Lifestyle
Tesla Racing Tips: Your First Track Day
Track days are one of the most exhilarating activities one can experience. It’s a chance to take your favorite car to a real race track to see what it’s capable of. See how you fair as a driver, learn firsthand about the culture of motorsports, and experience what performance driving is really like. We’ll be providing an overview of what to expect along with some Tesla specific tips for your first track day.
How Does it Work ?
Track days are set up by independent motorsport event organizers that make arrangements with various race tracks. There are usually several of them covering each state. Examples:
- Speed Ventures in Southern California
- NCRC in Northern California
- NASA throughout US
Each company will have 3 or more groups separated by driver experience. For example,
Blue – beginner
Purple – intermediate low
Black – intermediate high
Red – advanced
You start in the beginner group, and as you build your experience you move up to the next level.
How Much does it Cost ?
Depending on the track, the cost can be as low as $100 and as high as $400 per day. The average is usually around $200, but be sure to also include the following:
- travel/lodging costs
- track gate fee, around $15
- helmet rental if you don’t have your own, around $30
- about $60 per session if you want an instructor
- RV spot rental for charging, around $20 per day
- professional photos from the track (highly recommended), around $40
- participation in competition or ‘challenges’.
If you continue your racing adventures, over time you will want to get your own equipment such as a helmet, racing suit, racing tires and a professional camera.
Is it Real Racing ?
Technically speaking, racing refers to competition racing, also known as wheel to wheel racing. Open track racing competes for best lap times where as competition racing usually competes for best positioning (ie. the first one at the finish line wins). Motorsports groups such as Speed Ventures make it a fun experience by structuring the open track events to resemble competition with qualifying sessions and pre-grid positions.
Will My Car Get Damaged?
With competition racing, your objective is to win by any means necessary, which can include risking damage to your car as well as the competitor’s. In open track racing, the objective is to have fun, learn performance driving, be competitive, but walk away with your car intact. Safety should always be kept in mind and any risk-taking should be weighed against its consequences. The beginner group will consist of those who have never been on a race track before so exercise as much caution as possible when racing in this group.
Will my Insurance Cover Track Days?
In most cases, the answer is no. Your regular car insurance does not cover anything that happens on the track. Also keep in mind that car manufacturers, including Tesla, will not cover any warranty items that may have incurred while racing. A dedicated track insurance policy can be purchased for the Model S for approximately $400 a day, but that figure can vary greatly depending on how much coverage you’re looking for.
What is the Racing Format Like ?
The day starts with a driver’s meeting where you learn the rules for the event, but also given the opportunity to ask any questions you may have. Typically there are 4 or 5 20-minute racing sessions per day. So a group races for 20 minutes, then waits for about one hour while other groups race, and then the cycle repeats. It’s important to charge your Tesla during down time. Track driving consumes a lot of power so recharging in between sessions will ensure your Tesla Model S to have enough juice for three full sessions or four or five partial sessions.
ALSO SEE: The Tesla Racing Series
In the beginner group, the first one or two sessions are set up as a lead-follow exercise, where you follow an instructor. It’s an excellent opportunity to learn the proper racing lines.
What if I Have No Prior Racing Experience ?
It’s a good idea to get an instructor even if it’s only for one session. They can help you understand how to configure your steering and seating position as well as teach you driving techniques as you navigate the course. Lead-follow sessions are definitely a must for everyone. Another technique that is helpful is to follow a more advanced driver around the track and try to mimic what they are doing (if you can keep up).
Do I Need to Worry About Charging ?
Yes, you do. You will use approximately 4 miles of charge per 1 rated mile. Meaning if you have 200 rated miles, it will be enough for 50 actual racing miles. A typical track is about 2.5 miles, so 200 rated miles will get you 20 laps. Each session is approximately 10 laps. Without recharging you are good for about 2 full sessions. Charging at the tracks is usually done with NEMA 14-50, which gets you 4 hours * 30 miles per hour of charge = 120 extra miles, which is good for about another full session. Due to Tesla’s power limiting feature, we found it to be better to just run half sessions
Will the Tesla Model S go the Distance ?
The Model S is not built for racing. It overheats after one lap of hard performance driving. When that happens, power limitation kicks in to protect the car. A yellow dashed line on the power consumption gauge appears on the dashboard. The longer you go, the more severe power limitation gets. It’s a great safety feature as it lets you push the car as hard as you want without having to worry about car damage.
However this same protection mechanism has a drastic impact on the overall racing experience. You can start off as being one of fastest cars on the track on your first lap, to becoming the slowest car on the track in the subsequent laps.
