MY HEART is beating like a hummingbird’s. Is this really wise?
I’m lined up on Mondello’s grid in my 1975 BMW 2002 for a fast track session, pitting the Duchess against 20 thundering beasts, among them a quartet of race-bred Ford Escorts complete with rally decals and wheels as wide as a tractor’s, an evil Opel Manta that looks like it’d start a fight in an empty room and a Lotus Esprit so low to the ground it’ll need a search party to find it if it goes into the weeds.
The Duchess is a fine machine – nippy and with great poise. But even I’ll admit she’s way out of her league in this company. Still, in for a penny, eh?
I’m waved off. I jam on the accelerator and zoom off into the first corner, the tight Honda righthander. My throttle-blipping practice instantly forgotten, I shift down into second as I’m walloping the brakes. It all goes wrong very, very quickly. My heart pops out of my mouth and hides under my seat. The Duchess screams in pain and her backside flies out while I wrestle vainly with the steering. Suddenly, I’m drifting – albeit accidentally – like a pro.
Deluded, I take this as a sign of great skill, and give it some welly. All notions of holding back disappear. I chuck it around each corner, braking as late as I dare and torturing the gearbox. In my mind, I’m a legend.
My ego is soon deflated. Marshalls are waving blue flags frenetically at me. As I move over, three Escorts, the Manta and a massive black Camaro go past in a blur. The ignominy.
Soon afterwards, a Porsche 911 passes me on the home straight like I’m parked. So excited is he at his conquest, however, that he forgets to brake going around Honda and shoots straight into the gravel. That’ll teach him.
By the end of the 20-minute session, I’ve been lapped by nearly everyone. I don’t care. I’m dripping with sweat, retching on the adrenaline and grinning like a kid who’d just been handed the keys to a house made of chocolate.
The Duchess, bless her, has fared less well. Her tyres are ruined, she’s burned half her oil and her brakes are so cooked her interior smells like a Chinese smelting plant. She is decidedly unimpressed. I daresay it’ll be weeks before we’re on speaking terms again. But it was worth it.
Killian Doyle takes us for a tyre-screeching lap of Mondello in his classic BMW: Listen to his report on Torque Radio at motors.com
