Lee Sibley By Lee Sibley 3 years ago

Ready from road to race: the art of performance driving

9WERKS' Performance Driving Instructor Robert Colbourn shares some thoughts on the transferable skills honed from advanced driving techniques 

2020 was an excellent year for one, sole reason. As many petrolheads will remember, last year was the best year, in terms of traffic levels, since the 1950s. I don’t personally recall that era as I wasn’t around then but my mentor, the legendary Bernard Aubry, who started his coaching career in 1968, has always spoken of the Fifties as the Golden Age of motoring. If 2020’s traffic volumes were something similar to way back then, I can see why!

In the return to normality since, it seems there’s even more traffic on our roads than during the pre-COVID era. An increase in the volume of drivers on the road – and the varying levels of skill involved – brings with it more unpredictability, and that’s something we must respond to. 

So how do we predict the apparently unpredictable? For me it’s all about simplifying your expectations, starting with the idea that others will only do one of two things and that we only have four options to deal with anything.

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    Good anticipation is all about asking the right questions – in particular, breaking it down to the two basic possibilities of ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers. If you see a pedestrian that may cross the road in front of you, simply ask ‘Is he/she going to step out?’ Or, ‘Is that car going to pull out?’, ‘Is this car in front going to turn?’ The common theme you can see is that we’re simply asking a closed question, those with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ response. Then you choose whichever possibility will cause you a bigger problem than the other, and plan for that.

    This then leads me on to the fact that I always want my anticipation to be wrong. The last thing I want is a problem, so if I’m wrong I get a better outcome than I was ready for, but if I’m right, at least I can feel smug that they weren’t able to catch me out.  

    So what are the only four possible responses to anything? 
      You can change your speed, change your direction, change both your speed and direction, or none of the above. Obviously there are sub categories: speed up, slow down, move left or right, but I’m sure you get the idea. I’m a great believer that the more situations you can manage with just one solution, the less you need to remember and the more you can deal with. As Bruce Lee once said, ‘I don’t fear the man who has practiced a thousand kicks once, I fear the man that has practiced one kick a thousand times.’

      Performance driving is about reading situations before they happen, and that’s wether you’re on a race track, a quiet country road, or a busy stretch of asphalt. It’s a crucial, transferable skill, yet it’s often overlooked by many, from the everyman on a morning commute to the aspiring track day enthusiast keen to lap a little faster. If you’d like to hone your skillset with a trained professional, you can find my details here.

      Wishing you all the best for Q4 2021, and keep enjoying those journeys – wether you have the road to yourself or not!

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