Do I Need Racing Tires ?
On your first track day, no. Whatever standard tires you have on your car, they’ll work fine, as you won’t be setting any records on your first day. It’s only as you start getting more competitive and push the car harder, will you need to get tires that are more suited for racing. Bring a tire pressure gauge or a compressor if you have it. Your tire pressure should not be above 40 psi cold. Meaning, check your tire pressure in the morning before you get on the track. It should not be more than 40.
Is it a Strenuous Physical Activity ?
Yes it is. Performance driving for 20 minutes straight is a lot of work. Be prepared for that. Especially if you come from a drag racing or autocross background where racing sessions last under a minute. You will get used to it with time, but the first few times can be quite exhausting. Make sure to stay well hydrated, especially in the summer. A lot of tracks are in desert areas with hot temperatures and very low humidity. Drinking water is important to feeling well throughout the day.
Should I turn Traction Control and Regenerative Braking Off ?
Traction control will help you stay on track if you lose control, so leave it on. Regen braking improves stability during braking, especially at higher speeds, but it’s mostly a personal preference.
Is it OK to Capture my Track Experience with an Action Camera ?
Absolutely. GoPro is everyone’s favorite. It’s always nice to get GPS data readouts and overlays as well. Garmin VIRB is a leader in that area among consumer cameras in the $400 range, but they have serious accuracy issues. Professional action cameras such as AIM SmartyCam will be the best, but its high cost may not be for everyone.
Be safe and have fun on your first track day!
Investor's Corner
Tesla unfolded its first European “folding Supercharger”
Tesla’s folding Supercharger just arrived in Europe and it changes how fast charging expands.
Tesla’s Folding Unit Supercharger has officially landed in Europe, with the company teasing a new installation in its effort for a broader rollout targeting major motorway rest stops across the European continent in Q3 2026. The arrival marks a notable shift in how Tesla is thinking about network expansion, moving from hardware performance alone to engineering the logistics chain itself.
While Tesla did not reveal the exact location for the new folding Supercharger in Europe, the photo shared on X heavily suggests that this maybe somewhere in Norway. Historically, whenever Tesla rolls out an entirely new infrastructure architecture in Europe, whether it was the original Supercharger stalls years ago or these brand-new modular V4 “Folding Units”, Norway is almost always the designated launch pad because of its unmatched EV adoption rate and supportive infrastructure
The Folding Unit, introduced in March 2026, is a factory pre-assembled V4 charging station built on an industrial hinge system mounted to a heavy-duty concrete base. The entire assembly arrives on site ready to unfold and connect. Tesla confirmed the units feature telescopic light poles specifically designed for easy transportation and fast on-site deployment, a detail that signals how carefully the logistics chain has been engineered alongside the hardware itself. The design allows 33% more stalls per delivery truck, cuts installation time roughly in half, and reduces overall deployment costs by more than 20% compared to traditional installations.
Tesla’s newest “Folding V4 Superchargers” are key to its most aggressive expansion yet
Tesla also noted telescopic light poles which provide benefits over traditional Supercharger installations that require fixed-height poles that are awkward to ship, slow to position on site, and often require separate crews and equipment to erect before charging hardware can even be staged. By engineering poles that compress for transit and extend on arrival, Tesla has removed one of the quieter bottlenecks in the physical deployment process. Every hour saved on a light pole installation is an hour redirected toward getting stalls energized. At scale, across dozens of new sites per quarter, those hours add up to a meaningful acceleration in how quickly a location goes from approved permit to serving its first customer.
Each Folding Unit pairs a single V4 power cabinet with eight charging posts. The V4 cabinet delivers up to 500 kW per stall for passenger vehicles and up to 1.2 MW for the Tesla Semi, supporting twice the stalls per cabinet at three times the power density of its predecessor. Longer cables make every new station immediately usable by non-Tesla vehicles, a priority as Tesla continues opening its network to Ford, GM, Rivian, Hyundai, Stellantis, and others.
As Teslarati reported when the Folding Unit was first unveiled, Tesla’s Gigafactory New York produced its final V3 Supercharger cabinet in March 2026 after more than seven years and 15,000 units, completing a full pivot to V4 production. The European arrival of the folding design is the next chapter in that transition.
Faster and cheaper deployment means Tesla can justify building in markets and corridors that were previously too expensive to serve, filling the coverage gaps that have slowed EV adoption outside major urban centers.
