Come play in AMG’s frozen playground
Winter sporting program on Lake Winnipeg teaches a different set of car-control skills
Normally, starting a session at a driving school involves driving through a pit lane and onto a track. But the AMG Winter Sporting program in Gimli, Manitoba, is not your usual driving school. That becomes apparent as we creep onto the thick ice of the small town’s harbour, past docks where fishing boats would normally moor in the warmer seasons. Then the whole thing becomes downright surreal as we crawl past the towering MV Namao research vessel, still in the water with its heated hull keeping the creeping ice at bay, and circle out onto the vast, windswept surface of frozen Lake Winnipeg. And this is just the beginning.
This particular driving school isn’t about track times or trail-braking; this is about sliding the rear end of your car out in the corners, trying to keep control on a surface of pure ice. AMG has had a similar ice-driving academy in Sweden for the past 12 years, but this is the first year it has brought the school to the frozen shores of Gimli, with three- and four-day courses available between late January and late February.
The company took over 325 acres of the lake just off the shore to plow off five separate tracks through the snow, which are all cleverly connected for a 7,400-metre “Lap of the Continent” track to really practise your sliding skills (or lack thereof ). We had access to three very different AMG cars: the CLA 45, with a front-wheel-bias AWD system; the CLS 63S, with a rear-wheel-bias AWD system; and the rear-wheel-drive C 63. All had their traction-control systems completely off, and were stock, except for an extra lip on the front for protection from, let’s say “over-exuberance” on the track, and studded tires.
The tires themselves — Lappi winter tires from Sweden — are works of art. Each tire has had around 400 studs hand-glued into the tread by a husband-and-wife team in Sweden, who took care of some 600 sets of tires for both Gimli and the Swedish AMG experience.
How do you keep control of a sliding car on the ice? There are a few things to think about, but the main one is balance. You use the brake (or come off the gas) to pitch the car forward for grip on the front, or hammer the throttle to get the rear tires to either bite in or kick out, depending if your car is pointing straight or not. Sounds simple, right? It isn’t.
We had to try all that in the pitch darkness of night, when we were first unleashed on one of the tracks the evening of our arrival. Getting a car sideways means your headlights are pointing in a different direction from your line of travel, but the CLA 45 we started with proved to be light and nimble. Keeping the revs around 4,000 rpm, the corners come up quickly; a deft back-and-forth of the steering wheel and a soft dab of the brakes easily sends the rear out, but there’s no terror or panic. With full steering wheel lock and a heavy right foot to keep the wheels spinning, the little AMG pulled out of corners and settled with ease. A slalom course had the car rocking back and forth like a pendulum.
The morning brought a full span of the course, and it’s huge, with the fishing huts of locals dotting just outside the track area. Though you might think losing control and going into a snowbank isn’t so bad, think again: with rising and falling temperatures, the snow is almost as hard as the metre-thick ice underneath our tires. So, no pressure.
As much as the 375-horsepower CLA 45 is a beauty to drive in this environment, the 577-hp CLS 63S is the beast. Much heavier, much more powerful, and with an AWD bias to the rear wheels, it was a whole lot easier to spin out. And yet it kept its composure with the right input. More than a few times it was well past 90 degrees in a turn, and I was looking over my shoulder at the direction of travel, and yet it carried all the way around and straightened up, seeming to defy all laws of physics.
The final car was perhaps the easiest to coax into a spin; the 469hp C 63 sedan is completely rearwheel drive. A soft touch of brake and a turn of the wheel sent the rear around instantly; you’re off the gas almost as much as you’re on it in the beginning, all the while rowing the steering wheel to keep it in line. Finally managing to keep the engine revving while moving in a perfect arc around a corner was one of the most satisfying times of the day.
Save for a lunch break, almost the entire day was spent in the heated driver’s seat of one of the cars, a good thing considering it was -17 C on the frozen, windswept lake. The usual programs ($3,995 for the three-day Advanced course, and $4,995 for the four-day Advanced Plus) are over for this year, but will be available again early next year, and if you fancy horning a few very powerful luxury cars on a giant frozen lake — and, of course, if you have the means — the AMG Winter Sporting program is a good way to break up the winter blues.
Florida in February? Nah, I’ll take Gimli, Manitoba.