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Unfortunately I couldn't sign this guy off. He was not safe to drive by himself - not just to himself, but to others on track. There is WAY more to this story.
I hesitated to tell about this, because some of the techniques I used could get me banned from instructing for life. This is NOT something I advocate, and if I did it over, I probably wouldn't do it the same way. But here's the story.
This guy had been to Skippy School, and according to him (and his toady), they said he was their best student of that weekend. So he wasn't going to take any guff from a Carguys instructor. He kept blaming his car-to-car accident the day before on the way the school was run (How could we put a Corvette out there in the same group with hondas and volkwagens?!), on his tire pressures, on the driver in front of him, etc.
As far as I was concerned, he had by far the worst attitude of any student I had ever met. He wasn't completely unskilled, but his learning "attitude" made him dangerous. So on the second day of school (this was a 3 day school), I was still struggling with him, trying to get him to listen. He was so hard headed, nothing would get through to him.
I constantly had to remind him of his entry speed going into turns. And he was king of the late brakers. That is a really bad combination in a modified C5 Corvette, so I really had to stay on top of him. So I put a speed limit on him down the straights. He would constantly complain that we were doing "parade laps", and that I was holding him back. So at one point I had enough of this, and there was clear track around us, so I shut my mouth as we were going down the front straight. He IMMEDIATELY overcooked it going into turn one (I couldn't have planned it better), and we went 4 wheels way-off, grass flying everywhere. Lots of dirt in the interior of his shiny, souped up vette. So we went back to the pits for a talk. I told him flat out, I let him hang himself by simply shutting my mouth.
We sat there talking for a little while then went back on track. I could tell immediately his attitude hadn't changed, so I did something even more controversial. This was quite possibly the dumbest or smartest (depending on your point of view) thing I ever did as an instructor. Once again, we had clear track around us, so I shut my mouth, this time on VIR's bridge straight.
We ENTERED the uphill esses at 125mph (that Vette was FAST!), which was a solid 20mph more than I knew he was capable. I leaned over as we were going in and calmly said "We're not going to make it". It was spectacular! We slid and spun all the way to the top of the hill, finally stopping about 20 feet short of the tire wall on the outside of turn 9.
He was really shaken up after that. He even parked himself for the entire 3rd session - didn't even go out - said he needed to go back to the hotel and get his head on straight.
I expected him to pack it in, but would you believe Mr. BC came back for the 3rd day. This guy is one of the mentally toughest SOB's I've ever met (he's from brooklyn), which is both good and bad. He gutted out the first session on Sunday with me, docile as could be. He transformed himself overnight. No more complaints about "parade laps", he watched his entry speed, etc. I barely had to say a word. He still wasn't "fast", but at least now he was safe.
After that session, we went back to the trailer for our now standard 1 hour (yes!) post session talk, and as I probed him about what he learned, his underlying attitude re-emerged. At that point, I had had enough, and that's when I threw his toadie friend out of the trailer. Mr. Vitacco graciously agreed to take Mr. BC as his student for the rest of the day (I was mentally worn out), and Vitacco said that Mr. BC was a model student for the final two sessions.
Mr. BC actually came by before he left for home, and said he learned alot and appreciated what we did for him. I hope he really learned something, but I'm not so sure - its hard for a tiger to change it's stripes...
_________________ Mark O'Dell
THSCC member since '96
www.grandamadventure.com
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