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BMW Performance Driving School's One Day Driver Control Course
Finished the BMW Performance Driving School's One Day Driver Control Course today.
Day started out in the classroom, introductions, basic technique for looking where you wantnto go, steering, braking and acceleration.
First we drove the M340i for the slalom. Starting at low speed and building up.
Then to the emergency stop, stand on the brakes, let the ABS work and steer. Gotta look where you want to go.
Next we switched to the M240i for the road course. It includes a slalom, sweeping turns, hairpin turns and decreasing radius turn. Looking where you want to go, steering, braking at the right time, accelerating and vehicle positioning all come together here.
Lunch and then back in the classroom for a short lesson on understeer and oversteer. We headed to the 3 series again and to the skid pad. A watered-down polished concrete circle where we turn off the stability control, induce both under and oversteer and have to correct.
A switch to the 2 series again and an obstacle avoidance maneuver, at ever increasing speeds. The Box to make the lane change in seems really small, but with proper technique it is amazing what these cars can do.
Then we went back to the road course for timed laps, now it's not just trying to avoid cones, but to really reduce the time. Talk about a blast!.
Next to last exercise is a "rat race", on another wet surface. An oval set up, one car on each side and upon command you take off. Idea is to best the time of the other car, without skidding out (had to turn off stability control again) or hitting a cone. Both of those are disqualifiers.
The final run was a hot lap with an instructor for the full 1.5 mile course. I'll video for the instructor running this in a 4500 pound M5.
They had several courses running today, a teen course, day one of a 2 day "M" school, and a motorcycle course.
It was awesome!
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