S2KI – Honda S2000 Community

With the advent of the new year, the 2012 S2K Challenge series is off to a great start. The first event was staged at Buttonwillow Raceway Park using the 13CW layout. Our member Dipstick reported on the event and his account follows past the bump. It may also interest you to know that our very own ScandinavianFlick is planning to participate in the series and we are looking forward to his coverage as the season progresses. In the meanwhile click through and read Dipstick’s account of the inaugural 2012 S2K Challenge Series event.

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Many of us have memories of our very first track outing. The hustle and bustle around the paddock, purpose-built race cars being driven in on trailers, the whirr of pneumatic tools as lug nuts are tightened and the public announcement system calling groups to the staging area. All that may make a rookie feel out of place or insignificant in the grander scheme of things until the time comes to go out on track for the first session. Once you go out and run on track, you realize that you have crossed a threshold and that you now have something in common with all those people that you saw in the paddock. You now have driven on track, survived it and want to go out for more – an addiction takes hold. From the land down under (Australia mate!), our member, nofearofdanger, writes about his memorable first track day. We hope that this rekindles fond memories of your own first track day and we also hope that it helps those of you considering a track day to make an affirmative and life-changing decision. Be sure to leave a word of encouragement for nofearofdanger by sounding off in the comments.
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This is the EV-ster. It scares me.

I love everything about internal combustion. I love the noise, the mechanical complexity, the endless variation in character and delivery between motors; the smell of uncatalyzed exhaust wafting from the track is better than coffee on a cold morning.

Electric motors have precisely none of these things, yet Honda seems to have embraced them for their next generation of sports cars. Even the new NSX will be a hybrid. It would be unprofessional to panic prematurely, so I set out to determine whether electric cars can still be fun.

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Peace of mind – it’s what we seek as we get on with our lives. Perhaps it is the litigious nature of global society, the world coming to an end in 2012 or sophisticated marketing that has us geared towards derisking or hedging every aspect of life. We set aside income for a retirement nest egg, purchase trip insurance when we go on an all-inclusive vacation to a resort where one need not worry about watching their wallet, and among a whole host of other things, also carry insurance on our car. Auto insurance, it’s that thing which calms you down as you realize applying opposite lock does not quite seem to be working OR the first thing that calms you after you’ve walked out to a car that has been the object of theft or vandalism. Yet not many actually know the full extent of their insurance coverage until an untoward event forces them to learn possibly the hard way when it is discovered that insurance will not cover the damage to your S2000.

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Many of us enjoyed reading i_heart_my_db8‘s encounter with the McLaren MP4-12C. While we are all worshippers at the altar of VTEC, most of us remain at heart car enthusiasts and acknowledge other cars. Likewise, it warms our heart when a fellow car enthusiast acknowledges our enthusiasm as well. As things turned out, a group of Southern California S2000 owners were out on their routine Last Sunday of the Month Santa Monica Run when they encountered a McLaren MP4-12C. The door opened and jaws dropped everywhere when people realized who the owner was (Hint: the most famous chin in recent American talk show history).

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“Don’t get a ticket, and don’t get dead.”

It takes a different part of your brain to speak than it does to think, so sometimes it’s important to verbally reaffirm your goals before you set out for the day. It had been a long week, so I thought I’d set out on a beautiful, sunny, Southern California Sunday morning and go get some mental help. At my last billing, my therapy costs me $4.06 a gallon, but it’s always money well spent. Advice is metered out quite vocally with my right foot.

[Jump in, fire up the engine, drop the top, select playlist, roll out]

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On behalf of the Owners, Admins, Moderators and our Community Organizers, we would like to wish you and yours all the best for the holiday season and the upcoming new year.

At the time of writing we are nearing 20 million posts and have crossed the 100,000 membership mark. Amazing numbers for a community that is dedicated to and forged from the love for one single car. This community and all of you are a constant source of inspiration to all of us at the news team and we hope to continue writing and keep the homepage an ongoing front for discussion, information and fun related to the S2000.

