Dubai Autodrome introduces new drives

Dubai Autodrome invited us to a press conference to introduce some of their new “experience” offerings, namely involving driving their cars on their track with some instruction thrown in. One of us went to try it out. Sort of.

The new courses by their Race & Driving School all consist of one morning as far as I can tell, many unfortunately involving only “official” Audi cars. There is also a new offering where you sit and let an instructor drive you around in a Subaru WRX STi or a Clubman 2-seater, but driving courses with those already exist.

I becoming busy with our Mini tester, and also due to Audi thinking I am an a-hole, I didn’t go myself. So I sent my younger oaf of a brother, who also happens to be a support driver for our cause and is the joint owner of our five-speed Supra Twin Turbo beater.

After the press conference, attendees were allowed to do four laps each in a bunch of manual Audi RS4 cars with an instructor in the passenger seat throwing in a few tips about racing lines. Our oaf wasn’t allowed to do more than 5000 rpm in any gear, which made the drive rather dull, considering the RS4 reaches full power at a sky-high 7800 rpm. After this cruise, the instructor did one so-called “hot” lap (with no drifts involved), and then quit pushing it in the second “hot” lap, apparently to allow the car to cool down. My oaf of a brother also got the hint that the Audi TTs used a few weeks ago in another press demo (which I didn’t attend) were already fried.

Anyway, let’s hope the actual (expensive!) course allows the cars to be pushed to the max. Here’s a rundown of their new courses on offer:

PASSENGER RIDES 175 AED
AUDI TT TASTER (3 LAPS DRIVING) 210 AED
SKID CAR EXPERIENCE 595 AED* (Available from September 2007)
AUDI TT EXPERIENCE 750 AED*
GTS EXPERIENCE 875 AED
F1 STYLE SINGLE SEATER EXPERIENCE 875 AED
SUBARU EXPERIENCE 875 AED
AUDI RS4 EXPERIENCE 995 AED*
FIRST DRIVE EXPERIENCE (UNDER 18s) 525 AED*

The * denotes introductory pricing.