Mike Packwood

This is a picture taken in about 1998 of me driving an E type Jaguar at Silverstone in Northamptonshire. A brilliant day out. The man in the passenger seat was the instructor and after a few laps with him driving showing you the ropes, you were just allowed to get on with it! Fantastic experience. There were three E Types and we were all out at the same time, dicing with Lotus Elise's and single seaters. The Jaguars sounded brilliant and didn't feel 30 years old. You ended the day with a written assessment from the instructor. He mentioned 'red mist' in mine!

I passed my test 14 years ago. I've ridden all sorts of things, but up until a year ago had never done a track day. I took the plunge at Pembray in Sept 2009 on a VFR, managed two sessions and have never been so terrified in my life. I rode it there from Cardiff, with a tank- bag full of spanners and a banana for energy, as if that would help! I stopped after two sessions because a bloke I had met fell off and broke his collar bone, so I ended up taking his Mrs to Carmathen hospital to pick him up. Come 2010 I decided to have another go and in the spirit of things, bought a Blade, a 2002 RR2, fitted a towbar to the car and rented a trailer. Have you got any idea how fast a Fireblade will really go or how far it will really lean? No, me neither! I got technically better, learnt a lot about my nerves and my bike, got faster, better, more confident......but never got rid of the terror. 5 more days in 2010 and I decided to call it a day while I was still in one bit. Statistically it...