What do Canadian roads and Canadian drivers have in common?
Both are prone to freezing up.
Roads become frozen for a number of reasons, from freezing rain to heavy snow to bitter cold.
Drivers often freeze up when they start to lose control on a slippery, frozen road. “The biggest problem is the car starts to slide and they panic,” says Dave Goddard of the Motorsport Club of Ottawa. “They just don’t know how to drive in slippery conditions.”
In fact Goddard says many of the things we do, like slamming on the brakes or over-steering, are the exact wrong things to do. “The skills that you need are not something that comes intuitively.”
The MCO is trying to change that. Every year the volunteer organization holds a winter driving school. It’s a day-long session that combines classroom instruction with hands-on driving… on a track made of ice. It's the same track they hold ice races on at the Capital City Speedway.
“Snow happens. Black ice happens, and there are disasters all over the place. What we try to do here is condition people to be able to deal with those,” says Goddard.
The instructors are many of the same people who race on the ice track, as well as in winter rallies and cross-country races. “These people have a lot of experience on ice and snow,” adds Goddard. “They know how to handle a car.”
The Motorsport Club of Ottawa runs the winter driving school through the months of January and February. Click here for more details.
