Review: Thruxton Motorsport Centre
I visited Thruxton recently. It’s a great experience for those just getting into motorsport.
Thruxton is 90 minutes outside central London, right near Stonehenge. It’s a racetrack shaped like a gently-rounded oval. Much like many of UK’s tracks, Thruxton was created by widening the perimeter road surrounding an airfield — in this case, one which is still active. Planes sometimes take off overhead as you navigate the circuit.
The setup at Thruxton caters towards those who are relatively new to motorsport. There’s a pipeline of activity throughout the day, as droves of tourists, casual enthusiasts, and those who’ve obviously been given a gift certificate line up for briefings.
The best thing about Thruxton is that its various programs give you a guided way to enter into driving supercars. Thruxton features driving experiences that include the Lamborghini Aventador, Lamborghini Huracán, Ferrari 458 Spider, Aston Martin Vantage, and others. You can opt for the basic driving experience (typically 5 laps in the car of your choice), or an enhanced experience that starts with a warm-up set of laps in a Porsche Cayman (followed by 5 in the car of your choice).
For example, the Huracan basic experience runs £190 (http://www.thruxtonracing.co.uk/experiences/lamborghini-hurcan-thrill), which might be just about the cheapest way you’re typically going to experience a car like this. A Ferrari F430 basic experience runs £175. One-on-one tutoring in a Cayman is also available if you’re interested, as well as open-top driving in one of their F1-style super-light cars.
Downsides to Thruxton are for the more experienced drivers. Because of the mix of drivers and cars on the circuit, you sometimes find yourself blocked behind someone slow. Furthermore, the ride-along instructors keep your RPMs under ~6000, which for some of the supercars is a bit of a disappointment. Finally, they place sets of cones on the track itself (on its road surface) to guide novices so that no one ends up in the gravel. All of this ultimately slows your progress around the track.
The circuit itself is a pleasure to drive. Its long, sweeping compound turns raise the ante on proper setup, as early mistakes tend to multiply into later turns. Thruxton is all about throttle steer, weight transfer, and early planning.
But most of all, it’s one of the easiest ways for beginners to get into driving on a racecourse. I’d highly recommend this experience, especially given the relatively low pricing, for folks new to motorsport in the UK, and for fans of supercars.