First Folding Unit Superchargers in Europe 🇪🇺 https://t.co/KNfYWJukkL pic.twitter.com/YR1udIpH1i
— Tesla Charging (@TeslaCharging) June 10, 2026
Elon Musk
SpaceXAI just launched into your kitchen with their new app
SpaceXAI just powered its first consumer app and it predicts what you want to buy.
SpaceXAI just made its first move into consumer AI, and it involves your grocery cart. On June 3, 2026, Gopuff and SpaceXAI announced the launch of Go, a Grok-powered shopping assistant built directly into the Gopuff app that predicts what you need before you even start searching for it.
Gopuff is an instant delivery platform that operates more than 400 micro-fulfillment centers across the U.S., delivering everyday essentials, snacks, drinks, and household items in as little as 15 minutes. It is not a restaurant delivery app or a marketplace. It owns its inventory, controls its warehouses, and handles its own logistics, which means it has built one of the most detailed consumer behavior datasets in retail over its 13-year history.
Go combines SpaceXAI’s advanced reasoning, voice, and image generation models with Gopuff’s dataset of hundreds of millions of orders and real-time cultural signals from X to prepare a suggested cart the moment a customer opens the app. It learns each shopper’s habits and automatically builds a personalized cart based on time of day, location, order history, and real-time indicators. Returning customers can check out with a single tap.
Rather than searching for specific items, users can describe a situation like a game-day party or the desire for a healthy breakfast and Go will assemble a cart automatically. It can also predict when shoppers are running low on items like coffee or paper towels and have them packed and delivered in under 15 minutes. Grok voice integration lets users talk to the app in plain conversational language and check out completely hands-free.
Gopuff co-founder and co-CEO Yakir Gola said: “Today, we believe the greatest friction left in commerce is not delivery or instantaneous access to the essentials customers need. It’s the moment before: the thinking, the deciding, the remembering. We’re combining Gopuff’s demand intelligence with xAI’s frontier reasoning to create an everyday shopping experience that feels like a true extension of you.”
Why SpaceX just made a $60 billion bet on AI coding ahead of historic IPO
The timing carries context beyond the product launch. SpaceXAI was formed after SpaceX completed an all-stock merger with Elon Musk’s xAI earlier this year, folding one of the most advanced AI labs in the world into the same corporate structure as the company preparing what could be the largest IPO in history. SpaceXAI is dipping into consumer-focused AI just as it prepares for its public debut, and while Musk has openly discussed building an everything app, this launch uses Grok to power another company’s product rather than launching a standalone consumer platform. Every consumer-facing deployment of Grok ahead of the IPO roadshow adds tangible evidence that SpaceXAI is not just an infrastructure play but a direct competitor in the AI application layer where OpenAI and Google are already fighting for dominance.
Lifestyle
Tesla saves its passengers again – This time after a 300-foot cliff fall in Malibu
A Tesla Model 3 fell 300 feet off a Malibu cliff and both passengers survived.
A Tesla Model 3 plunged roughly 300 feet off a cliff on Mulholland Highway in Malibu on Friday morning, May 29, 2026, and both occupants survived. The crash was reported at approximately 7:30 a.m. near the 2500 block of Mulholland Highway, triggering a multi-agency rescue operation involving Malibu Search and Rescue, the Los Angeles County Fire Department, the California Highway Patrol, and McCormick Ambulance.
When first responders arrived, the male driver was outside the vehicle shouting for help while the female passenger remained pinned inside the Tesla. Rescue crews rappelled down the cliffside on ropes to reach the wreckage. A flight medic was lowered by helicopter to begin treating both victims, and the driver was hoisted up to the roadway before crews used the Jaws of Life to free the trapped passenger. Both were airlifted to a local trauma center with moderate injuries despite a remarkable result for a fall that steep.
The outcome is not surprising, considering Model 3 earned an overall 5-star rating from NHTSA in every category and sub-category, and recorded the lowest probability of injury of any car ever evaluated by the U.S. New Car Assessment Program. The absence of a traditional engine in the front of the vehicle creates a longer crumple zone that absorbs impact energy before it reaches occupants, and the battery pack running along the floor gives the car an unusually low center of gravity that reinforces structural rigidity.
This is not the first time a Tesla has kept passengers alive after going off a cliff. A Tesla Model Y carrying a family of four survived a plunge off a cliff at Devil’s Slide near San Francisco in January 2023, with two adults and two children walking away from a 250-foot fall. That incident drew widespread attention to how the structural integrity of Tesla’s electric platform performs in extreme crash scenarios that most vehicles would not survive.
Tesla Model Y driver who drove off cliff with family attempts to avoid criminal conviction
