Ford Racing School - Dream Park

The High Life
If you've been to more than a few race tracks, as I have, you begin to appreciate the nice ones. My jaw dropped just driving into Miller Motorsports Park. This is hands-down the most impressive motorsports facility I've experienced in the continental U.S. It's a veritable motorsports playground with a 4.5-mile road course, a 0.9-mile go-cart track, and a Supermoto track, where motocross dirt bikes run on asphalt and dirt.

Other than the overall upscale nature of the facility, the most impressive part is the unprecedented spectator views available from the grandstands and the VIP clubhouse. The track was designed with a nearly unobstructed view of the entire track. It's a facility that makes watching a road race nearly as fun for the spectators as it is for the drivers.

While the facility has innumerable niceties-a playground, spectator Oases for picnicking, and the inevitable gift shop-one part of Mr. Miller's personal playground you don't want to miss is the MMP museum, featuring a fraction of his collection in the form of vintage GT 40 race cars, Shelby GT 350s, and much more. It's worth checking out, and in many cases you can even pick up a die-cast model of one of the cars in the museum. I'm sure the Shelby and SVT fans and the SAAC and SVOTA annual events held at Miller enjoyed the hardware in the musem.

Take the Challenge
Having had an absolute blast getting to know the West Course in the MMP school car, it was time to sneak in a few laps in the Mustang Challenge racer. What separates the Challenge racer from its school-car brethren is a 340-pound diet that primarily consists of a gutted interior and BFGoodrich g-Force R1 DOT race tires. If you ever doubted that extra weight was holding back the performance of your 'Stang, this car proves it is. In addition to the diet and tires, these cars feature Torsen Racing Differentials, AIM data systems, Sparco fire suppression systems and removable steering wheels, and Steeda racing front splitters and rear wings.

When coupled with the sticky tires, the lighter Challenge car took on a new personality-and it was a great one. The extra go and grip magnified what was already good about the school car. Easy to drive and balanced with the right racy demeanor, it's the kind of open-track ride I'd love to own, as the power never overwhelms the chassis. That makes for a safe, fun driving experience.

If you get the chance to drive one, I'm sure you'll have the same reaction, and you might wish you could race it. Well, it turns out you can-even if you don't own one. MMP has put together something called the Mustang Challenge-a seven-weekend, 14-race series. Each weekend gets you two qualifying rounds and two races. To run the series, you must complete the licensing school, which will run $3,700. Once that's under your belt, you can buy a Challenge car for $55,000, lease one for the season, or rent for $3,500 for the weekend. It sounds expensive, but if you aren't buying the car, you just pay, show up, and race. No headaches, no race trailers, no working on the car. Just racing fun. Now $3,500 sounds really affordable, doesn't it?