Christa Kojima had done ok on her first track day and had a pretty good time so we figured that the best thing now would be to get some formal education on a higher speed track. Fortunately, my good friends Martina Quan and Dwain Demet happen to own a racing school located at Willow Springs Raceway, DK Racing School. The DK Racing school happens to have a large women clientele also it inst exclusively for women. What I like are great instructors that are established drivers and a good instructor-to-student ratio. The trouble with track day instruction is many times your instructor is a volunteer that isn’t getting paid and thus often isn’t that good of a driver themselves. For this reason, I wanted Christa to attend at least one formal school and get some professional instruction. DK Racing School is accredited to issue FIA and POC racing licenses.
The DK racing school is located in an excellent facility right outside the main gate of Willow Springs. They have a full garage and a well-equipped classroom with a very comfortable lounge where yours truly could relax and eat snacks. Previously for two evenings beforehand, the class had some zoom meetings to go over a lot of stuff and to prep the students for what was to come. I like this approach. The day started with a classroom session where everyone got to meet each other and got to learn the track with some lecturing on driving techniques.
Christa’s instructors were Martina Kwan, Erin Volgel, and Denise Longwell with help from Dwain Demit. All of the instructors have extensive racing experience and are quite seasoned. I knew Christa would be in good hands. After the classroom session, the class went out on the track in the instructor’s cars where they got out and walked the various turns so they could actually see the racing surface, landmarks, and apexes.
Christa’s ride was our Project FR-S. The FR-S is an excellent handling and braking car but it is way down on power. The FR-S had less than half the power of any of the other student’s cars which were things like a 991 GT-3, a GT2RS, an R35 GT-R, and various Porshe Racing class cars. Christa was afraid that she would be holding her fellow students up. Our FR-S proved that it is a solid build running all day with zero problems. The Falken RT660 tires provided great grip even after 3 track days so far and hardly seemed to exhibit much wear after this school!
After the track walk, it was time for Christa to do a lead-follow session with her instructors.
