Ever had a scary slippery moment on a wet night? Perhaps you spun on a track day in a tight corner? These days many of us have high powered cars, with few opportunities to safely use their performance. These skills can be learned but can’t be taught in the classroom or from a book – you need is an instructor who enables you to learn from your own experiences.
Want to learn more - then read on to discover how to improve your sensitivity to the signals your car is sending, have fun and gain lasting experiences.
Don Palmer has a unique coaching style. He encourages you to explore your current knowledge and experience, and challenges you so your skills gradually improve until you can do things that you never imagined. Don’s UK driving courses take place on road and track, accompanied by much burning rubber and squealing tyres. This is superb fun and Don’s many amateur and professional driver clients keep him very busy throughout the year. Each February Don takes his training courses to the Volvo Cars Driving Academy at Älvdalen in Sweden, which offers his clients a marvellous opportunity to drive on ice and learn in a few days what could take months to learn on road, track and airfield. Bring warm clothes, a sense of humour and a willingness to explore the boundaries of your car control skills.
“There are only 3 things you need to master to be able to drive well, on ice, road or track – steering, steering and steering”. Thus spoke Don Palmer as we surveyed the slalom course set out across an expanse of frozen Swedish lake.
Our initial briefing, a well practised balance between seriousness – they want to be able to use the cars for the next course – and humour – ‘always make sure the lights are on so we can find the cars if the ice cracks’.
A stick delivers what is probably the single most important lesson of the briefing – If the stick represents the total amount of traction available on a tyre, then it has to be shared between steering and acceleration (or braking), so if you are doing a lot of one, there is not much opportunity for the other.
The course gave ample time to explore how this simple model is the key to keeping the car under control in the most extreme conditions. Don continually challenges you to explore your beliefs about what is possible in the car and helps you find your own answers and corrective actions at sensible speeds on wide open spaces of the lake.
The cars were equipped with electronic aids for all conditions, but nothing will overcome this simple rule as demonstrated by our acceleration and braking test. As expected under acceleration the 4 wheel drive cars are far superior to the 2 wheel drive cars. The grip that is available from the studded tyres is amazing, enabling you to drive on polished ice that you can barely stand up on. More enlightening is that under braking, all cars behave the identically with no difference in stopping distance between the front, rear and four wheel drive cars.
The slalom and ice track exercises stretch your skills and the beliefs in your capabilities even more and you quickly learn through Don’s supportive coaching.
All the Volvos were easy to drive and acquitted themselves superbly in all of the exercises. We quickly learned that steering quickly and accurately is a skill that can be practised in any car. The Volvos were fitted with studded tyres, although not necessarily on all the wheels. The red V70 has normal tyres at the rear which gives it many of the characteristics of a rear wheel drive car. This was a ‘wibbly-wobbly’ car, with anything but the most gentle steering movement provoking violent oversteer, requiring accurate opposite lock to counter. In extreme oversteer the front studded tyres allow you to pull the car out of the skid with the throttle. You learn a valuable lesson with total focus on the steering and the feel of the tyres as they lose grip.
In extreme oversteer the front studded tyres allow you to pull the car out of the skid with the throttle. You learn a valuable lesson with total focus on the steering and the feel of the tyres as they lose grip.
In the rear wheel drive car the fun really starts as you can provoke understeer with the throttle as well as the steering, and even with studded tyres it is incredibly sensitive. Fortunately there is a LOT of SPACE on the lake, so spinning does little harm although it is best to avoid the banks of snow to save the effort of digging yourself out.
Instructors at a track day, tell you to plan for the following corner as you line up the apex of the current bend, so as you exit each corner you are already setting up the line for the following entry. The need to do this, is even more necessary on the ice, as it enables a much smoother line, and you naturally steer towards the direction that you are looking, even if you are sometimes looking out of the side window!
In the hotel bar we met the group who were to start on the ice the next morning. Recalling how we felt 48 hours previously I realised how much experience and learning we had packed into two days on the ice. We had spent virtually all the available daylight driving on ice, experiencing the limits of grip under acceleration, braking and steering. I am sure that next time the steering goes a little bit light as I turn into Paddock Hill bend I’ll recognise the sensation and be ready!
The experience you gain in such a concentrated time is worth a huge amount. In a recent article in Porsche Post Steve Merritt calculated that (assuming 10 track days per year) it costs him £1618 to do a track day in his GT3 including depreciation. The intensity of this ice driving experience is probably equivalent to 5-10 track days, and works out at quite a bargain. Even better there is a trip to Sweden and a lot of fun thrown in and you get to learn the 3 most important things about car control; steering, steering and steering.
