How good of a driver do you honestly feel you are

[Cookie Monster]

I would say 4.

[Soup DeVille]

If you're stomping on the brakes and gas the whole way through you're probably doing it wrong.

Or, you have little power and bad brakes?

[Rich]

I don't know.  I'd need to race on a track competitively with other drivers in the same cars to find out.

[Rupert]

I don't know.  I'd need to race on a track competitively with other drivers in the same cars to find out.

I was hoping you'd put a number out there. My plan was, for track driving, you minus 2 points.

For public roads within reasonable limits (i.e. not pushing a car all the way), and using the scale we seem to be using (which, as Laconian pointed out, is well passed biased), I'd say 6 - 7. My only accident was because of a wet patch mid-corner (and it didn't do any damage to anyone or anything, and was eight years ago), I've got a pretty good flow on roads I've been on before, and including gravel roads in the woods, people don't generally keep up. I do lack a few skills (heel-and-toe, drifting), but general car control is better than average. On a track, using the same scale, probably a 2 or 3.

Using a real scale, 4 on public roads, and 0.2 on a track.

[mzziaz]

About 6 I guess.....and hope.

[Onslaught]

If you're stomping on the brakes and gas the whole way through you're probably doing it wrong.

Well everyone else there is doing it wrong too then. I don't know, it just didn't do anything at all for me. I gave it a fe try's and won't do it again.

[omicron]

One million.

[Byteme]

Day to day driving, being aware of what's going on around me, avoiding idiots, etc. while making better time than most;  probably an 8.

Driving at or near the limit, probably a 5.0327.  I don't do that much anymore and I'm likely a bit rusty.  

[SVT666]

If MexicoCityM3 claims he's a 7-8 and he tracks his cars on a regular basis, I'm going to say I'm a 6.  If he hadn't posted that, I would have said I was a 7.  I have great car control and I can drive very fast very safely.  But, I've got nothing on people who track their cars all the time.

[CALL_911]

Honestly, I wouldn't even know where to begin in terms of rating myself. I don't think I can. Except for those who track their cars here, I doubt there's anyone who's not in my boat.

[Cookie Monster]

Honestly, I wouldn't even know where to begin in terms of rating myself. I don't think I can. Except for those who track their cars here, I doubt there's anyone who's not in my boat.

Yeah, I guessed a 4 because while I do believe I'm better than most drivers on the road, I do drive like an idiot quite a lot (comes with the age). I haven't had any accidents (yet ) and have gone to some auto-x's, but I'm not great at auto-x and have had some careless moments behind the wheel.

All in all I believe I'm a far more conscious driver than most people, especially compared to my friends and family.

[Eye of the Tiger]

If you ever been out with a true professional, especially a race or rally driver, you will realise that while your skills may seem perfectly fine for normal road driving, there is so much more to learn.

On that basis, unless there are things that you have not told us about your driver training, I think most of you have way over-called your skills and abilities here...... if the likes of Michael Schumacher and Carlos Sainz are a 10, then few of us are honestly ever going to be better than a 5 or 6. 

I guess you can count me as one of the few.

[sportyaccordy]

If you ever been out with a true professional, especially a race or rally driver, you will realise that while your skills may seem perfectly fine for normal road driving, there is so much more to learn.

On that basis, unless there are things that you have not told us about your driver training, I think most of you have way over-called your skills and abilities here...... if the likes of Michael Schumacher and Carlos Sainz are a 10, then few of us are honestly ever going to be better than a 5 or 6. 

This is why the 7s and 8s are surprising to me. 7-8 is like a midlevel professional race car driver... I don't think anyone here could hop in something like an F1 car and do a race-worthy lap time

If Ayrton Senna was a 9... how can anyone here be an 8?

[SVT666]

Who said anything about professional racing? I thought we were talking about how good we are in our everyday lives compared to other normal people.  If we're including professional race car drivers I would be a 3, but that would mean most drivers are a 0 or 1 and I don't believe that.

[Northlands]

I'd say 7-8 on regular roads for regular driving. I've avoided a fair number near calamities caused by other drivers ( and with passengers to prove it. ) I've driven a fair amount of cars for decent lengths of time ( AWD, RWD, FWD, land barges, vans, trucks, econo boxes..etc. ). All that being said, I'm also downright tame to how I used to drive.

HOWEVER, I've also done some track driving and had some training, and on the track, I'd be a solid 3-3.5. Mind you these are local instructors using a track made on an old airport site. I drive well enough not to crash and also can drive near the limit in many smaller cars. I'm still trying to master controlling small slides in some RWD cars on track ( I have much less fear on ice since it requires a lot less speed to do. ). I've no experience in AWD on a track or doing any kind of logging dirt road higher speed shenanigans like I used to do an old civic I owned.

[Northlands]

Who said anything about professional racing? I thought we were talking about how good we are in our everyday lives compared to other normal people.  If we're including professional race car drivers I would be a 3, but that would mean most drivers are a 0 or 1 and I don't believe that.

Yeah, that's how I took the meaning of the thread as well.

[Morris Minor]

I'm a former 7, but as I age and therefore my eyesight & reaction times deteriorate, I am going with a 6. I'm cautious and read the road ahead better than most, but I'm erring to self criticism.

Curiously, I think driving the totally unexciting and uninvolving Pilot has dumbed me down. When my son was home, and I got a lot of wheeltime in the G35 Coupe (6MT), the attention and involvement it demanded made me a better driver.

