Today was another young drivers event at the Castle Combe race circuit near Chippenham. The course aimed at 14-16 year olds had the priority of teaching the basics of safe car control within the safety net of being off road and under professional tuition.
Last time, a few of our instructors were involved with the course, along with other driving instructors from around the local areas. This time, Belt Up School of Motoring was the sole training school involved, with Driving Force, the organisers, overseeing the operation.
There were, today, around 18 young drivers, of which the vast majority had never driven before. All drivers left competent on moving away and stopping, gear changing up and down. Approaching left and right junctions and most, if not all, of the young drivers moved onto the race circuit for some higher speed training. With a speed limit enforced on the track of 50mph, all training was undertaken in complete safety.
The trainers taught with complete professionalism, and we had huge smiles and fantastic feedback from the young drivers and their parents. The course is a credit to the organisers at Castle Combe circuit and Driving Force, and the Belt Up instructors were as always a credit to us.
Belt Up School of Motoring are also looking to get involved with Driving Force to offer the school program to schools in the Midsomer Norton, Radstock and Frome areas. Discussions are hopefuly going to go ahead with the main schools in the area, and we are looking to be at the forefront of delivering the fantastic course as set out by Driving Force. Driving force are passionate about their courses, and I am starting to understand why.. They have also written a Btec course which has been recently accredited by Edexcel, so the possibilities of young driver training are endless. We have Male and Female driving instructors with Belt Up who share this passion for road safety, and we all believe that getting the message out to the young adults at this stage will set them up for their further driving careers, hopefully at the same time, helping to reduce the horribly high number of road incidents in our area which involve the younger age groups.
