New owner seeks place to push car!

[JRay]

Hi folks,

 

New(ish) owner here, looking for a private airfield/skid-pan or similar to go push my Westie to it’s limits (and a little beyond). I don’t want a traditional “track day” set up, or an experience you can “drive your own car”. Just a big piece of tarmac and nobody around to watch me spin out a few times. 
 

Hoping a good session (or three!) getting to know my motor will make life a little safer on the roads.

I live in the West Midlands, anywhere within and hour?

 

Any suggestions welcome.

 

Thanks in advance,

 

James

 

 

[Rob Hunter - Club Secretary]

I've done skid pans at Silverstone, Bruntingthorpe and Donington, but they've always been in their car on a cradle and I don't know of any old airfields that are still accessible. 

 

I think the closet you will get would be at somewhere like Curborough, where you will at least get solo track time.

 

Your question does bring back happy memories of holidays to visit family in Scotland though.... from being about 8 years old (just big enough to reach the pedals), one of the highlights would always be my Dad taking me to the disused RAF Kinnell airfield (between Arbroath and Brechin) and letting me drive the family Vauxhall Cavalier (or later a Montego!) flat out down the runway and teaching me handbrake turns! 😂

[Terry Everall]

Try Blyton Park Driving centre

[BenD]

Welcome to the club

i also live in the west midlands. you could do worse than to get yourself on the Warwick area track day

theres just you on track. and a great bunch of people

[TAFKARM]

Agree with the above, you won’t learn much at low speed in a car park - a big proportion of Westfield incidents I’ve seen are through not understanding weight transfer, you can’t really experience that at car park speeds. 

[Dave Eastwood (Gadgetman) - Club Chairman]

1 hour ago, Rush Motorsport said:

Agree with the above, you won’t learn much at low speed in a car park - a big proportion of Westfield incidents I’ve seen are through not understanding weight transfer, you can’t really experience that at car park speeds. 

 

Absolutely.

 

It's worse than that though, learning car park type low speed "drifting" type manoeuvres, while fantastic for developing balance and car control, are actually counter intuitive when it comes to recovering a sideways car or handling it at the limit. 

 

The first Westfield drift day I ever did, (brilliant fun and thoroughly recommended BTW), Russ was constantly rapping my knuckles 'cause for ages, at the start, I'd break the car loose as instructed, but then reflexes immediately took over and had me automatically trying to correct and recover the car. 

 

Traditional advice to learn the sort of thing you want, is to do airfield track days, as there's much more run-off than circuits. Of those, though, most will see you out in a group, so excess spinning, drifting etc will be frowned on, typically. Somewhere like Curborough, where it's one car out at a time, is probably you're best bet. You can also hire it yourself for a small group of friends, and split the cost, so if everyone is cool with what you want to do on track, you'd have no problems.

 

Sadly, many of the  old airfield tracks and trackdays are gone now, so there aren't that many left. 

[Martyn Vann - Warwickshire AO]

Hi James,

 

As said above, you can't get better than our track day at Curborough on Friday 24th September, individual time on circuit so that you can focus on driving the car at the speed you are happy with, lots of advice, passenger rides available, BBQ lunch etc.

 

You need to be quick though as only one place available now!

 

Martyn

[LukeW]

@JRay as others have said above,

plus you can pinch the odd passenger ride in other westies that will be there! 

[dombanks]

Does oulton park still do their days on that drift track? Guess the danger is bending a wishbone but might be of use

[JRay]

Thanks all for comments, useful advice!

 

Dont worry, I wasn’t intending to tag around my local Asda car park!!! 😂😂

 

I live 5miles from Curborough so will check it out. Might drop you a direct message @Martyn Vann - Warwickshire AO. 
 

cheers,

 

james

 

[Rob Hunter - Club Secretary]

39 minutes ago, JRay said:

Thanks all for comments, useful advice!

 

Dont worry, I wasn’t intending to tag around my local Asda car park!!! 😂😂

 

I live 5miles from Curborough so will check it out. Might drop you a direct message @Martyn Vann - Warwickshire AO. 
 

cheers,

 

james

 

 

There's quite a few of us local to you (Tamworth, Nuneaton, Burton, Derby, Notts etc) that often go to local car meets, or meet up for a coffee, chat etc at Barton Marina, Blithfield etc. You are more than welcome to join us 👍

 

At Blithfield a few weeks ago....

 

 

You also should also try and get on one of the legendary runs out organised by @Julie Hall - Joint Peak District AOin the Peaks, again a load of us in this area normally meet up and convoy up there to drive on the great roads and eat lots of cake!

[cast iron]

some kart tracks will hire the circuits by the hour, teeside park near us is quite reasonable