I've never done any competitive driving, other than on an indoor kart track. I would love to take a couple of weeks off and blow some serous money on a performance driving course at Road Atlanta but, as with the $700/mo dues I'd like to spend at a golf club here, I can't afford it, not while I'm putting my daughter through school.

[68_427]

I've never done any competitive driving, other than on an indoor kart track. I would love to take a couple of weeks off and blow some serous money on a performance driving course at Road Atlanta but, as with the $700/mo dues I'd like to spend at a golf club here, I can't afford it, not while I'm putting my daughter through school.

You should watch the last episode of UK Top Gear.

[Byteme]

Yeah, that's how I took the meaning of the thread as well.

Ditto

[Byteme]

I've never done any competitive driving, other than on an indoor kart track.

The last time I was on a kart track some kid tried to cut me off in a corner.  He was quite suprised when I put him into the tires.  God damn kids.

[sportyaccordy]

Who said anything about professional racing? I thought we were talking about how good we are in our everyday lives compared to other normal people.  If we're including professional race car drivers I would be a 3, but that would mean most drivers are a 0 or 1 and I don't believe that.

I don't think an 0 or 1 is unreasonable. And the intention was to compare one's self to professional race car drivers. A full span absolute scale. Just to kind of put complaints about driver isolation + electronics in context

Also don't sleep on video game experience. There have been many stories about dudes who had no experience but shit like Gran Turismo and went and decimated a real track like Laguna Seca. That might be good for 1/2 a point.

[hounddog]

This is why the 7s and 8s are surprising to me. 7-8 is like a midlevel professional race car driver... I don't think anyone here could hop in something like an F1 car and do a race-worthy lap time

If Ayrton Senna was a 9... how can anyone here be an 8?

Professional level?

If that is what we are using I would say that when I was still working, and teaching, my skill level would have been a 7-8.

Keeping with that same scale, I would say my skills are probably a 5-6 now.   I have not kept in practice with all the skills I once had/knew.

[SVT666]

I don't think an 0 or 1 is unreasonable. And the intention was to compare one's self to professional race car drivers. A full span absolute scale. Just to kind of put complaints about driver isolation + electronics in context

There is nothing in your original post with the intention of comparing ourselves to professional race car drivers.  That Civic is from an amateur race series.  If we're comparing ourselves to the Michael Schumachers of the world, there isn't a guy on here over 5, so that would be a pointless thread.

Also don't sleep on video game experience. There have been many stories about dudes who had no experience but shit like Gran Turismo and went and decimated a real track like Laguna Seca. That might be good for 1/2 a point.

The last time I was a serious gamer for car racing games was the original Need For Speed from 1996-1998.

[SVT666]

Professional level?

If that is what we are using I would say that when I was still working, and teaching, my skill level would have been a 7-8.

Keeping with that same scale, I would say my skills are probably a 5-6 now.   I have not kept in practice with all the skills I once had/knew.

I call a big ole Bullshit on that one.  If professional racing drivers range from a 7 (low level pros like Formula Atlantic) to a 10 (F1 and WRC), there is no way in hell you were even close to that.  Cops are better than most people because of their training, but they are not anywhere near as trained or as skilled as even low level professional racing drivers.

[Rich]

If we're comparing ourselves to the Michael Schumachers of the world, there isn't a guy on here over 5, so that would be a pointless thread.

Why? 

[Cookie Monster]

This is why the 7s and 8s are surprising to me. 7-8 is like a midlevel professional race car driver... I don't think anyone here could hop in something like an F1 car and do a race-worthy lap time

If Ayrton Senna was a 9... how can anyone here be an 8?

If Senna was a 9, there would be no 10.

[SVT666]

Why? 

It's not a fair comparison.  If I got out on a track in an F1 car I wouldn't even get up to speed to warm the tires up enough and I would end up sliding off the first corner.  Richard Hammond is definitely an above average driver and he could barely keep heat in the tires.  Schumacher would lap me before I finished the first lap.

[Cookie Monster]

It's not a fair comparison.  If I got out on a track in an F1 car I wouldn't even get up to speed to warm the tires up enough and I would end up sliding off the first corner.  Richard Hammond is definitely an above average driver and he could barely keep heat in the tires.  Schumacher would lap me before I finished the first lap.

I would probably be too scared to drive the car.

[Onslaught]

Yea, I'm not talking about being a 6 or 7 next to an F1 guy. I'm talking about driving for normal people who track cars for fun. If we're talking pro race car drivers are 10's then every guy on this site is a .5 at best.

[hounddog]

Also don't sleep on video game experience. There have been many stories about dudes who had no experience but shit like Gran Turismo and went and decimated a real track like Laguna Seca. That might be good for 1/2 a point.

I have an incredibly difficult time believing that.

Sure, some of the game "physics" apply in the real world, but, without ever having stepped into a car and having to deal with the real life variables such as yaw/pitch/G-force/pushing etc. and being capable to understand how these things are effecting the car on the road, while navigating multiple turns and curves?  It would be incredibly difficult to deal with these issues for a beginning race driver who has only experienced two dimentional "racing."  

We had tons of police officers who have been through basic precision driving in their academies, drive police cars for years and then one day are sent to the MSP Advanced Precision Driving School.  Usually, a few put their cars in the grass, others drop a wheel off the track and have to requalify all while having several days of driving instruction prior to running at high speed.

Jump in a car after only playing video games and kill everyone on the track?  Probably not.