interesting :0)
My parents gave me a Silverstone Driving Experience day out for Christmas
<Big Grin>. It's been a long three weeks' wait but finally today I pulled
myself out of bed at 6 am (on a Saturday, arrgh!) and headed for
Silverstone. Two uneventful motorway hours later we crossed the bridge over
the famous Hangar Straight and pulled into the Drive car park in the middle
of the Silverstone F1 circuit. Ehehehe. I could see a brace of bright yellow
Lotus Elises, a Ford Escort Cossie, a dozen Formula First single-seaters
sitting in lines in the pits, an Evo 6, and yet more exotic machinery
glinting in the sunshine. The ground was damp and greasy from last night's
rain (ulp!) and there was a bitterly cold wind blowing so it was straight
into the Drive building (caf, briefing rooms, waiting area) for coffee and
hot sandwiches whilst we signed in at registration.
We were early and my girlfriend/chief photographer was unimpressed with the
hour we had to wait before the briefing, but a couple of chocolate bars put
an end to the "you made me get up way too early I could have stayed in bed
for another hour and it's cold and I forgot my hat and and etc etc".
Eventually I shuffled into the briefing room with the other 14 people on my
course, and we spent a hectic half-hour trying to keep up with the
instructor, Rob, who ran through a million important bits of information at
very high speed (I don't *think* this was TVR Tuscan GT driver and
Silverstone race instructor Rob Barff, but it may have been - one of the
cars in the Drive car park had the number plate "B4RFF"....).
Rob's main points (as I understood them) seemed contradictory: (1) don't
crash or spin, and (2) don't hang about, its a racing car, so give it some
welly!
After the briefing we split into two groups. My group was to go to the Stowe
circuit (the Race School's training circuit which lies inside the lower loop
of the full F1 circuit) to grapple with the school's Formula First
single-seaters, and the other group were minibussed off to drive Peugeot 306
GTi 6 hatches on the South Circuit. I've never driven a racing car before so
I was pretty nervous, especially because the tarmac was so greasy. We'd been
told that one spin is forgiveable but two would mean the end of our track
session, so I was anxious not to get too carried away at the start.
Once strapped in with helmets buckled, we were led slowly away behind a pace
car for three track familiarisation laps. Coloured cones marked the points
for braking, turn-in, clipping and exit and the Stowe circuit is pretty
simple so it was easy to see the line. I tried flooring the throttle briefly
a couple of times to feel the grip (or lack of - it was greasy enough in
places to break the rear wheels loose in 3rd gear even at low speed). Better
be careful!
The pace car brought us back into the pits and then we were sent out one by
one to start lapping on our own. Right, here we go, this is me in a
single-seater race car, time to start impressing the instructors with my
beautiful power slides and near-lap-record times......? No way :0) I took it
*really* easy for the first few laps, slowly building up the speed whenever
I dared. I could feel the rear wheels twitching as I accelerated gently out
of the corners and I only felt that I could safely floor the throttle when
pointing dead straight. When I did though... WAHOO!!... this thing is
*fast*. Big grin again.
On my second lap I was shown the blue overtaking flag. Doh. I eased off at
the start of the straight and watched the other car slide by me and then
tucked in behind him for the next bend. Aha, here's where I'm going wrong,
he was way faster than me through the corners. Fine, I thought, I can do
that too, so I built the speed up a bit. A lap later it was me doing the
overtaking as a slower car got flagged and let me past. Sweet. I got a bit
cocky through the next hairpin and tried putting the power on 20 yards
earlier than I had been doing before. Immediately I felt the back end swing
out, and, oh bugger, I was losing it! Mustn't spin mustn't spin - I fed in
the opposite lock until the steering wheel was as far round as it could go,
and then there was this amazing slow-motion moment as the car decided what
to do.... a second later (felt like a whole lifetime) the rear stepped back
into line and I was pointing straight again. Phew! That really got the
adrenalin going and down the next straight my heart was thumping away, but
at least I'd managed to stay ahead of the car that I'd just overtaken (I
didn't want him in front of me because of the spray from the damp road,
which could cover the visor in just a few seconds, very awkward).
Another few laps and I was starting to feel pretty comfortable in the
Formula First. The North hairpin had one really really slippy patch to watch
out for but everywhere else the grip was fairly consistent, and flying down
the straight at 4000 rpm in 4th gear (about 85-90 mph the instructors said)
and only 5 yards from other cars was an awesome feeling. I started pushing a
little harder again but alas, I was brought to a halt by the chequered flag
and "Pit In" board - no way! That couldn't *possibly* have been 10 laps
already could it? Bugger!
