Well, Commander Augenstein will be turning in his flight suit at the end of this year and going civilian after 22-plus years, and as part of that plan, he'll be moving back east (from Fort Worth, Takes-us
).
Why would anyone care? Well, as part of the move from a place where the roads tend to run straight for the horizon, and the only place to get your jollies is on cloverleaves, he's planning ahead.
Some may remember that, back in the days when he was living in Reno (and commuting to the Fallon NAS), he could run those mountain roads up to and around Tahoe, making for highly entertaining Sunday mornings. So the move to Fort Worth meant that, while contemplating both the M3 and the C63 as replacements for his 911, he went for the latter.
No regrets, but you see where this is going?
Right. He's got a Jerez black, competition-packaged M3 on order. This car will be similar to the last M3 tested against the C63 coupe in the pages of Car & Driver, and that car weighed 3552 pounds, full of gas. Thumbs up, I say. Still too heavy, but way light as far as current M3s go, and wa-a-ay light compared to the 4000 pound Merc.
Plus, with him moving closer (Washington DC area, quite possibly), I'll get to sample the wares more often. The only thing is, my bride will dearly miss the C63. She's a closet horsepower/sound effects freak, and that car simply delivered on those fronts. Yeah, she can drive stick cars, but much prefers to just put it in D and motor.
Oh well. She can still ride in it and enjoy that particular unique sound track, plus of course he still has that Boss 302 LS with its own amazing sound.
So, he's coming from automotive nirvana to a slightly different automotive nirvana - and I'll be sampling both more often.
Bruce
PS - My only question is:
Is he coming
from the Dark Side, or going
to the Dark Side.
PPS - No, the Fallon commute didn't involve any curves, it being located perhaps 50 miles east of Reno, right in the middle of nowhere. You run out there via U.S. 50, also known as the loneliest highway in the country, and when you get in the vicinity, pretty much the only way you know is that, every so often, an F-18 comes screaming by on the deck at a high rate of knots, and promptly disappears.
Way back, when pilots spotted you out there in your family truckster, they'd roll in on you! I can only imagine what you'd feel as you watched these guys peel off and and roll in, coming at you with hair on fire at .999 Mach, and suddenly
your hair is on fire as you try and exercise control over your sphincter muscles while they come over at 100 feet agl - or less.
They've since been discouraged, presumably since the dry-cleaning bills submitted to the Navy were getting onerous.