I went and did an Advanced Defensive Driving course today in an attempt to stop feeling so total paranoid and phobic about being in a car and like… having to drive on the road with hundreds of fuckwits who seem determined to try and kill me.  It feels like every time I get in the car since the accident last November I am flinching at shadows and freaking out when anyone gets too close to me or does something stupid.  I even hurled abuse at a poor hapless teenage Pizza Hut delivery driver who ignorantly cut us off in traffic!  So off to defensive driving course for me…. and it was fantastic.  I went through the Anchor Driving School that operates at the Mt Cotton Training facility and they put us through a whole pile of driving scenarios.

There was a timed obstacle course where they get you drive your car through all carefully placed witches hats to see how well you navigate the various obstacles.  I had some problems with this as I tend to rely heavily on my mirrors (twisting my neck/back around isn’t great).  I probably could have done this better in my old Rav4 as I am far more familiar with it’s size etc than I am with the new car so far.

Then we did Emergency Wet Braking which the Swift handled so easily until they pulled the ABS fuse out to disable the ABS so you can feel the difference and understand exactly how much better the car knows how to brake than you do!  Then it was onto Wet Evasive Braking which is done at 60kmph, 70kmph and 80kmph and it was scary to see how much longer the braking distance is over just 10kmph faster.

We also did Wet Emergency Lane Changes which was heaps of fun.  They get you to barrel down a hill at around 80kmph or so and then ram on your brakes as hard as you can while steering sharp left and then right before coming to a complete stop.  Some cars totally lost it doing this and they spun out all over the place but my little Swift handles like it’s on rails when all the safety features are turned on it managed to perform the manoeuvre at just shy of 100kmph… which was about 15kmph faster than any other vehicle there.

We also did a Drink Driving Simulator Exercise where they put some ‘drunk goggles’ on you that simulate the altered perception you have when you’re drunk and all you have to do is wear them walk to your car open the car door and get the engine running.  Which ought be dead simple but so many people had huge trouble even walking around the car let alone getting into it.  It was hilarious to watch everyone stumbling about trying to give it a go.

After that it was on to  Skid Pan Training!!!!  Woo-hoo!  I was apprehensive at first but this was absolutely the most fun you can have in a car without prophylactics!!!  The aim is to make you cognizant of how your car handles when it’s out of control so they’re trying to teach you at what point your car will skid and how to regain control without understeering or oversteering.  So we spent a few hours throwing the cars around on the skip pan which is made of a specially slippery base that they then douse in a bit of diesel to make it slicker and if that weren’t enough it was pissing down rain most of the day!  A lot of cars were all over the shop but it was actually quite difficult to make my Swift slide out.  Even with the ESP turned off, doing nearly 20kms over the allowable speed limit on the skid pan AND pulling handbrakies as I hooked into the turns… the Swift barely slid at all.  It sticks to the road like glue and goes exactly where you point it.

All up it was a really good day despite the pouring rain and it’s a shame that this sort of thing isn’t a compulsory requirement for people to get their license.
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