Speed Week: driving the Formula Renault 2.0 racer

Two Austrian men are rummaging around in my lap. I raise my arms above my head, failing miserably to get out of their way, as they tug on the many straps that surround me. With every yank, I’m anchored more tightly into my seat. Only it’s not really a seat. They ought to be called no-seaters, really. ‘Single-seater’ implies at least one seat, and all there is in this thing is a man-sized, duct-tape-lined hole in the bodywork.

The ‘thing’ of which I am now a fleshy component is a Formula Renault 2.0-litre. Lewis Hamilton raced these. So did Kimi Räikkönen. And Felipe Massa. And they’re pretty handy. I, however, will not be racing. I will simply be trying to stay on track, and not accelerate nose-first into the back of the Rangie SVR, from which, for the first couple of laps, several photographers will attempt to capture the look of wide-eyed terror through my visor.

I’m in this situation because, the Red Bull Ring will, for a small fee, let you loose around the track in something a bit tasty. And the breadth of what’s offered here is impressive. Fancy a lap in the Formula 2.0, like us? Go ahead. Or maybe a romp through the 550 hectare off-road play area in a Defender? Sure. How about a lesson in drifting on the Driving Centre’s skidpan in a Group-N spec Evo? Absolutely. They do bikes too, and go-karts. You can even buy a two-day experience where you have a pro like David Coulthard as your instructor – for €2,988.

All 49 vehicles are kept in a massive garage colloquially known as the Toy Box. There are 12 KTM X-Bows in there, eight of these F2.0s, a couple of Formula Renault 3.5s and an F1 car or two. And, presumably, one hell of a burglar alarm.

Then there’s all the other stuff dotted around the region – paragliding, skiing, kayaking – plus the spas, the gourmet restaurants, the many hotels. It’s all down to Projekt Spielberg; the multimillion-euro grand plan to renew and refresh the entire region by turning it into some kind of vast adventure playground, with the brilliantly specified Ring at its heart.

Responsible for the driving experiences is Bernhard Auinger, a single-seater racer himself who, before kneeling down to walk me through all six buttons in the F2.0’s cockpit, popped out for a quick shakedown in a Formula 3.5. It’s the quickest, scariest thing the Ring will let you drive, providing you can successfully master the F2.0 first.

And that is not easy. If you’ve never driven a single-seater before – as I hadn’t, much to the amusement of my colleagues – the driving position comes as a bit of a shock. You sit a bit like a square-root sign, with your bum on the floor, your thighs angled up and lower legs stretched out towards the front wheels. The pedals – of which there are three – are impossibly thin, but you only need the clutch for setting off and shifting from first to second, which makes things more straightforward. You do have to left-foot brake, however. It’s so tight down there, you don’t have much choice.

The six-speed sequential gearbox requires a fair amount of heft, which is tricky when your upper arms are the circumference of a bamboo shoot, and the clutch operates over, maybe, an entire centimetre of pedal travel. “You will stall,” I was told, repeatedly. But I didn’t. And then I was out on track, all by myself.

Once it’s warmed up and there’s some temperature in the tyres, the F2.0 is a joyous thing. That 2.0-litre, naturally aspirated Clio engine is just inches away from you, so it feels as though it’s bolted directly to your neck, such are the vibrations it telegraphs through the solid chassis and into the flabby human behind the wheel. The unassisted brakes are so powerful, you often find yourself pulling up tens of yards before you need to, and the steering is so pointy and direct it’s as though the rack and your brain are telepathically intertwined.

Back in the pits, the two Austrians unbuckle my harnesses and help me up and out. A little over €400 buys you five laps in the F2.0. I’ve been trying for two weeks now to find something I’d rather spend that money on. Haven’t yet.