Drive Limits vs Track Day

[mightymolecule]

I have a birthday coming up and would like to treat myself to some kind of track experience. I drive a stock 2.0 MX5 NC that I haven’t yet taken on the track. I’d like to explore its limits and get comfortable with oversteer. This is my first RWD car, although I’ve been driving for 20yrs and have done track days before in FWD and a Lotus driving academy day in an Elise, which was great.

I’m wondering if I’d get more from a Drive Limits airfield training day or just taking it to a track day? I think I might find the track day more fun but not sure if I’d naturally be able to play around with oversteer on my own or whether I’d benefit from some specific tuition. My local track is Snetterton but I also noticed the Mx5 club does track days just for Mx5s, which I’m tempted to do because I would be out with similar powered cars.

I know this sounds a bit daft but one thing that makes me hesitant about Drive Limits is the thought of intentionally spinning a car at 70mph. Maybe this is a reason in itself to do it!

[brillomaster]

If you deliberately want to practice oversteer, I'd steer clear of a trackday. In the dry, it'll actually be quite hard to get an mx5 to oversteer at a sensible speed, and deliberately trying to provoke a car will see you get black flagged.

I'd do a drive limits day, where oversteer is actively encouraged.

If you're anything like me, it actually takes a good few days to get comfortable with an oversteering car, both applying the correct amount of lock, and then knowing how to regain control smoothly, and i don't think a full trackday at Snetterton is a good place to experiment.

[Glenn63]

Oulton park do drift days on a separate track that’s made slippery so can practice oversteer very easily whilst going fairly slowly.

[ScoobyChris]

Would recommend a limit handling day if you want to get familiar with handling at/beyond the limit. I did mine with Don Palmer at Bruntingthorpe which was transformative but understand he doesn’t do them any more.

Chris

[alicrozier]

mightymolecule said:

I know this sounds a bit daft but one thing that makes me hesitant....is the thought of intentionally spinning a car at 70mph. Maybe this is a reason in itself to do it!

Yes, exactly! Way better to intentionally spin it at an airfield than unintentionally spin it at a trackday.
The correct answer of course is to do both but I think you'll have way more fun (be more confident, comfortable, faster and safer) at a trackday after first learning the car at and beyond the limit in a safe environment with a good instructor.

Other car control courses are available. I'd personally recommend Andrew Walsh.
https://www.awdrivertraining.co.uk

[mightymolecule]

Thank you everyone for the advice. I’ve decided to go for the driver limits airfield experience before booking a track day - this sounds like it will perfectly suit my needs and I’m sure I’ll get loads out of it!

[SpudLink]

mightymolecule said:

Thank you everyone for the advice. I’ve decided to go for the driver limits airfield experience before booking a track day - this sounds like it will perfectly suit my needs and I’m sure I’ll get loads out of it!

It's great fun. They'll get you doing things you didn't think were possible. And afterwards you'll get a lot more out of future track days once you are comfortable with oversteer.