Realising I am crap at driving my car 'fast'

[MrOrange]

AliMc99 said:

For road driving Advanced Police Instructors are the best option- hence another strong recommendation for HPC. ASFAIK You can start off with a half or full day ‘taster’. If you like it and you end up doing the full course then this also covers airfield/track based car control/limit handling.

Or If you are based in the North West, RegLocal who posts on here and has lots of useful videos on his YouTube channel might be worth contacting. I’ve not met him but like the HPC instructors he’s also an Advanced Police Instructor.

Seconded RegLocal. He has a book - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Advanced-Performance-Driv... and excellent Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/c/RegLocal

I went further a spent a day with him on-road driving, it was brilliant and I learned loads despite a fairly solid history on two wheels and national level saloon-car racing!

[Somewhatfoolish]

Pit Pony said:

Somewhatfoolish said:

Pit Pony said:

Anyone can drive a fast car fast.

It takes real skill to drive a slow car fast.

The way to obtain the skills, is to sell your M4 and buy a Daewoo Matiz or a City Rover or a Fiat 126.

The most fun car I've owned was a Fiat 126. Slow, underbraked, no comfort. Compromised handling.

The car in which i learnt how to overtake properly was an AX 1.4D

Both cars required planning and guts to get anywhere in a reasonable time.

I get the thinking but there are so many opportunities you simply cannot take with that sort of thing. Perhaps get a bike instead.

You shouldn't be needing "guts" for advanced driving. A driver with lots of guts will outpace any advanced driver until he spills them all over the road.

Totally agree fast on road driving is a completely different discipline to track driving. The former is usually limited by visibility, the latter by grip.

When I say guts, I mean, carefully planned and executed. There's a couple of places I overtake now, where at the exact point of overtaking you can't see 100 yards in front. During the planning, some 200 yards before that you can see the best part of a mile.
I have no doubt that the person being overtaken thinks I'm crazy, but I've even scanned the fields for tractors and won't bother if there's one in the field, just in case.

Those scenarios are pretty rare though - I appreciate there's a small number of places where you can overtake with only 100 yards current visibility having scanned things before but personally I don't believe you can make that assessment on an unfamiliar road (except very very rare cases like e.g. up on the north pennine dales... but in those cases you are never going to have trouble overtaking anwyay). I guess what I'm really getting at is these are niche cases and not applicable to most overtakes, no matter how satisfying they may be.

The joy of advanced driving, for me anyway, mostly comes from totally unfamiliar roads.

[Somewhatfoolish]

MrOrange said:

Seconded RegLocal. He has a book - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Advanced-Performance-Driv... and excellent Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/c/RegLocal

He has more than one book! I reccommend both.

[Veryoldbear]

RegLocal's books are also entertaining ...

[jaf65]

Another vote for RegLocal. Spent a day with him earlier this year after spending a long time watching his Youtube channel.
Past my test around 30 years ago and safe to say I learned more in that day than I thought possible. It has transformed my day to day driving and looking forward to another day with him in October.

[tonyg58]

waremark said:

Looks as though Andy Walsh formerly of Car Limits and First Lotus has started a new business. He was (and if it's him) presumably still is one of the best for limit handling. If you want to be an excellent and quick road driver, my recommendation remains a coach with a police advanced trainer background such as High Performance Course or Reg Local. The full HPC includes the same limit handling training as offered by AW.

Andy will help you find out how quickly your car will go round a bend without falling off - but on most bends your speed is limited not by that but by being able to stop on your own side of the road in the distance you can see to be clear and can reasonably expect to remain clear.

Yes, it's Andy Walsh back in business.
Took a half day course from him about 20 years ago and improved my driving immensely.
I don't think any other ex-F1 drivers give driving lessons in the UK.

[NS66]

the internet said:

*please move to different forum if required*

Had my M4 Comp for just over a year now and I am starting to realise I am really pretty crap at driving it 'fast'. Other than slowing for for bends and gunning it on straights I am a bit useless - I freely admit it !!!!!!

So, after some advice or pointers for things to do, places to go, training to get etc etc

thanks

Sounds to me like you are a safe,considerate good driver with self preservation high in your style of driving.
The number of drivers I see driving rural national speed limit roads at a constant 60+ without a thought on whats beyond the blind bend always gets me. I question myself also come back to the same conclusion - these drivers are either stupid, have a death wish or both!!