Nascar Driving experience

I was recently in Las Vegas to attend the world famous SEMA show. Any guy who is into cars should visit the SEMA show at least once in their lifetime. While in Las Vegas I took the opportunity to drive a Nascar at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway with Richard Petty Driving Experience.

After having spent about 30 minutes in the briefing room I was ushered to the track side to get ready to drive the Nascar. Having driven a Formula race car, a WRC rally car and other various types of racing cars I was quite eager to try out the Nascar. Being a non American I seldom seeing Nascar on TV it was kind of interesting to see why the Americans love Nascar so much.

One of the good things about the Nascar driving experience was that the organizer did not water down the experience by giving you a tuned down car. The car I was going to drive was actually a full scale race prepared Nascar with the full 600+ hp with full slick tires and roll cage. Getting into the car itself was a bit of a challenge as I had to climb through the window (lucky I am not a very big guy). Having climbed into the car getting the car moving was simple enough as the clutch on the car was surprisingly soft. Once on the track the aim was to position the car to hit the painted markers on the track surface as this determined the ideal position where the car should be on the track.

Driving the car was actually far more simple than I imagined and required little skill. Going fast in the car was merely to follow the markers, lift off the throttle at the entry of the turn and putting your foot down again mid way through. All of this is done in 4th gear so there is minimal gear changing. Unlike the movies, the drivers do not really shift gears while zooming around the track. The real action is in the overtaking as all you need to do is draft behind another car and wait for the opportunity to overtake on the straights.

The fun for the spectators is in the overtaking and accidents. Being alone on the track is easy but when you have 30 other cars on the track it can be quite crowded making driving fast a real challenge.

I can sum it up as an interesting driving experience but not one that I would repeat as it was rather boring. Having spent so much time in a racing go-kart, the Nascar experience is really just not challenging enough and does not put your driving skills to the test.