As you know zombies are will-less and speechless humans capable only of automatic movement who are held to have died and been supernaturally reanimated.
Later this month all the Australian ones will be in Capital Hill, Canberra, for a resumption of their activities. So it can’t be long before the zombie apocalypse.
Given that, I suggest you tick off your bucket list ASAP. Of course, on top of your list is motor racing.
Today, in between talking about the ACCC’s reaction to the VW apocalypse and what we learnt from last weekend’s German Grand Prix, we’ll be showing you how to get on the track, see if you like it and live out your middle-class fantasies.
In Sydney or Melbourne you can start with Tony Palmer at the Formula Company (www.theformulacompany.com) who can organise for you to drive your own car on the track. If you like that you can have an instructor beside you, and if you like that you and an instructor can get behind the wheel of something more serious.
From there you need the least-known owner of big racing teams. Strangely enough Garth Walden called his company Garth Walden Racing and together with partner Myriam Chrystal he runs Porsche GTs, Radicals, Ferraris, Lambos and production cars for owners who want to turn up at the racecourse, sit in, strap up and get out on the track.
Actually Garth had no choice about being in the race car business. Father Brian used to drag him to race tracks at 2am in the morning, had him on a motor bike at four years old and racing karts at seven. Brian has been racing for 44 years, with his first outing on the track in a Mini, then just about everything from Falcon GTHOs to Nascars, with a 16th outright in his first Bathurst 1000.
Garth raced dirt bikes till he got sick of “breaking bones”, V8 Supercars, did three Bathurst 12 hours with his dad and three-quarters of a season in his own Falcon before he ran out of money. Along the way there was the usual sleeping on his father’s couch, working two jobs for 20 hours a day and becoming a top fork lift driver. Pity there’s not a forklift super series.
He ran Perth’s Aaron Caratti’s F3 car, then his Carrera Cup Porsche, managed some podiums for himself in production cars at Bathurst, and Radicals everywhere including Spa, then ran the Radical operations before starting his own shop with one car. Today he runs 26 cars, has a joint venture in race car engineering and is putting together an Asian Le Mans series.
Oh, and along the way Garth found time to become three time Time Attack world champion in the Tilton Interiors Mitsubishi EVO IX. In time attack racing, very highly modified sedans do a lap of a racetrack from a rolling start, by themselves and the fastest time wins. You have to be there to get it.
So what’s it cost to get Brad to guide you from rookie to Lewis Hamilton? While a state championship series will cost you $40,000 a year, a national $100,000 and a Carrera Cup series $350,000, he can get you out for some coaching and non-racing track days for about $20,000 a year plus a car.
Talking of the forthcoming Apocalypse, last week’s story on the VW dieselgate brought hundreds of emails from Audi and VW owners who are feeling completely helpless in the wake of the scandal. Being the car owners’ advocate I immediately called the media people at the ACCC to see what they were doing, particularly after VW’s $20 billion settlement in the US. Don’t worry, the government is on your side. Yes, now that VW management have admitted they embarked on a wilful and systematic scheme of cheating on emissions, involving dozens of employees at all levels of the company, by knowingly installing defeat devices on millions of cars sold around the world, our taxpayer-funded corporate plods told us they “were investigating”.
Finally last weekend, Nico Rosberg, who says Garth Walden taught him everything he knows, was handed a five-second penalty for forcing Max Verstappen off the track during the German GP. Well the five seconds became eight, because the Mercedes stopwatch broke.
This is a shortened version of the original article. To read the rest go to http://www.theaustralian.com.au/life/motoring/garth-waldens-amazing-racing-career/news-story/6517adca499f39babb0d52f8b0c88b05
