#DrivingRecords

“Tested on the Nürburgring,” is just the latest eye-rolling claim to be adopted by automakers desperate to instill a new product with an air of sportiness.

“Nürburgring?!” being the anticipated reaction. “Well, the Germans aren’t going to let just any minivan on that track … ”

There’s much guilt to go around. Just as a Ram maintenance truck trundling down the runway at Edwards Air Force Base is not a space shuttle or F-35, running some laps on the famed circuit does not a supercar make. Still, the track’s allure persists, especially among marketing types.

Sometimes, an achievement crops up that makes the typing of “Nürburgring” an acceptable practice — specifically, the setting of a record.

It was a pain in the ass — literally. “I spent two years training my ass,” Carl Reese tells me via phone, shortly after his announcement of YACCR (Yet Another Cross Country Record). “I was serious about my fitness. I even sat on my seat (a Sargent aftermarket replacement, with backrest) while I was on my computer doing my job. But by the time I got into Pennsylvania, I was in so much pain that it was affecting everything else. I was hitting the kill switch on the bike instead of the turn signal because my senses were overwhelmed. I was glad to see that New York skyline.”

As a devoted, even bigoted, owner and rider of Honda motorcycles, I was tempted to make a comment about BMW riders and their proclivity for “training their asses.” Instead, I let Carl Reese, already familiar to TTAC readers from the Tesla cross-country electric-vehicle record with Alex Roy late last year, keep talking about how, and why, he rode his BMW K1600GT across the country in a shade over thirty-eight hours, ass pain and all.