Seen it all before: A visit to Longcross Studios Car News

A very young Lewis Hamilton first sat behind the wheel of a road car at the event and, as you might expect, did well. Rally star Richard Burns, who was at the top of his game at the time, struggled a bit. And 1979 Formula One champion Jody Scheckter found that impossible, although I suggested to him that since I had seen him drift a McLaren M23 at 150 mph at Silverstone before, he shouldn’t feel too wrong.

Naturally, before inviting such important and prestigious guests, we did a risk assessment. We were happy that the huge concrete inspection ramps a few feet from the skidpan were more than enough to add a bit of danger that would focus the minds of our competitors.

The greatest drifters, we soon discovered, were Lotus chassis engineers. Unlike today’s drift, we used standard cars and tires and the in-car judge, which was usually me, rated the pilot on smoothness: basically how little he had to steer or pump. the accelerator. Eventually we moved the competition to racing circuits, but the purity was lost.

My favorite memory of Chobham? There’s a lot to choose from, but you have to step into the Snake in a Ferrari 250 GTO with lots of opposing locks applied, putting a pair of golfers out of their putts as a few million pounds of screaming V12 sports car smoked.

for a few years now, because the opportunity never presents itself. It doesn’t matter: I regularly relive memories of the place from the comfort of my armchair in front of the TV.