TOC Students Learn How To Be A Race Driver

TOC Automotive College is one of the early pioneers in automotive education. It was established with a passion to provide the best learning experience in automotive and motorsport training.

TOC is now taking motorsport education to a new level by partnering with top racing team Aylezo Motorsport to create Malaysia’s first High-Performance Driving and Racing course.

Aylezo was founded by racing driver Zen Low who has established the team as one of the most successful race winning operations in Asia and this year Aylezo is competing in two of the region’s premier series, Lamborghini Super Trofeo Asia and Asian Le Mans.

The TOC-Aylezo Racing Academy is based within the home of Aylezo Motorsport, at 3 Stone Park in the precinct of Glenmarie, which is equipped with its own kart track, world class simulators and physical fitness gym.

Adelaine Foo, CEO and Founder of TOC explained how it come about and what are its aims and objectives:

Our graduates go out and work for motorsport teams and Aylezo was one of them. One thing they realised as a team was that while the students are very good technically, they lacked racing experience. We realised that a good technician needs to have practical racing experience so that they understand exactly what the race driver is talking about. Similarly race drivers need to have some technical know how in order to close the communication gap.

The TOC-Aylezo Racing Academy is an eight-week course and is designed to give a unique insight into what it takes to be a race driver, together with an understanding of the on-track race engineering involved.

Motorsport is a very complicated business with many variable factors that have to be taken into account, so racing car simulators are used as a very useful explanation tool.

Communication between the racing driver and the engineer is paramount. The students do their training in pairs, with one becoming the driver and the other the race engineer, and then they swop so that they can understand what is going on either side.

The simulators are set up for that purpose and various adjustments can be made to the car’s set up so that the students can actually feel the difference those adjustments have made to the handling of the car. This way the students can learn first hand the very effects of the changes and experience what this is like on the race track, such as the effect of weight transfer, camber adjustment or toe changes.

Students also learn the essentials such as the correct seating position, the angle your arms should be at, as well as familiarisation of the many controls on a modern racing car.

Then there are the basics of actually driving a race car, such as brake and accelerator control, cornering, field of view and understanding the all important reference points, which is essential for a driver on the track.

Once the students understand how to drive the race car, then they can start on track work on the many circuit layouts available on the simulator. This includes familiarisation of the circuit, the braking points, cornering speeds and once they are sufficiently confident, then time attack to see how fast and smooth they can be against the clock.

Students also learn the importance of fitness in the custom built gym and the training racing drivers require, such as upper body strength, cardio, plus core and leg exercise. The physical fitness can be put into practice on the kart track which was designed with a range of corners to test the skill of the drivers. Preparation is particularly important and before they start driving, the students walk the circuit to learn what the track looks like and the racing lines before the challenge of trying to set the fastest lap.

“The TOC-Aylezo Racing Academy is a true test and provides an opportunity for all automotive enthusiasts who want to embark on this adrenaline filled industry,” said Zen Low, founder of Aylezo.

The course is open to everyone, but students do require to have some basic technical understanding. The course is essentially 30% theory and 70% practical to help drivers optimise their performance.

For further information email: info@toc.edu.my or visit Aylezo Racing Academy Official Page