Alexxi's excellent adventure (BMW Driving school)
Posted: Mon May 12, 2008 7:08 pm
Man, I'm really tired so this is going to be a short one. As per usual I had the only Forester there. Someone else had a GC Impreza with a WRX swap, the owner is a 50 something lady who does rallye events, cool ! First off I want to say this is the best driving school I've taken hands down, I've done at least a half dozen different courses in my day. There was no shortage of seat time, lapping or instruction. My instructor was excellent and constantly guided me to improving my lines and driving technique. His instruction was key to making my day as great as it was. The track itself is phenomenal. Calabogie is the newest and longest track in Canada designed by somebody famous for designing F1 race tracks. Its full of elevation changes, every kind of corner including several blind ones at full out speed on/off camber. Simply amazing and the surface is to die for.
Klaus asked me at the end if there anything lacking in the school and quite frankly I couldn't think of anything. They even provided lunch as a added bonus, one less thing to think of. Bottled water, I wish they had water instead of just pop for lunch so there's ONE thing that could be improved. That is easily enough addressed. Really, short of providing video footage of your corners after each session there's not much more to expect. The course was A1 and I could see myself doing it again down the road. Value for your money is fantastic, $300 gets you a full day of lapping with your own instructor.
I drove down with 2 sets of wheels, one set was more of a backup than anything. I spent most of the day on a set of worn RE070's, OEM tires for the STi. I've never driven on them before and they were fantastic for a street tire. Lap after lap they provided tons of grip and never overheated on me.
My other set were RA-1 R comps , I brought them purely as backup in case the RE70's started to cord which they did not. The idea was to improve my driving skills using street tires with lower limits. This worked out really well, while they provided tons of grip it was clear when I pushed too hard which allowed me to improve the next lap instead of running R comps which can hide mistakes.
For the very last session I swapped over to the R comps just to get a feel for the difference same day and to test out the feel of some very wide rubber on the new suspension. The increase in grip was immediately noticeable in both cornering and braking. I would still like to stress the importance of learning on lessor tires and I'm glad I spent most of the day on the RE070's. I'm willing to bet many people make the mistake of jumping to R comps too soon in search of more speed. Technique is more valuable than performance parts, there is no doubt.
I'm truly exhausted, I had a blast but it sure wipes you out. Here's a few pics from the day
Klaus asked me at the end if there anything lacking in the school and quite frankly I couldn't think of anything. They even provided lunch as a added bonus, one less thing to think of. Bottled water, I wish they had water instead of just pop for lunch so there's ONE thing that could be improved. That is easily enough addressed. Really, short of providing video footage of your corners after each session there's not much more to expect. The course was A1 and I could see myself doing it again down the road. Value for your money is fantastic, $300 gets you a full day of lapping with your own instructor.
I drove down with 2 sets of wheels, one set was more of a backup than anything. I spent most of the day on a set of worn RE070's, OEM tires for the STi. I've never driven on them before and they were fantastic for a street tire. Lap after lap they provided tons of grip and never overheated on me.
My other set were RA-1 R comps , I brought them purely as backup in case the RE70's started to cord which they did not. The idea was to improve my driving skills using street tires with lower limits. This worked out really well, while they provided tons of grip it was clear when I pushed too hard which allowed me to improve the next lap instead of running R comps which can hide mistakes.
For the very last session I swapped over to the R comps just to get a feel for the difference same day and to test out the feel of some very wide rubber on the new suspension. The increase in grip was immediately noticeable in both cornering and braking. I would still like to stress the importance of learning on lessor tires and I'm glad I spent most of the day on the RE070's. I'm willing to bet many people make the mistake of jumping to R comps too soon in search of more speed. Technique is more valuable than performance parts, there is no doubt.
I'm truly exhausted, I had a blast but it sure wipes you out. Here's a few pics from the day
