DAY IN THE LIFE

Stuart Jones, professional race instructor – and author of motoring crime thriller ‘The Broken Trust’

Author and racing instructor Stuart Jones

I am obsessed with driving, I adore writing, I’m hooked on travelling and fascinated by people, and I have a weird love of early mornings. Fortunately these are all boxes ticked in my job as a race-driving instructor. I am chief instructor for Donington-based BookaTrack Ginetta, I’m a director of the Association of Racing Driver Schools (ARDS), and I run a motorsport management and logistics business. I am a published author, too… so my days usually start very early.

My driving obsession started very early. I remember sitting on my Dad’s knee while I steered his sky-blue Vauxhall Viva HB round a New Forest field, and from then on I was hooked on all things motoring. I have stayed hooked for the 50 years that followed.

Most days I travel to or from a circuit of some description either by car, truck or plane, but I leave the plane-driving to someone else. After doing these journeys for a few years I have sadly ended up with standard stopping places for each circuit I visit, be that the McDonalds on the A50 on my way home from Donington Park or the first service station on the E40 on the way back from Spa Francorchamps, where I have been ordering the same cheese walnut baguette and coffee for many years. If one of them is closed due to some untimely refurbishment, then my whole journey is ruined by such a thoughtless act.

I have enjoyed racing in various machines, but my job as a race instructor has opened up a world of opportunities to drive an expansive array of four-wheeled exotica, a privilege I will never take for granted. To name one favourite would be like naming a favourite grandchild. I am not that brave, so I will take the easy option and list a couple in date order.

I felt as though I sat on rather than in an exquisite 1935 ERA, but I was soon able to make friends with the pre-selector gearbox that had given me a sleepless night before my drive. A 2002 Ferrari Enzo totally blindsided me. Expecting it to be a hyped-up, overpriced diva, I was soon brought to my knees by this temptress that had me begging for more time with her. Finally, a car that defies science for me around every circuit I have driven it is the master McLaren, the P1.

Writing provides an easy escape for me, and I have to be careful that when I have escaped from the rough-and-ready real world I do not forget how to get back! Involvement in the vibrant motorsport scene ensures I have always got words in my head that need to be whipped into some sort of order, while travelling for the job offers a lot of writing time while waiting in airports or faceless hotels.

I never tire of travelling, and if time permits I will always seek out the best driving route rather than the quickest way from A to B. This always offers challenges to embrace and experiences to savour. For example, on one refuelling stop in an obscure French village, a

‘fifteen minutes of exercise clears my carburettors and sets up my high-mileage, one-owner body for the day’

simple smile at a boules-playing group elicited an invitation to demonstrate how bad the English are – or maybe just how bad I am – at playing this most French of games. Pity was handed out later in the evening, along with copious amounts of wine and a bed for the night. The icing on the travel-adventure cake was the serving of a bacon sandwich and a strong brew the following morning to soak up and replace the previous night’s excesses.

Being on the move, rather than working in an office environment, means I get to meet many new and interesting faces, and I hope it also saves people from having to endure me for too long. Even my wife will politely and expertly enquire after a few short days: ‘So, when are you off on your travels again?’

The range of ‘people experiences’ I have had would be hard to top. When I was giving supercar passenger rides for the Sporting Bears charity, a bright young lad told me his mum has a large jar on the mantlepiece which she fills with spare change. When it’s full, they count it and then decide what to do with it – the one rule being they have to spend all of it on having fun. The recently emptied jar was paying for all his rides in his dream cars that day. Wow!

Leaping the void, I also coached an A-lister in a million-pound-plus Lightweight Jaguar E-type round Spa. He raced under a pseudonym and jealously guarded his track time, so he could enjoy a moment of escapism from his hectic high-profile life. So many stratospheric stars find release in drugs and drink, he told me over lunch, but his drug was driving.

All these experiences tend to start at silly o’clock in the morning. Fortunately I am a morning person and somehow always manage to switch the alarm off on my phone before it has done its job. Then 15 minutes of exercise clears the carburettors and sets up my highmileage, one-owner body for the day.

Early-morning drives are the ultimate for me, alone with my thoughts and the rumble of whatever four-wheeled muse I find yourself in. The warming, rolling roads are still breathing, not yet congested with stressed drivers frustrated with their office start times. Often I also have a grandstand view as the dark skies are beaten into submission by the all-powerful rising sun. More often than not a great day of driving beckons, once the sat-nav has been shown the error of its ways and has given way to the sound of an unfolding road map.