Why pro success in historics shouldn't be taken for granted

I've ended up so immersed in the historic racing scene that I now earn pretty much 100% of my living in this world. It goes back to 2003 when I was in the middle of having a couple of disastrous and forgettable appearances in Formula 3000.

My dad has always loved classic cars and he had a little bit of a foothold. He had a share in the ownership of a Lotus 11, which was prepared by the brilliant Twyman brothers. They very kindly gave me a seat in the car at the Goodwood Revival in 2003.

It was one of the very first times I'd ever driven a historic car. I remember having a serious wake-up call in practice coming down the back straight towards Woodcote. I hit the brakes hard for the first time and just spun 360 degrees on the spot at speed. Fortunately, I was able to carry on.

My foot was accustomed to the brake pressure that I applied in an F3000 car (below), which I'd literally been testing the day before. I simply hit the brake pedal way too hard, put all the weight on the nose and it just went around like a spinning top.

There was a very severe mental adjustment required for getting out of a modern car with slicks, wings and power into a lightweight historic car with tiny contact patches. You need to be quite delicate with the controls.

Those transitions from one car into another is something that I now consider a part of my job. At the Revival or Le Mans Classic or any event, you can be in two or three wildly different cars that herald from different eras and each has contrasting characteristics.

These days, it's not a problem as I feel I have developed a sense of knowing what to expect. I consciously try to anticipate before I start the engine and drive onto the circuit.

I would say this is the reason why some professional drivers can find it quite difficult jumping into an old car. Not always, but sometimes. If all you know are modern single-seaters and prototypes, a historic car can genuinely feel like it's got a puncture or somebody hasn't tightened up the wheelnuts properly.

When I see guys like Andre Lotterer arrive at the Revival and just smash it like they've been doing it all their lives, I don't know if people really appreciate just how amazing it is

I certainly struggled with that in the beginning. The first time I ever raced a Jaguar E-type was at the Revival with Gregor Fisken in 2004, the year I won the European Le Mans Series title for Courage. Gregor kindly invited me to be his co-driver.

Before practice, the guys running the car said, 'Take the car up the road and along the country lanes and just dial yourself into it. It's got numberplates, go for it.' I literally did about a mile or two up the road from the circuit and I nearly quit on the spot. I just felt like the car was desperate to throw me into a tree. I had no idea what to do with it.

But then you push through that and within five or 10 laps of practice it all starts to make sense. Your backside adjusts to the comparatively massive amount of movement in the car - not just the drifting in the corners, but actually even when you upshift on the straight it can feel like the whole car has a wobble. Now, I barely even notice it and most historic racers wouldn't - it's just what you know as normal.

But if you're used to modern stuff, that's a massive wake-up call and quite a hard thing to wrap your head around. It's why these days when I see guys like Andre Lotterer arrive at the Revival and just smash it like they've been doing it all their lives, I don't know if people really appreciate just how much it marks those drivers out as being absolute superstars.

I can tell you from first-hand experience, making that transition into something big, heavy, wobbly and powerful with no brakes like an AC Cobra or an E-type as a one-off is bloody difficult. When some of these stars show up and just spank it - it's genuinely amazing.

People, I think, in the grandstands or watching on TV just assume that they're the world's top drivers and that's what we expect of them. But let me tell you, there are plenty of modern racing pros who give it a go and they really struggle and they never come back. They just don't click with it.

Seeing that skill is one of the reasons why I love this world. I love the people, the cars, the races. I find it really rewarding that I am going racing, often in amazing cars, but just for fun.

When I started it was the first time I had ever experienced racing without trying to be professional and serious and make a career progression out of it. Then it turned into this great opportunity.

It isn't always easy, particularly in the wake of coronavirus, with all your days being cancelled, but it's just been a fantastic evolution from eight years ago when I didn't know how I was going to make a living or keep my career going. I couldn't be happier.