Last week was a fun and dynamic opportunity for me at Circuit of the Americas. I was helping out a longtime friend, Daniel Bloom, who is the owner of Apex Track Events. Apex has evolved through the years, initially starting out as a semi-private track day experience. They still offer that today, but now they are exclusively for race teams looking for testing opportunities.
Apex coordinates their event days in conjunction with various racing organizations’ schedules, so the dates fall in a convenient window for race teams to test leading into their upcoming races. As Apex continues to expand, they found themselves with two events at the same time on different ends of the country last week. Luckily, I got to step in and help!
Dan was both putting on the COTA event and driving at it, getting ready for the upcoming Porsche Sprint Challenge race weekend. That meant my role during the Apex event was twofold: helping Dan with the logistics and track operations components as well as coaching Dan to help him learn COTA prior to the race weekend.
Dan had never been to COTA before, so it was an entirely new track experience for him. We had a ton of fun not just learning the track but also putting on a successful event for all the race teams who participated.
If you’ve ever been to an Apex event, you know it’s unique because not only does it provide a low car-count testing environment, but Dan also provides top-notch catering for breakfast and lunch. There’s even a full-service espresso bar that everyone uses to stay fueled up during the day!
Dan made a lot of progress learning the great F1 circuit and came up to speed quickly. It was such a fun week for me to get to both coach a client who was successfully hitting his goals and to help keep the event running smoothly.