Very belated post on the first training for my future racing licence. It took place a couple of months ago on the circuit at Motopark Krakow in Poland. Just to be very clear, it’s still a long way away till I actually get the licence (hoping for end of 2018, maybe 2019) and I’ll be taking part in amateur racing events in the meantime. There are various types of licences (mind you, they different a bit in the UK and Poland/continental Europe, so still figuring out which one to go for). In the UK my goal will be to get the National B racing licence which will enable me to apply for races at a more professional level. The general rule is that while I don’t have any official papers, I take part in amateur events for training purposes and eventually I’ll upgrade (take the test) in order to be eligible for professional competitions. I have to remember that driving at pro level will also require more funds..so gotta start looking for filthy rich sponsors or simply win the lottery!
I’ll write in more details about each exercise I did in the next blog posts, but here’s a short summary of the two days I spent at the circuit and the skid pan.
I trained in the Mini Cooper / BMW and have to agree with the hype: it’s a tremendous little car. People love it because it’s fun and charming, excellent design throughout. But it’s also got terrific handling, easy to control and drives so smoothly, like slipping on Chanel leather gloves. I’ve never actually driven a Mini before, though I’ve seen it everywhere around London, as it’s such an iconic car in the UK.
On day one my instructor told me about the proper seating position in a car, how to hold the steering wheel and the basics of controlling oversteer and understeer. On the day two, I was mastering breaking on the skid pan and learning how to do the slalom. You might say, ah..you’ve had a driving licence for nearly 16 years, you must know how to turn left and right. Hmmm wrong. Driving smoothly, knowing at what angle to approach the curve, hitting the break and gears at the right moment – these are all important elements of good race and rally driving (even when you’re performing a basic slalom). What I definitely learnt after two days is that it takes quite a while to acquire the good habits. So… training, training, training.
Jeez, I look so serious here lol
A bit more relaxed post-training :)
