Managed to finally go for the Advanced Driver’s Training course During the weekend.
It was actually something i’ve always wanted to do even before i got my driving license, with so many organisations having such driving programs, it was quite a handful trying to figure out which to go for. But only one course provided the cars, the track and the tyres for a full day of hooliganism and thrashing about! That is the BMW-ADT.

I’ll have to state for the record that i am NOT associated with anyone or anything from PML Singapore. this is basically a normal driver’s perspective of his first ever advanced driving course. When some friends wanted to sign up for the course, i joined them as well. It was truely great fun.

Had to wake up really early in the morning though, i stayed in Bedok, so it was a full drive from one end to another end of the island, took me roughly 30mins
The whole process of getting there was pretty smooth , only drawback was we had to get off and on the bus to clear customs… anyway, onto the event itself.

A whole fleet of nice and shiny E90 330i’s were all parked out front for us.
Breezed through the theory part which wasn’t too bad honestly. We were then split up into different cars and different groups and went for a slow slalom run to warm up and get used to the “proper” seating positions.

After warmup, some drinks. (Worth mentioning cos there were really lots of drinks stations, mostly bottled water and 100plus) It was REALLY HOT during the day.
Shortly after, we all split into our individual groups and moved on from there.
For me, onto Emergency braking, the road was soaped up generously (and i mean GENEROUSLY!!! look at the big bubbles!!!) It wasn’t too bad, a good way to start it off i guess.

Following that, we moved on to the brake+swerve, again performed at varying speeds, me and my co-driver (HKfung) basically just whacked it at higher and higher speeds until we ended up killing a number of cones. But that’s what it’s all about right? HAHAHA… (“let’s do the next one at 70!!!” , “Hey, That was 80!!!”) The car handled really beautifully throughout.

In between modules we all had a shot going round the track whilst following the instructor, I REALLY REALLY REALLY Enjoyed this bit… (esp. on the last run when i was following the instructor with a bit of cooking oil on the wheels)

Next lesson, emergency lane change. Seeing the demo from the instructor it looked really tight, but when ur behind the wheel, it’s not as difficult as it seems. It’s so much fun when u can really just go out and drive a car thru such situations in a controlled environment without having to worry about breaking any laws.

Following that, the nex lesson was pretty much one of the most fun bits really, the Understeer and Oversteer modules. Understeer was and OK bit but the best part was the oversteer area, the road was soaked in cooking oil (smelt like it too) and it allows for very easy tail out runs from the cars. Now, where else can u spin , slide and throw the car about so much? I was laughing and enjoying myself all the way. My co-driver and i were basically trying as hard as we can to hold the car in a slide. (Met with much discouragment from the instructor. “You’ll burn-out the active steering motors!!” “ease-off, ease-off…”)

The aftermath of all that fooling around… cars were COVERED in cooking oil and dripping with the stuff too!!!

Instructors gave us a “preview” the get us to join the IDT, we got to ride inside for a reverse flik, oh what fun!

End of the day, we all had a timed slalom course. (I blame the traction control for ruining my u-turn…should have switched it off… hahaha)

So overall what do i think of it?
Well, to be honest, i wish it could have lasted longer, i wish we could have had more time driving and i wish the cars didn’t have active steering (cos i wanted to drift the cars)

But what does this car really teach me? I feel that what this course really does is put drivers into simple real life emergency situations which we might have all read about but never really had the chance to explore or experience. We all read about understeer and oversteer but not many of us would have had the chance to experience them. I personally had experience with understeer on a wet road and it wasn’t funny, it was kind of scary really, when u turn your steering wheel and the car”s still going straight towards the wall, lucky for me, natural instinct got me to back off and i managed to stay clear of the wall and live another day.

What these exercises in the course do is condition the drivers to get used to such events happening i guess, so that if it ever happens in real life driving, we would not panic and mess up. And we’ll be more prepared to handle such situations and we will know what to expect.

Is this all worth the SGD$500 entry fee? fo’sure man… It’s all worth it. (except maybe the food, how bout some catered KFC next time)

All this might sound boring but when you are there on the track, it’s all basically just pure fun. Really really great fun. Stuff learnt here might save your life one day too. Next up Intensive Driver’s Training (or IDT), any sponsors?

This entry was posted on Monday, March 20th, 2006 at 6:30 pm and is filed under Garage life, Updates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.