So today, I went to the Intel / BMW seminar. Was great fun. The first half of the day, Intel had several presentations talking about computer virtualization (ala VMWare). Pretty interesting. Say you are testing a website that has a separate web content computer, a database computer, and a message forum computer...you could run all of them in virtual thingies on your own computer and run it like that. They also had operating system and application streaming where all the files are not local on your computer. The advantage of that is that patches and changes can be applied and then when you next boot up it'll be there...so you change it in one place and everyone gets it.

The second half of the day was the BMW performance driving seminar
1. I rode passenger with an instructor named John Paul (not the pope). He led the Indy 500 in 1998 for 100 miles, eventually finishing 7th. I also rode passenger to a guy who races in the Grand American Rolex series driving a Daytona Prototype. Cool.
2. Drove an M5 w/ the paddle shifters on their infield road course, they added these Mickey Mouse side paths, so you couldn't really go super fast...think Streets of Willow. I turned on the Power mode which bumps the car from 400hp to 500hp. Made the shifting program the sportiest and off I went..It was faast! Got the rear end loose a bunch. Very fun. Most people drove really conservatively so it was really fun to just blast off and drive on the edge. It was only later that I discovered there was a suspension setting button, and I had it on comfort instead of sport. I was wondering why the car rolled so much and didn't appear to handle well.
3. Drove the M Coupe 6 speed manual on an autocross course. Of all the cars I drove, I liked this one the best cuz it was the sportiest. Also drove super aggressive...the best time was 30.5 seconds which was what the instructor could do. The best I did was 31.8 w/ a 250 pound passenger. Also the traction control or stability control would kick in and drop power..sucks.. And the interior sucks too..at least the dash ..cheap plastic
4. Drove the 335i coupe 6 speed manual across an autocross. Twice. Again, drove on the limit. Over the limit actually, I tried to trail brake into this decreasing radius turn, went in too hot and ran over some cones..kekke. I felt the car was a little too large to be super nimble. Also the traction control or stability control sucks...I mash the gas and nothing happens cuz it determines it would be too dangerous.
5. Drove the M6 convertible 6 speed manual on an autocross...that car is too large...hard to handle cuz it's too big.
6. Drove gokarts around the kart track. Twice.. Fun! You got to race against other people...it's really hard to pass cuz they aren't looking back...

I would get the M coupe if I could :P even over the 335i, it's not sporty enough. I also wish on the M5 I put the suspension in sport mode so I could see how it really handled.