Road testing the full Croft Circuit racing experience

BEING flattened against the passenger seat of a racing car flying sideways around a bend is one way to spend a drizzly midweek morning.

There’s not much to indicate how fast the car is going other than blurred scenery and rain drops streaming off the windscreen.

The Caterham Seven carries a top speed of 130mph and it feels like we’re going roughly double that around Croft Circuit.

It’s impossible to tell this is the first experience day of the 2018 season at the North Yorkshire track – there’s certainly not a spec of race dust on the instructors.

“Can you believe I get paid to do this?” grinned the circuit’s resident Stig as we rumbled into the pits after an aptly-named high-speed passenger ride.

The entire three-hour Racing Car Addict experience offered by Croft was fast-paced from the first to the last lap, but it had started out slightly more sedately with a safety briefing for all would-be Lewis Hamilton’s taking to the track that day.

Following a quick registration at Croft’s offices, near Darlington, there was time to get a cup of tea from the catering van before around 25 of us gathered into a room that separated the paddock from the pits.

ON TRACK: Reporter Charlotte Bowe with ARDS instructor Mick Kinghorn in Croft Circuit's Porsche Cayman

It was here we had our first glimpse of the very wet two-mile track. But not to worry, our tutor told us standing water and a slick surface were his favourite driving conditions... I wasn’t entirely convinced.

The informative briefing ended with drivers being told the structure of the day – three laps in a Porsche Cayman, five laps in a single-seater Formula Forward 2000 and five laps in a Ginetta G20.

But first – three familiarisation laps in a Peugeot 308.

Three of us clambered into the hatchback to get to know one of the longest circuits in the UK in the capable hands of a track tutor.

Afterwards, we were immediately invited to swap the Peugeot for the leather-clad driving seat of a gleaming white Porsche Cayman, capable of 171mph and reaching 60mph in five seconds.

Mick Kinghorn, an Association of Racing Driver Schools-approved tutor, guided me through a quick seat adjust and we were off. At least I hadn’t stalled in front of dozens of friends and family waiting to see their loved ones behind the wheel of some furiously fast motors.

Switching from my 998cc Toyota Aygo to the two-litre Porsche was surprisingly easy, largely thanks to the clear guidance and

on-track tuition from Mick. Tight corners, chicanes and hairpins didn’t seem daunting.

But that was an entirely different story when I was handed a crash helmet and strapped into the narrow cockpit of a proper racing car.

RACING: Behind the wheel of a Formula Forward 200 at Croft Circuit. Picture: TONY TODD

All those weekends spent watching Formula 1 and the countless hours playing video games had come down to this. The machine was rolled out of the pits by engineers, just like I’d seen hundreds of times before.

Ignition on, engine revving. And revving and revving. I couldn’t get out of first gear.

Thankfully, no one could see my red face underneath the helmet as I eventually got away and out onto the open track.

With confidence growing lap-on-lap, it was literally breath-taking to put the pedal to the metal and let the car power along the straights and nip the apexes of each turn.

The roar of the open-wheel formula racer was deafening and every bump or twitch was unmistakable in the car which has no brake assist or virtually any computer system most drivers rely on.

It’s definitely an experience every petrol head has to try.

The immediate feedback from the Formula Forward was more than matched by our next drive – the powerful open-topped two-seater Ginetta G20. Its incredible speed must be overcompensating for it not having any doors.

FAST LANE: The Ginetta G20

The Ginetta felt like the single-seater’s bigger, badder brother. It was a neat combination of the Porsche’s bulk and the Formula racer’s raw attack.

It’s impossible not to beam beneath the crash helmet with the thrill and pride of an instructor telling you: “I think we have a racing driver on our hands”.

There was one more surprise up the sleeves of the welcoming team at Croft Circuit, who told me an instructor and the Caterham Seven were ready and waiting for one last ride.

Speechless and breathless after a blistering couple of passenger laps, I could only squeak when the pit crew asked how it went.

Slipping and sliding around a racing track is definitely one way to spend a weekday.

• For more information on Croft Circuit or its regular experience days, visit croftcircuit.co.uk or call 01325-721815