How Good a Driver Do You Have to Be?

Driving isn’t something we should take lightly, it’s a privilege and a rite of passage for most of us that represents freedom, growing up and marks one of the first events in our lives that makes us feel as if we are becoming adults. Learning how to drive properly and using the skills necessary to make adjustments on the road to stay in the lane is part of the finer points of driving skill that we learn during this time, but some drivers have more skill than others.

Those who become professional drivers, whether they drive for stunts in movies, perform exciting rides of speed and precision or find ways to race around the track on a weekly basis have a much higher skill level than most of us who are average drivers. While we can handle a car going at speeds up to eighty mph on a highway that’s meant to turn and curve in ways that will help you stay in your lane and work with traffic, these professionals are the epitome of what great driving can be and what it means to take to the road in a high performance machine.

When you have the skill it takes to drift down a mountain road that’s full of hairpin turns you have the opportunity to see some of the most impressive sights on the road and have a great time rolling down a road that’s carved into the canyon wall as you narrowly escape falling off and ending up at the bottom of a cliff. In order to accomplish this feat you have to be confident not only in your vehicle and the equipment you have, but also in the skill you have as a driver.

Check out the video linked below. While it’s obvious this is a promotional video for the driver of the car, the skill and precision in which he has to drive to handle the Franschhoek Pass in South Africa is simply amazing. The car chosen is an 812 horsepower Mazda RX-8 and the driver is Mike Whiddett, a professional drifter from New Zealand who obviously has a full helping of courage at his disposal in order to handle this awesome run down the mountain that results in him being able to return a cassette tape to the driver of an old truck.

You can see during the video that he narrowly escapes some of the corners as he makes his way down the road to where the truck is located. At speeds that reach up as high as 154 mph you have to ask yourself how much skill it has to take in order to make it down this narrow run of road and still maintain some of the impressive speeds he reaches. Check out this video and then pick your jaw up afterward as you witness this perfect harmony of man and machine out on the road in an effort to tame this harrowing road full of hairpin turns.