Spin it to win it

I accelerate hard from standstill, rear tyres chirping and squirming for grip. I find second just before the limiter, the end of the short straight approaching fast. I change into third, holding the speed at 70mph as I approach the turn-in point. Because just ahead, a hard 90-degree left beckons. And then, as I initiate the turn, I do the unthinkable. Against every instinct and every hard won experience, I lift off. Moments later, it happens. Of course it does. The back end snaps.

In what I tell myself is nanoseconds, on comes the furiously applied opposite lock. But this car is mid-engined, all the electronics are off, and the wailing of the tyres will live long in the memory. Because that is the sound of inevitability. The Lotus comes to rest amidst an acrid cloud of tyre smoke – after having gone backwards, sideways and everything in between. I’ve managed to keep the engine running but don’t feel remotely proud of myself. It’s by far the biggest, fastest and most dramatic spin I’ve had in anything, and I feel sick to my stomach. Everything about it felt so fundamentally wrong.

But yet… I completed the exercise perfectly.