Audi Driving Experience @ Infineon Raceway

I am not a fast driver nor a gearhead. So when I was reminded of my Audi Driving Experience was 8:30am at Infineon Raceway, I was tempted to cancel my reservation. My gym partner, John, talked me out of it. "It will be cool!" he said.

Great advice! I dragged myself out of bed at 6am and drove all the way to Infineon Raceway. Audi had a simple breakfast of Kashi bars, juice and yogurt waiting. After a quick registration, we were been led into a small training room. The instructor, who is also a race car driver, gave a quick lecture on over-steering, under-steering and why 4 wheel drive vehicles more stable. While it was a pitch for Audi vehicles, this is the first time I was exposed to the mechanics of steering, braking and accelerating in a car and found it very interesting.

After the lecture, we were led to the parking lot. Orange cones had already been set up and we were taught several drills: braking, turning and accident avoidance. Another instructor, Todd, which has done Pike's Peak in 11mins, showed us what to do.

The first drill was using the ABS system to stop. He had us approached a set of cones at high speed (~60mph), then hit the brake hard to engage ABS. During his demo, the parking lot was wet from the rain and the car skidded a long way. The designated stopping point had to be moved back.

We then formed groups of 3 and each group took turns trying the drills. The other's in my group were pretty skilled, and I was concerned if I was able to execute the drill. I went at high speed towards the cone, but lifted my foot off the gas pedal before the designated stopping point to hit the brakes. My stopping distance was therefore shorter, but still the drill gave me quite a rush!

The second drill was to drive around a tight turning course at high speed, practicing stopping in the straight line entering the turn and accelerating coming out of the turn. We engaged the sports mode on the Quattro and had a lot of fun with this one. Even though the turns were quite sharp, I was able to enter most turn with the engine brake and accelerate smoothly out of the turns. I can now better understand why people enjoy watching auto racing, because driving the turns was really exciting!

The last drill was accident avoidance. Here we drove hard towards a set of cones, much like in the braking drill, but instead of braking, we were to avoid accident by letting go of the gas pedals and swirled around the cones. Staying loose was the key in this drill. Again, I was concern since I am not that great a driver:(

I actually did pretty well on this drill. I came in with the correct speed, lift my foot off the gas pedal at the correct time, but over corrected on my swirls and had the back wheel hit the cones as a result.

After practicing in the parking lot, we were given helmets and got to drive S4/S5 around the actual race track!

I got into a S4 with auto transmission. In the cars were walkie-talkie, so that we could hear our instructions. One of the instructor, Stu, got into a S5 and led. All of us follow him around the track, with instructions coming from the walkie-talkie. Overtaking was not allowed. Cones had been placed on the track to help us navigate which side of the track we should be in to reduce the angles of our turns.

Given the condition of the track, we were able to still do ~30mph around the tracks to keep up with Stu. We did 2 rounds around the track. My car skidded a little on the first time around the track, but did not have trouble on the second time.

Since I was alone in my car, the instructor invited me to sit in his car on the second drive round the track. I was able to observe first hand how he handled the turns. He had a skid too on his run, so I suppose my skid was nothing to be ashamed about:)

We had a quick debrief session after the drive, then I went about to look at the Audis on display. We were asked to fill up a survey about our experience on a iPhone, and feeling sleepy(I woke up at 6am!) I went home.

This is my second test drive event. The first was the Mercedes-Benz C-class test drive event in SF. The food was better at that event, but given we were driving on SF roads, not very exciting.

The Audi Driving Experience is more fun and I hope to participate in future test drive events which have more emphasis on driving.