Jonny Lieberman: Pikes Peak Practice Is Three Daunting Days Above the Clouds

I'm going to preface everything below by declaring here and now that there's no way to fully explain the Pikes Peak hillclimb, which I'm running this year in the Porsche Pikes Peak Trophy by Yokohama class. If anyone stopped and thought about it, the race would be canceled immediately. Perhaps retroactively. There's no other motorsports event like it. None. "It's the world's only living racetrack," my coach and Pikes Peak hall of famer Jeff Zwart likes to say. He goes on to explain that the "track" is in fact three distinct sections, and there isn't a way to ideally set your car up for the entire 12-mile, 156-turn race. That's about the same length and number of turns as the Nürburgring Nordschleife, but because of the nearly 5,000-foot rise in elevation from start to finish, weather and road conditions are all over the place. Visually, as a driver, you see the track surroundings change three times.

The bottom section runs through a lush, green pine forest; the middle is above the tree line and is marked by massive boulders along the route, first-gear hairpins, glaciers, and sheer cliffs. OK, maybe 80-degree cliffs, but they do drop about 1,800 feet (nearly) straight down before the ground starts to level. There are three such guardrail-less drops; I named them Madness & Death 1, 2, and 3 while learning Pikes on a simulator. Google "Pikes Peak EVO crash" if you want a good look at Madness & Death 3. The desolate upper section, which starts at 13,000 feet, looks like Scotland midway through a nuclear winter. "You can't explain the upper section to people who haven't driven it," pro driver and five-time Pikes veteran David Donahue told me. "It just doesn't make any sense."

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Speaking of not making much sense, let me tell you about the practice sessions, which is all I've done as of this writing. The route we race to the summit is a public toll road that more than half a million people drive each year. Costs to drive on it vary, but figure $15 for each person or $50 a carload, so we're talking real money. This means the powers that be don't want the road closed for a few dozen maniacs save for one Sunday a year: race day. However, as the road is constantly changing—alive, as Zwart would say—practice is necessary. In fact, it's mandatory for rookies like me. With that in mind, here are what my three practice days looked like:

2:22 a.m.Alarm goes off. Hit snooze.

2:31 a.m.Snooze goes off. Get up, hose off, get dressed, double check gear.

3:00 a.m.Meet my crew at Porsche Colorado Springs, the dealership that's supporting me.

3:15 a.m.Leave the dealership for the mountain.

3:40 a.m.Arrive at the gate. Wait in line with every other team.

4:00 a.m.Start rolling up the mountain toward the pits.

4:20 a.m.Unload the car and change into racing gear.

4:45 a.m.Driver's meeting, where we hear things like "bowling-ball-sized boulders were on the road up at the 16-mile marker" and "they released 15 bears onto the mountain this year, so look out for them."

4:55 a.m.Start strapping into the car and turn the oxygen bottle on. More on that in a bit.

5:00 a.m.Green light means go, go, go!

5:05 a.m.The first car (whoever's ready first) takes the green flag. Other cars quickly follow.

5:15 a.m.Sit in race car, waiting for the other dozen or so competitors to get to where you are, and try and wrap your head around the fact that this is really happening.

5:30 a.m.Cruise back down to the start of the day's section and do it all over again. We squeezed in five sessions on the longer, bottom section on day one, and six sessions each of the middle and upper sections on days 2 and 3.

8:30 a.m.Track goes cold. Start packing up and change.

9:00 a.m.Leave the pits and begin heading back down the mountain.

The above explains factually what happens. Emotionally, physically, and perhaps spiritually, it explains nothing. Here's an example: In mid-June, when you're driving the middle section (which begins at 11,400 feet at a spot called Glen Cove) the sun rises below you. Think about it. I watched an orange dawning sun off to my left rise from below the road I was racing up. Surreal is too weak of a word, but I've never seen anything like it. This also means that on your next run, the sun is directly in your eye. Like, you're facing it. Sunglasses won't work here; the Zwart-approved technique is to put a 1-inch strip of painter's tape across the bottom of your helmet's visor. It works like the brim of a baseball hat, and since the visor is adjustable the tape works no matter where the sun is. Plus, if there's actually a fire you just flip it down and you can still see over the top of the tape strip. Brilliant, and one of the many quirks of the mountain.

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Which brings us to the third day of practice.

"Just make sure I go second," I say to my crew chief, Jason Schmitt. Ever since we got above 11,000 feet on day two, Schmitt has been looking at me with a sideways smirk just before we get going. See, he lives in Colorado Springs, and the locals think us sea-level types go a bit soft in the head at elevation. Which, to be fair, we do. Day three found us parked in the practice day's temporary pit at Devil's Playground, 13,000 feet high. I'd gotten screamed at the day before as I was the first car to the top of the middle section. Once I passed the checkered flag, I made a U-turn and parked my Cayman GT4 Clubsport on a part of the road I thought was safe. Nope! "Move your [CENSORED] car NOW!" a rightfully angry Pikes Peak volunteer hollered at me with a look of contempt and disbelief on his face. "Sorry," I shouted through my helmet. "It's my first day."

It was actually my second day at that point, because on my first day we ran the bottom section (the starting line is 9,300 feet) and when we made a U-turn to come down, they parked us on the road. No one told me day two would be different! This was now the third day, and I was once again the first one in their car. But I had no idea what to expect at the peak and wasn't in the mood to get shouted at again. "Please make sure I go second," I pleaded again to Schmitt. "Let me turn on your oxygen," a still smirking Schmitt said. That's right, some racers elect to run O2 right into our helmets. Because it helps. But my point stood. I wanted to go second.

Three minutes and 49 seconds later, I took the checkered flag. I had done it. As I went past the man with the red flag (on practice days the yellow-vested crew use a red flag to whoa you down and park you), I burst into tears. If I can get a little personal for a moment, the past three years included the deaths of five people very close to me, including my sister and my mother. For whatever oxygen-starved reason, my mom's face popped into my head the second I saw that red flag and realized I'd done something no one could ever take away from me. Sure, it was just a practice session, but I'd driven a race car to the top of Pikes Peak. I just broke down. I was weeping. Tears of joy, I assure you. It felt so good, and I think it hit me that I'd never be able to share this moment with her. I've yet to fully deal with her death, yet somehow this helped. Let's call it catharsis.

As for now, I'm trying to brace myself for what I'm going to feel when I do it on race day. Eleven days and counting. Wish me luck!