Christian von Koenigsegg and Mate Rimac are in the back seats. John Hennessey was fastest to our BMW hire car and wangled the front seat next to me. I'm driving. The consequences of having an off are unthinkable. Unplug these three and Instagram car channels would be empty of content, hypercar forums would have nothing to debate and exotic car buyers would be forced to limit themselves to cars from Gordon Murray and Horacio Pagani. Who were both meant to be here incidentally, but instead had to send their apologies. Gordon, Horacio, you're both much missed - next time.
Maybe they'd heard about my driving. I'm doing a track guide for the bosses before they go out and drive each other's cars. Trouble is I've never been to Sonoma Raceway before today either...
Valuable cargo loaded, I head off around this beautiful track wedged into a furrow of hills an hour north of San Francisco. Grab handles are grabbed, there's a bit of joshing from the back seats, but I manage to keep the BMW on the black stuff, show the lads the potential hazards and traps among Sonoma's off camber downhill corners and sketchy brake points, then bring them back to the pits to climb into cars with vastly more power than a nervously driven SUV.
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