Here is looking forward to a fun-filled 2012 and we only hope that the fun quotient grows exponentially for 2012. For all those that have garaged their S2000, we will hope for the quick arrival of spring, for those that have the car taken apart for winter builds, we wish you luck and for the lucky few that are out there driving top down or up, we hope you will be safe and remember to lay off the eggnog for when time comes to drive between the mustard and the mayo.

Seasons Greeting and a Happy New Year! May all your dreams come true.

- Your News Team
(c32b, energetic, JulieU, ScandinavianFlick & aashish2)

In this edition of S2000s in the News (our random news feature in which we troll the internet in search of news related to the S2000), we have reports of crashes, one of which could have been avoided while the other appeared to have been inflicted on the unsuspecting S2000 owner. Montgomery News, a regional publication from Pennsylvania, mentions the S2000 in a list and AutoGuide spins the EV-STER’s arrival as the next coming of the S2000. Click through to read on and feel free to sound off in the comments. Continue reading →

Who knew that S2000′s could talk (or type) with a distinctly Aussie accent? In the first-ever recorded case of human-machine linguistic communication (because siri really is a person responding from a call center overseas), we hear from one S2000 that has found a home in Perth, Australia, telling us how Christmas is celebrated down under in the company of mates that include humans and machines. So tell Sheila or John to watch the shrimp on the barbie, while you click through to read the article. Tip of the hat to slackzy for the writeup.

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We have just launched a few new shirts and also a bunch of fleece into the store. It’s been a long while since the last batch of new gear.

Order yours today from the S2KI Store http://store.s2ki.com!

‘Tis the season of receiving. We say that knowing fully well that most of you have either a list of goodies or some expectation of what you want to receive this season for your S2000. Being the motorheads that we are, it is par for the course. We started a debate of sorts amongst the editorial team about what we thought ought to be on the list of every S2000 owner this holiday season and came up with the following (in no particular order of importance). We hope you all have been good this year and that one or more of the following make their way into your stocking:

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 There is something to be said about Halo cars – they provide street cred to a manufacturer and its fans, bragging rights about ‘Ring Times’ and opportunities galore to exploit young impressionable minds via social media outlets. Nissan has the behemoth GT-R, Toyota has that curious carbon creation, the Lexus LF-A, Chevy has the Corvette ZR1 and Honda had the NSX which was quite the marvel of engineering and handling for its time. Currently though, Honda has no halo car, although rumors and hushed whispers indicate that something is coming.

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I live by “simplify and add lightness”, both as an engineer and a driver, and the Lotus 7 has always seemed to be the purest road-legal interpretation of that philosophy. They are, however, exceedingly rare in the United States, so when the opportunity to purchase a Birkin S3 arose, I was overjoyed. Less than ten minutes after I spotted it online, the Evil Red Racecar (my much-modified S2000) was snarling north along the 5 freeway.

90 miles devoured in under an hour, I found myself at a dealer featuring an impressive collection of 356s and classic Ferraris. The owner had already pulled the car out around back, and after a short ride in the passenger side, we switched seats. Moment of truth time…

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Fast Hondas have an image problem. From The Fast and the Furious to the “VTEC just kicked in, yo!” meme, our cars have become associated with an unpleasant stereotype: ignorant, obnoxious drivers; street racing; and the infamous “fart can” exhaust.

This stereotype is aggravated to no end by the tendency of our community to customize their cars with the frippery of faux performance. It may well be the right of each individual to modify their vehicle as they see fit, either to express themselves or with the intent of improving upon its capabilities, but one man’s treasure is another’s trash (and vice versa). A clear boundary should be drawn between modifications which are purely cosmetic in nature, and those that actually improve performance.

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We got word from fellow news team member, JulieU, that a write-up was brewing  from one of  the crew that attended the 2011 Boston Mountains Tour (BMT). A significant other and forum member, Ms. Goes Fast, was so inspired by the event that she wrote a speech for a class project about the Boston Mountains Tour and what it meant for the participants. As you will read, events such as these have a special meaning for they are all about rekindling that bond between driver and car as well as the common kinship shared by enthusiasts from a diverse background. Click through for a video slideshow and to read the true meaning of the BMT and be sure to leave a word of appreciation for Ms. Goes Fast.

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