Please read:  The Application Process  
This is NEW as of Spring 2008!
Classes will now be held at 400 Dorset St - MONDAYS and THURSDAYS
An Application and Policy Statement is available here in WORD format: for 2008
...also available in Acrobat Reader (pdf) format
A calendar for 2008-2009 school year is available here in WORD format: Calendar
APPLICATIONS ARE ACCEPTED FROM ALL OF CHITTENDEN COUNTY
Summer Class cost  -  $755.00  -  Subject to Change.
School Year - $695.00  - Subject to Change.

There are current openings for January WINTER 2009 SESSION

Maintaining Control and Balance in the Corners

Objective: The objective of this lesson is to apply and learn the physical laws of gravity, inertia, traction, and balance as they apply to cornering a vehicle.  Simple physics can save your life, or steal it away in one wrong corner. 

Directions: Review the diagram below. Practice approaching a corner in a slow and controlled manner. As the vehicle is turned into the corner the speed must have already been adjusted.  Many new driver wait until they are turning to slow the vehicle - and many will find that is too late.  Apply a whisper of gas (as in the hill start procedures) just as the vehicle is exiting the corner. This whisper will hold the back of the car down (as it did on the hill), distributing the weight of the vehicle evenly on these tires as the vehicle come out of the corner.  The vehicle, because of the laws of physics, wants to travel in a straight path.  The tracton of the four tires (with their very small "footprint") is all that will allow us to turn successfully.     Slowing before the corner (before you turn the wheel to "take" the corner) will allow physics to work FOR you.  If we go too fast into a corner; the laws of physics will win, and the vehicle and its occupants will lose.
    If a corner is taken "a little" too fast - try slowing just 3-4 mph to prove to the student that "in-control" is only a few miles per hour different.  Slowing actually allows you to "take" the corner in less time as you are accelerating out of the corner - where the car that goes into the corner too fast is on the brakes (and off balance) far into, and even coming out of, the corner.

Inform the driver that the benefit of this exercise is not only to maintain balance in the corner but also to aid in the comfort of  all the passengers as well.  Ask if they have ever gone around a corner when someone else was driving when they rocked and swayed from side to side in their seat?   The answer will probably be "yes!". This exercise should totally eliminate that uncomfortable off-balance (and dangerous) situation.