Moncton native Lorne Banks is a professional driving instructor who has taught high-level techniques to race drivers, the secret service police agencies and even the U.S. Navy SEALS.
Source: Times & Transcript
Monctonian returns home after years of training race drivers, military and police in high-level techniques
NEW BRUNSWICK - Lorne Banks has spent the last 20 years racing motorcycles, racing cars and training drivers - including the U.S. Navy SEALS - in advanced techniques, and now he wants to start his own course that will help young New Brunswick drivers be safer on the road.
Moncton native Lorne Banks is a professional driving instructor who has taught high-level techniques to race drivers, the secret service police agencies and even the U.S. Navy SEALS.
"I want to set up a young driver's course that will teach them how to survive, whether they are in city traffic, on the highways or on back roads. I want to educate kids in this province and eventually take it all across Canada so they won't get killed, and hopefully be able to do it so it doesn't cost them a dime."
The Moncton native is now starting to seek out corporate sponsors - auto manufacturers, insurance companies and the like - to help make the idea of a high-level driver training course for average people a reality.
Banks says recent accidents in New Brunswick that claimed the lives of teenagers probably could have been avoided if young drivers had learned how to handle their vehicles when things start to go bad. He says young drivers need to be taught to be aware of what their car is doing and how it will react when the roads are slippery, when they are going too fast or when they start to lose control.
"If someone is going too fast on a dirt road and they drop a wheel off the pavement, they can oversteer and get into trouble. It's all because of lack of education. How can you expect a kid to fix an emergency situation if they've never practised it? Today's kids don't get a chance to learn these things. I want to take them out into a field and onto a skid pad and show them what will happen in certain situations. The more you learn about vehicle dynamics and physics of what the car is doing, the less apt you are to do something stupid. Drivers need to learn survivability and instincts. You need to avoid accidents instead of being part of the accident."
During his courses, Banks will often send students through a series of pylons or obstacles. When they come back smiling after a clean run, he'll give them a cell phone and ask them to text or talk while driving, then stand back and watch them knock the pylons all over the place. He does it to make the point of how people need to pay attention.
Banks grew up on the Salisbury Road on the outskirts of Moncton and graduated from MacNaughton High School in 1981. His first driving experience was as a youngster at the wheel of a tractor, and then in an old Volkswagen in a field. He raced motocross in the 1980s and then got involved in motorcycle road racing. He formed his own company, Banks Racing, and won two national road racing championships. He then moved to the U.S. to form a Superbike team that represented the U.S. and Canada. He moved to Montana and later to Indianapolis where he got involved in racing Sprint Cars. He attended every racing school he could find and landed a job as an instructor with Skip Barber racing schools, which offers courses all over the United States. From there he became involved in corporate driver training for big-name manufacturers like BMW, Porsche, Dodge and General Motors. BMW sent him to Germany to teach a road and dirt course for both cars and motorcycles. And in 2005, he ventured into the world of training military special forces, police, FBI, Secret Service and other professionals in things like high-speed pursuits, driving with night-vision equipment, security driving, motorcades and even the proper method of ramming cars to stop criminals who refuse to give up.
He says training members of the U.S. Navy SEALS on high-level driving techniques was an incredible experience. He put them through drills where they drove military vehicles at breakneck speed in total darkness - with simulated gunfire and explosions - to escape armed attackers.
"They are highly trained to do what they are told. If you tell them to go full throttle and don't lift, they'll go full throttle and not lift, so you have to be careful of what you get them to do because you don't want them to get into too much danger."
From the motocross track and the battlefield to highways and city traffic, Banks says the laws of physics, vehicle dynamics and the golden rules of survival apply everywhere.
"The most important thing is to look further ahead from where you will be in a few seconds and if you get into an emergency situation, look for the empty space where you can escape. If you look at the tree, you're going to hit the tree. If you look at the guard rail, you will hit the guard rail. Ninety-nine per cent of the accidents that people get into can be traced back to where they were looking. You can avoid trouble if you pay attention and stay aware of your surroundings, and anticipate the other motorists and what they will do."
He says understanding the physics of what the car will do if a wheel goes off the road or the tires hit a patch of slippery slush is important.
"Vehicle dynamics is not rocket science. It's simple physics. You have to know the limitations of your vehicle."
For example, when you step on the gas the weight of the vehicle will shift to the back, which means the front tires will have less traction for turning. When you hit the brakes, the weight shifts to the front. Race car drivers know that as they approach a turn, they can give their brakes a quick tap that will shift the weight of the vehicle onto the front wheels, which will give them more traction and control as they go into the corner. Banks says this little trick can be applied to city driving to give drivers more control as they go through intersections.
Here's another example: this week's weather has been very hot which means streets and highways will have a thin film of invisible tire residue on them. If it rains this weekend, that residue will turn into a greasy wet substance. Drivers have to train themselves to look for slippery patches and remain calm if they feel a sudden loss of control, because oversteering just before you hit a good traction patch will do much more harm than good.
The same goes for the little grooves in the highway that can fill with water during a heavy rain and cause the car to hydroplane. If you oversteer in an effort to regain control, the car will shoot off in the opposite direction when it regains traction.
"If you are paying attention and move over half a lane to avoid those grooves, you can avoid trouble."
Banks says vehicle technology has come a long way over the last 20 years with all-wheel-drive, traction control and ABS brakes, but people still need to read the road and know their vehicle's limitations. This is especially important during the winter months when slush, ice and snow can create unseen hazards.
He suggests parents start pointing out things to kids years before they are old enough to take the wheel, and get them behind the wheel of a go-kart early in life so they can start learning how machines handle.
"The average person doesn't think about this stuff very much but it's important. Most people think they are great drivers but after 18 years of teaching this stuff I've realized that when it comes to vehicle dynamics, most people haven't got a clue."
