Last year, Volkswagen decided to hand a truly spectacular insider freebie to the fellow who runs a popular VW owners’ forum: an all-expenses-paid race in the TDI Cup at Road America. The TDI Cup is meant to be a talent showcase for twentysomething novice drivers whose parents can come up with $45,000 and all related expenses, but VW waived all the age, talent, financial, and racing-resume requirements for our forum friend.

Prior to the event, several people asked me “How’s he gonna do?” My iron-clad prediction was that he would finish DFL, and that would only be because there’s no place in a race behind DFL. I’d only met the guy once, but I’d seen the video which is freeze-framed above, and that was enough for me to play amateur odds-maker. In this video, we repeatedly see him “shuffle-steer”. Shuffle-steering is a word for what most of us do on the street every day: change the position of our hands on the steering wheel while turning. It’s comfy, it’s useful for downtown parking, and I find it to be very useful when I’m texting on back roads, but on a racetrack, it is the mark of the chump.
(Read More…)