Feature: California Beaming
February 1, 2007
I am no longer driving the car. I am merely along for the ride.
As the car spins to a stop, I cannot help but smile, because losing control of
the car on the safety of the infield is not frightening, it is intoxicating.
After a few more spinouts, I learn how to take command of the car, despite my
own pressing desire to continue the spin parade. "The skills you learn in our
program are practical lessons that will keep you alive on the road," says
Gubitosa. "We are not a racing school—we are a control school."
The final two exercises, which serve as the “cool down” portion of the program,
exemplify BMW’s emphasis on control. We are taught how to manage the ABS in a
BMW 650i at safe road speeds and maneuver through a series of cones in the M
Coupe autocross course. Although these last two lessons may not satisfy the
adrenaline junkie, they are brilliant in their design: All instruction is
offered with the help of a two-way radio. “We have been doing this program in
Spartanburg since 1999,” says Gubitosa. “We found that students want to spend as
much time as they can in the cars, and the radios make it possible for us to
teach outside of the classroom setting.”
The California Performance Driving School ($1,250)
was BMW’s first offering of an on-location school outside of the Spartanburg
facilities. No future on-location offerings are scheduled at present. All 350
seats of the course, which were offered free of charge to anyone who purchased
an M5 or M6 during the previous year, were filled weeks in advance of BMW’s
two-week California stay. This is not the driver’s education course taught by
your high school gym teacher; the Performance Driving School gives you a chance
to better understand the capacity of a high-performance automobile. “Every
graduate of the BMW program acquires the knowledge and skill needed to drive
these cars the way that they were meant to be driven,” says Gubitosa. “And now
they have the ability and the certificate to prove it.”
BMW Performance Driving School, 888.345.4269,
www.bmwusa.com/bmwexperience/performancecenter
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