production line! Wow, unlike the day before during the official tour, we were allow to step right up to the cars. Touching was not allowed tough. The training lasted until 17.00. Later on, the instructors picked us up at the hotel for the organised dinner in a nice restaurant in downtown Leipzig. The other morning, we started again at 08.00h. The track was divided into 4 different section each of which we drove for almost an hour after having being thaught about the ideal line. After another excellent lunch in the restaurant on the third floor of the Porsche "tower", Sunday afternoon was dedicated to free driving and taxi rides with the instructors. Each group got to drive 4 stints of about 15 minutes. We had a blast. This was only interrupted for a short "show-driving" with the Carrera GT. That car is not from this world. Just hearing it gives you goose bumps. Jochen Albig, the head instructor in Leipzig, really knows how to tame that beast. It was amazing.









Overall, an amazing weekend. I recommend this two-day course for everyone interested in improving his skills and driving on a track which includes reconstructions of some of the most famous curves from various race tracks around the world (BusStop from Spa, Mobil 1 S from Nürburgring, Loews from Monte Carlo, etc.).