Just busted my cherry this past Monday up at Miller and wanted to share the experience and info with my peeps. If anyone has been considering doing that track, stop considering it and do it!!! That place is absolutely amazing. For those that don't know, the facility is set up with two 2.2 mile courses (East and West) and can also be configured to run the outter perimeter of both courses (3.06 miles), or the "full" course which is every single turn out there and the full 3500' front straight which is 4.5 miles around. We did the full course and it was incredible! The front straight is so long, when you come out of the final turn (turn 23, yes, that is 23) you can't even see turn 1, it's that far away. The track is nice and wide (saw some guys come through the last turn 5 wide once), has tons of grip, and isn't bumpy anywhere. Best of all, it seems to be a rider's track, meaning, it has both technical sections, as well as fast flowing sections (kinda a combination of Pahrump and LVMS, but to the 10th power).

4.5 miles per lap is a huge lap too. If you make a mistake in a particular turn, you have about 3.5 minutes to think about it before you're in that turn again. To ride the full course, it was $269 and worth every penny. I'd do it again this weekend if I could, it was that great of an experience. If anyone is interested, the organization hosting the event was Apex Track Days (Schedule | APEX Trackdays) and they were pretty solid. Unfortunately, they're last event of the year is Oct 15th and it's only the East course, but keep them in mind for next year. If I'm able, I plan to go at least once a year.

Oh, and they have everything there for you. There is a cafe there that serves pretty good hot food so no need to bring food unless you need snacks. They also have a ton of garages (didn't even get charged) with air/power plug ins EVERYWHERE. All you basically need to do is show up and have fun! Oh, and gas is available at the track, but THAT you will want to bring because it's stupid expensive.

I had the Go Pro going so once I get through the video footage, I'll try to put something together and post it

Sweet!
Thanks for the update...looking forward to some video.

(video, or it didn't happen!)

Man Robbie... I bet that Gixxer of yours was in its element on that track. And yes, I'm waiting for the video as well!

E, that was the first time I was able to really give it some stick and go up through the gears at full throttle! My first time down that straight was an eye opening experience...LITERALLY. It's a totally different experience than riding LVMS. Out here, you pin the throttle to the next turn, then slam on the brakes, go through the turn, then pin the throttle to the next turn, etc. Believe it or not, we get used to riding that way, and in my case, I tend to try to ride all tracks that way until I figure out that it doesn't work. When you come up on your brake marker at 160+ MPH, you come up on it a lot faster than you realize, and I damn near ran off in turn 1 because I was going WAAAAY too fast, but once I figured out where I need to get on the brakes, it was in heaven. Best track I've ever been on by far.

Outstanding! MMP is an awesome track, one which I would love to get back out to. Now stop posting and put up the video!

By the way Fontana has a long straight as well, check out my video

It is an amazing facility. Definitely must ride at some point

Get that Video up!!!! sounds cool!

posted this on the 702 boards and thought I'd ask here as well. I've been trying to put videos together of my Miller track day, as well as this past weekend out at LVMS. Problem is, when ever I drop the video into the Windows Movie Maker and start editing out the boring stuff, after a few minutes, playback gets choppy and the sound no longer matches up with the video. Kinda like the video is getting hung up but the sound isn't. Any recommendations on some good movie maker software that won't cost me an arm and a leg? Keep in mind, I'm not trying to be Stephen Spielberg, I'm just trying to put something decent together.

If you shot in 1080P your system could be having issues keeping up. Those files take a ton of processing power to playback.

I did it in 720P but I suspect what you say may be true. I was able to put a very short video together of a dude highsiding his R1 in front of me, but it's only about 35 seconds long or so. Same scenerio though, I had to load the full video into Movie Maker then chop it up to make the short clip I posted on YouTube, and that seems to be where my problems begin, when the full video clip is loaded into Movie Maker. I'll keep trying though.

