Quote:
Originally Posted by Dmarcen
Can you elaborate on what hands on activities are included throughout the day? I am from the Greenville area so could be fun to fly in and visit some family with the new car but curious what the "experience" actually entails from someone who got to experience first hand?
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Sure, let me give you a nice summary..
As soon as you arrive to the Performance Center they receive you and present you with the Team of people that will be working with you that day.
They start off with a briefing of the on hands activities you will do on track and explain what features or performance and security you will be trying out. Normal stuff ABS, Emergency braking, Defensive maneuvers etc. They also explain DSC and other safety features.
They bring you out and let you get comfortable in the car (they set you up in a model similar to the one you bought). Once all setup in it you are ready to roll out.
Once setup in the car you head to the track and basically do multiple braking exercises increasing speed after each run and showing you how to maneuver the car while under hard braking. This was a very good experience because it shows you really how good the brakes on these cars really are. No fade after all the heavy braking we did.
After the braking exercise they take you to the small layout which includes a slalom and couple good corners so you can basically go at it. We did about 7 laps each. Here it will depend on the amount of cars being delivered. My group was three cars that day so we had more space between us. I asked the instructor if I could push the car and she said go for it.
After the track portion we headed to the open space they have for the part where they show you the effect of running DSC on vs off. This was a great exercise since it shows you how from 25mph to full throttle you are spun out immediately when DSC is off. You repeat the exercise with the system on and you feel all the features and computers kicking in to basically ensure you can still maintain the car under control while in full throttle on the wet track.
Next up is the hot lap portion where they get you in an M5 and basically swing it around like its a 2k pound car. This was extremely fun.
After the hot lap they let you pick an X5 and head over to the BMW Museum (a mile or two off the Performance Center) where you check out some nice cars they have there. You return back to the PC and take the X5 on the off road trail they have setup. This portion was as engaged as the track portion. Shows you all the features and capabilities these SUVs have for tackling off roads. Starts off with a very long portion of water which you run thru and then multiple up and down hills kicking in the use of cameras and downhill assist.
After this they serve you a nice lunch, then provide some time to check out the store they have there which sells items you can't get online or at BMW dealers
Finally they present you with you car and the person they assigned to you sits down and basically walks you thru each an every detail an feature of the car. Answers all your questions and basically sets you up to have a good baseline of how to get thru the iDrive menu easily.
I can tell you it is completely worth it, and I don't see how people order cars and don't pick them up as a PCD.
If you have family in the area I would say you should enjoy the PCD and also catch up with family which is what I did since I picked up Thursday and stayed an extra day to do the XPEL wrap and then headed to Georgia and met up with multiple friends and stayed over a couple more nights.