Advanced Driving School - Part 1
From Blythe Unawareness to Decided Anxiousness
So forget tantric sex. Try learning how to drive! A 40-something virgin's testimonial.
By Nigel Etherington 11/1/2006
My corporate role had disappeared earlier in the year. Part of me was glad. I'd been traveling to Europe a dozen times a year, with responsibilities in two time zones. Now that was behind me and I had some downtime. I hooked up with some buddies who were in the same boat for the usual round of breakfasts and coffees. We played some tennis or golf. I was rusty.
Heading home from a day on the links, I saw a sign up ahead that recalled my first and only BMW Car Club meeting some 4 years earlier. I turned into Bavarian Motors. Inside was the paraphernalia of speed - helmets, brake rotors, R compound racing tires. John Dimoff, who with partner Steve Gailits runs the racing arm Raven Performance out of the same shop, came out to greet me.
I noted the picture of his blue M3 sedan, hunkered down as it raced through a corner. "I've got one of those too", I said, "but I've never had it out on the track".
There is a lapping day next weekend, he told me. "Why not?" I wondered. I'd owned my BMW M3 for 5 years and I'd never really learned to drive it the way the engineers had intended. Driving it to an underground parking garage every day was like having a Steinway grand in your home and using it to play chop sticks. Now John was offering up an opportunity - could I play Rachmaninoff behind the wheel ?
"OK, you're on", I declared. It was a decision I wouldn't regret: a summer of fantastic fun, a few fears and a new fraternity. It was the beginning of a summer school obsession but I didn't yet know it.
Dunnville Driving Addiction
A borrowed helmet and a quick technical inspection was all I needed to join John and Steve at one of their Raven Lapping Days at Dunnville track near St. Catherines. My instructor was Covell Brown, pilot of a race-prepped BMW 325i; he appeared much younger in spirit and looks than his nearly three score and ten years might suggest. He asked if I'd been on a track before. One skid pad course, I replied. We quickly stripped the car of my unrestrained belongings and jumped into the car. We hooked up the two-way intercom into our helmets, and then headed out for a few slow acclimatization laps with Covell at the wheel. He showed me braking points, apexes, and track-outs for each corner, plus designated passing areas. Then we came in to swap positions. I could hardly wait. My hands were perspiring and my heart racing - these are the first signs of addiction. I felt confident I'd be quick from the 'get go'.
Not the case. My untrained approach was not fast at all. With adrenalin pumping, I stomped on the gas, stabbed at the brakes, and popped the clutch as I rowed furiously up and down the gears. "Whoa, whoa", roared Covell, "Stop thrashing and destabilizing the car!" Fast driving was smooth driving, he explained. It had its own rhythm and apparently I was upsetting it. Then he burst into a melodic waltz, rendering the Blue Danube midway down the straight - "La, la, la, la, la ...La, la... La, la". That was followed by a lilt in the corners: "squeeze the brakes, gently, now feed the throttle, gradually". Then all too soon the checkered flag came out to end my inaugural session. It had been entertaining, but harder than I thought.
During lunch Covell gently inquired whether I could feel the pedals. At bit of strange question I thought, considering I'd been driving for thirty odd years. He explained "You know, you are a bit like an on-off switch out there". I had to admit that I couldn't feel very much wallowing around in my cross-trainers. I observed the experienced lappers were wearing laced driving slippers, so attempting a cure I put on slimmer dock shoes. Smoothness was obviously lesson number one. It became my sole focus.
After an inauspicious and humbling start, I started to hit the 'racing lines' with some regularity in the afternoon track sessions. The steering wheel and pedals were in constant motion, or so it seemed. As Covell said, "This is driving, not pointing!" Some corners were better than others as I strived to feel the car, using all my senses. My instructor made some approving comments, such as "nicely done" when I made a smooth turn-in or clipped an apex cone. Covell's parting words were not exactly a ringing endorsement. I appeared to have "some natural aptitude" but, as is not uncommon, needed more seat time to unlearn a few more driving habits. Everyday driving experience didn't count for much on the track, but I applied my 'born again' appreciation driving smoothly - and slowly - back to Toronto. I was hooked. Over the summer the BMW Car Club would have to satisfy my cravings three more times.
Mosport Taste Test
The Trillium Chapter was having one of its Advanced Driving Schools in mid June at Mosport International Raceway. It was a tax-deductible steal for only $400 (excluding GST), and perhaps the best 'insurance' you can buy. My apprehension about tackling Canada's world-famous road course was increased when the compulsory pre-school technical inspection confirmed the suspicions of my right foot. Unfortunately new brake rotors and pads couldn't be installed in time. While it passed I felt a reconnaissance was prudent to prepare me for the track's high speed and often dangerous corners - especially the notorious Turns 2 and 4. I motored to Bowmanville to observe the Friday session reserved for instructors and advanced students.
It was a memorable experience in more ways than one. I arrived to find the track quiet as a light rain shower had cancelled the prior session. Venturing into the paddock, I ran into Will Zaraska, the driving instructor/racer/entrepreneur who had sold me my silver M3 sedan with his Autotrader tagline: "Put the kids in the back and take 'em to the track". Five years later I was finally here, sans les enfants. He welcomed me to the car club fraternity and agreed to take me for a ride in his "tow-truck": a gold 1995 BMW 525i wagon with some big brakes, treadless R-compound tires - 'stickies' - and a trailer hitch.