Now that I mentioned it, I just realized that I didn't post the link to the crash here on this site. Keep in mind that when I shot this footage, it was only my second session on this track so I was still learning...hence the low corner speed. Plus, I wasn't sure what the hell homeboy on the R1 was gonna do once he passed me. Turn up the sound and at about :36 you can hear rocks and pieces of his bike hitting me as I pass by

Did you have to reformat your video before uploading it to YouTube?

Nope. Just uploaded it. They allow up to 2GB file sizes now. It kinda looks dark and non-HD because it was cloudy outside, and the camera was shooting through my non-HD windscreen!

Gotta get one of those HD windscreens. The one I bought is even in 3D!

Hmm I also have windows movie maker and after I edited my video it would not let me upload it to YouTube. Said it needed to be reformatted. I gave up and just posted an unedited video

Josh - is it in WMA format? Usually Windows Media Player/Movie Maker makes it in WMA format (Windows format). Maybe that's what the problem is. I'll bet that R3K's format is probably MPG/MPEG and I'll bet that's the accepted format by Youtube and not WMA.

At least that's one thing to check out.

I just checked and my "file type" is MP4. I'm guessing that's the default setting by the Go Pro HD I'm not even sure if you can change that.

UPDATE: I think I figured out what you're doing wrong Josh. Once you finish the movie and want to save it, go to "Save Movie" (in windows movie maker) and select "for high definition display". Then the movie maker program will finish the movie correctly and automatically give it the necessary file extension to upload to YouTube. I clicked on the wrong save option and the saved movie wasn't a "finshed" movie so when I uploaded it to YouTube, I got the same error message you got.

I know man, I've gotta get my dollars right first. Those HD screens ain't cheap, and the 3D ones are ridiculous!!! You must be ballin'!!!!

well, I haven't bought any new software to put together a video myself but my dude hooked this one up. I blew turn 6 at 2:37 but at 4.5 miles per lap, I think I was probably getting tired.

2011 10 05 - YouTube

Nice video... all of those turns look fast and flowing. That looked like a honey badger at the 2:50 mark!

Wow, I thought I was the only one that noticed that.

It does look like very fun track. Lots of concentration though during those long laps. Great vid!!!!

yeah, the first half of the track is fast as hell, especially turns 1-4 which would be the west course. The second half (East course) is the technical part

Alright chaps, it's that time again. Apex track days is holding another full 4.5 miler up at Miller over Labor Day weekend. I'm all signed up and ready to go. This time, they're combining The A (race) group with the faster B (intermediate) group guys, and putting the slower B group guys with the C (novice) guys, so only 2 groups but each getting 30 minutes of track time per session. Still $269 but well worth it. If you've been on the fence about doing this track day, stop bullshitting and get up there and get your boogie on. If you've ever wanted to see exactly what your 1000cc, 500hp War Hammer can do, this is one of the only tracks I know of in our region (possibly the nation) that has such a long front straight, and Sep 3rd is the ONLY date on the calendar where we get the full course and the full straight!

http://www.apextrackdays.com/schedule/index.php?id=106

I want to get back up to MMP, Robby I'll let you know by Aug.

Sounds good Josh. Don't wait too long though or you run the risk of them selling out on you since this is the only date for the full configuration

I know but I really can't commit until after aug 5th

Duty calls!

Registered for Group B! See you there Robby

What group were you riding with? There was a group from Boise that went, and here are some action shots of them.

http://boiseriders.net/track-time/14...th-2012-a.html

What "B" group? There's two! There's the A/B group and the B/C group

Since it was my first time seeing that track, I rode in the B group last September for the full track configuration. Based on which corners they showed in the pictures, and the July date stamp of the posts, I suspect these guys were only riding the East Track. That Waldo dude makes me what to take my RC51 instead of Da Gixxa!!

On the registration page it only had 1 group b, if/when they assign the different "B" group riders i will do the b/c as i have never ridden this track.