We did a skid car first thing in the morning, which is a Chrysler rigged up with hydraulics and outriggers so you can take weight off either the front or back wheels, such that the car is very suceptible to over or under steer. For a person who's driven on snow for years, it's fairly intuitive.
After that we learned the racing line in a van, then started practicing.
The Lotus is about 200hp, 2,000lbs, and the roof of the car is about waist height. They look badass. Being a practitioner of yoga will definitely help you get in and out of the car. Your ass is probably 4" off the ground when you're driving. The 1.8L Toyota engine has a lot of pull from 6,500rpm up to 8,500. The cornering limits are unbelievable, I've never been in a vehicle that high performance before.
Lapping it was fun, we did follow the instructor off and on all day. It feels so good to hit the right lines, and it's fun just being an active pilot in the car instead of regular boring driving. Other than lack of storage space, the Lotus would be awesome for Portugal.
At the end of the day we did autocross in a parking lot type area - a race through a cone course that you've never seen before. On round one I got the fastest time, except for a 10 second penalty from the jeers of our group because my threshold brake stop from 140 to zero went two inches over the stop line. Too funny. Next closest time was three seconds back, which is a large spread. Most of the participants own sports cars too.
On round two I came up short by one tenth of a second, bummer!
Super fun day overall. I love performance driving. I'd love to do a two week bike spring training with a 3 day driving school in the middle for recovery days!
After that we learned the racing line in a van, then started practicing.
The Lotus is about 200hp, 2,000lbs, and the roof of the car is about waist height. They look badass. Being a practitioner of yoga will definitely help you get in and out of the car. Your ass is probably 4" off the ground when you're driving. The 1.8L Toyota engine has a lot of pull from 6,500rpm up to 8,500. The cornering limits are unbelievable, I've never been in a vehicle that high performance before.
Lapping it was fun, we did follow the instructor off and on all day. It feels so good to hit the right lines, and it's fun just being an active pilot in the car instead of regular boring driving. Other than lack of storage space, the Lotus would be awesome for Portugal.
At the end of the day we did autocross in a parking lot type area - a race through a cone course that you've never seen before. On round one I got the fastest time, except for a 10 second penalty from the jeers of our group because my threshold brake stop from 140 to zero went two inches over the stop line. Too funny. Next closest time was three seconds back, which is a large spread. Most of the participants own sports cars too.
On round two I came up short by one tenth of a second, bummer!
Super fun day overall. I love performance driving. I'd love to do a two week bike spring training with a 3 day driving school in the middle for recovery days!
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