Out of the Firsts, into the minibus and there was just time to get our
breath before we were on to the Peugeot 306 Gti 6's on South Circuit. This
is the "bottom half" of the full F1 circuit, running from Becketts clockwise
around to Club and then just before Abbey it cuts across through Ireland
(the "wrong" way) and then it's back to Becketts again. Apart from
rollcages, the 306s were standard road-going cars (which surprised me, I
kind of expected uprated brakes and suspension). Still, 167bhp and "a
passive rear-wheel steer system which makes them feel more like a RWD hatch
when pushed hard" should be interesting.... :0)
Helmets on again (open face this time), and we were off to meet our
instructors, who were to be riding with us to give advice, keep us out of
trouble, and to help out with overtaking/traffic. I was matched up with BTCC
Vauxhall driver Phil Bennett - 4th in the 2001 BTCC - there's a man who
ought to know the quick way around Silverstone! After a brief wait whilst
Phil's WAP phone refused to dish out the Monte Carlo rally results, we were
off. Phil drove a "slow" (!) lap to point out the various coloured cones and
markers, and then a quicker one to show me what I ought to be doing, heh.
Then it was back into the pits to swap seats. My turn. 6 laps. Excellent.
The 306 has a 6-speed box, but 4th gear was pretty good everywhere on the
South circuit which meant there were no gear changes to think about. This
was great as it left me more "spare brain power" to use to concentrate on
all the things I should avoid, like spinning, other cars, armco, spinning,
spinning into other cars, etc....
As before, the coloured marker cones were an incredible help and the line
was easy to see (slightly harder to actually stay on it though!). The 306
felt wonderful to drive and it took just two laps before I was
four-wheel-drifting into the Ireland right-left-right, taking a bit of kerb
as I did so - an incredible feeling! Even though the track was greasy it
didn't seem to matter as once over the "limit" everything was calm and
controllable. Awesome. Phil kept up a running commentary, alternately giving
praise and barking orders, and I really got into a rhythm. On the 3rd or 4th
lap (they all kind of blur into one!) I *nailed* the exit of the right-left
chicane at the start of Hangar Straight, drifted out wide under hard
acceleration and carried a ton of speed down under the bridge, overtaking an
Elise and two 306s as I did so. Wahey! Phil was in charge of all the traffic
decisions (and the rear-view mirror, it was unnerving not to be able to use
it in traffic) and occasionally grabbed hold of the wheel for a second "keep
your foot down Jim, keep it down, flat to the floor, good lad" to swerve us
across the track and down one side or other of the slower cars. Ehehe. At
the end of Hangar Straight we were up to around 115mph (so I'm told, I never
had time to look at the speedo!) before jumping hard on the brakes - looking
back it's kinda weird to be doing that in a road car on a greasy surface,
but at the time everything felt spot on. Sure, the 306 was squirming around
when braking hard, and on the road that would scare me half to death, but on
the track it just felt great :0)
Phil presented me with my "Sportscar Driving Assessment" sheet when I got
out of the car - all A's and B's in the boxes and a really rather generous
92% overall mark, highest on my course. Cool!
Back to the Drive building for the debrief, where we found out that two of
the "other" group had managed to spin their Formula Firsts.... Rob teased
them a little which gave us a laugh and let me burn off some of the
adrenalin that was still pumping around. It seemed that almost everyone
preferred the Firsts to the 306s, but I disagreed. In the greasy conditions
I was unwilling to push the single-seaters too hard as I *really* didn't
want to spin (and so be called into the pits, missing precious track time),
whereas with the hot hatch I was really happy with the handling (and the
safer understeer characteristic) so I pushed much harder and felt like I was
getting much more out of the car. The South Circuit was also more
interesting than the Stowe circuit, and overtaking the Lotus Elises gave me
a real kick :0)
We kicked out of Silverstone and made our way 20 miles down the A43 to
Bicester Retail Village for lunch and a bit of shopping (part of the bribe
for my photographer!). An excellent day out and worth every penny - my Drive
Experience cost 120 plus insurance - see www.octagonmotorsports.com for
more info. Now, how long will it take me to save up enough to go again? And
again? :0)
Big thanks to Rob and Phil for excellent instructing and ...
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