With a few dry patches emerging, Will took me for my first excursion along the 'wet lines' at Mosport - loaded tires off the slippery concrete inserts. And several times he asked me to switch off the emergency flashers I had inadvertently (?) switched on grasping any available surface to hold. I recall one instance just after rain recommenced and Will held his four-wheel 'Tokyo' drift right the way through the Moss hairpin corner. I mean full opposite lock, power over-steer, up, around and back down onto the straight. There Will signaled the pass to his mate Dave's turbocharged BMW (E34) sedan with whom he was playing cat and mouse. Dave waved in a gentlemanly manner, acknowledging Will's masterful demonstration, and walked away with 380 HP unleashed on the Mario Andretti straight. I had quickly got a sense of the club's camaraderie and skill level. And I suspected no tow-truck had negotiated this track with such panache. The session concluded safely prior to lunch. Given the 'butterflies' I'd experienced in my first rolling taste test through Mosport countryside, I decided to eat lightly.
By late afternoon the sun had broken through, the track had dried and proceedings resumed at the regular pace. Meaning fast. My personal highlight was a lift I snagged with John Dimoff, whose silver M3 race car carries the Raven badge with distinction at BMW club races in North America. As we set off, John indicated that he would check-in with me after a few laps to see if I was 'OK'. Even without a speedometer, I knew I'd never traveled faster in a car, and that was just the warm-up lap. Each successive lap got faster as tires and engine came up to operating temperature. And it wasn't the spectacular acceleration - e.g. 400 HP in a 2500 lb chassis! - or the roller coaster cornering that made the impression. It was the prodigious braking. The first time we came downhill to the Moss Hairpin 'flat in fifth'- and probably close to 200 Km/h - I was fully expecting to land on the roof of the refreshment stand perched atop the slope ahead. Suddenly an thunderous brake squeal accompanied the 5-point harness' python-like embrace of my torso. Takeoff aborted. Apparently several G's of massive deceleration - maybe 3 times peak acceleration - had brought us back down to a safe cornering speed. After a few more laps of this terrorizing experience, John calmly took one hand off the wheel on the back straight to give me a thumbs up sign. I responded with two to be sure that he didn't mistake my white knuckles on the rollcage as submission. It was a case of living on the edge of adhesion where, after a few laps of lapping at 160 Km/h, the sheer exhilaration trumps any scary thoughts of misadventure.
Having learned what 'quick' really meant, I now realized I'd be driving in relative slow motion over the next two days at the BMW club's school. On the road home, I had to face the 'racers' weaving in and out of the traffic. How much safer we'd all be, I thought, if drivers on public roads demonstrated the same skill and consideration required of those attending advanced driving schools.
Masters' Sermons and Teachable Moments
Saturday morning, at the first student classroom session, we were greeted by Chief Instructor Derek Hansen and Rob Foreman, ex-chapter President and co-author of the BMW club's student manual. Derek, with grey beard and treasured walking stick, treated us to an inspiring introductory lecture on the art and science of high performance driving. He was like Moses delivering a sermon from Mount Mosport. He began with a recitation of driving school commandments and an exhortation to follow each instructor's directions in car. "They are designed with safety as the paramount consideration" he intoned. Derek then followed up with the kicker that got your attention, "repeated infractions - for example, 4 wheels off the track more than once - would be result in expulsion from the school. Without refund! " This was clearly not the place where 'cowboys' could endanger themselves and others without sanction. Over the course of the weekend, however, more than one driver would find themselves approaching their limits and landing in a 'teachable moment'.
Etherington on track to experience his first 'teachable moment'
Hesitation - which could perhaps be defined as the opposite of firmness - was to furnish my teachable moment this weekend. I had finished braking and was entering the daunting turn 2, a corner which 3-times F1 World Champion Jackie Stewart had called one of top 10 toughest in motor sport. Over the brow and by the first of two apexes, I was still closing on the classmate several car lengths in front. Instinctively (for the average passenger car driver) I lifted my right foot off the accelerator to slow the car. The response from my instructor Will was clear and commanding: "Don't do that again! Stay on it or you'll be making an appointment with the concrete barrier". Point taken, but to this novice that exhortation seemed counter-intuitive, like playing a game of chicken from behind that could land me up the tailpipe of the car in front.
Rob Foreman provided an opportunity to explore my unsettling experience in the next classroom session. Aware of Manfred Winkelhock's fate, the Formula 1 driver killed negotiating turn 2 in the late 70's, I raised a question about what you do when you might be in over your head. Rob's answer was simple and instructive. There is no right answer ! Just degrees of situational awareness and control skill that you learn to apply. In essence, if you carry too much speed into a fast corner, such as Mosport Turn 2, you are committed. You cannot suddenly lift off the throttle - never mind brake! - or you will find yourself on the proverbial slippery slope in an instant. The only safe approach is to modulate both throttle and steering to balance the car. How much? Well that's the art of performance driving. The driver must feel when grip is recovered. Get it right, and you slingshot out of the corner with a 'banzai' rush. Get it wrong? Well, centrifugal forces will pull the backend out and, presto, you're in a spin. So how close to the edges of the friction circle had I been, I wondered. Car mastery was apparently more than acute awareness and deft motor control. It also seemed a delicate emotional balance between your desires and your fears.
Fortunately my first BMW advanced driving school was thrilling but comfortingly uneventful. I was truly exhausted, however, after the two long days of classroom, skid pad and in-car training. I'd practiced the holy trinity of smoothness, consistency and firmness. And loved every minute but with a decided anxiousness - not confidence- given the punishment this track can exact for sloppiness. So like the runner who finishes his first Boston Marathon, I was relieved to have just made it through the weekend. But with new awareness and appreciation of car control skills, advanced driving now appeared a lot further down the road! But it was a road that I was more than prepared to travel...