Watch BMW Give Teens the Keys to a 300-hp Classroom
Photos and video: Chris Worden
The theory that America’s 80 million Millennials hate cars may or may not be true, but it remains for the auto industry a sort of canard in a coal mine: a warning song too familiar not to be heeded. One of the suggested sources of our youths’ alleged automotive disdain is a fear of dying, a worry that has been drilled into their heads, in part, via the propagation of true statistics, like those showing that motor vehicle crashes are the number one killer of teens in the United States.
BMW, like all auto manufacturers, is well aware of its problems with American adolescents. That is in part why it created its Teen Driving School across the street from its factory in Greenville, S.C. The program is founded in altruistic principles: a mission to provide young people with quality driver training that is safe, fun, exciting, and educational, and helps them become less likely to die behind the wheel.
But there is no doubt that deeper marketing principles are at work. If a company lures in teens, transcends their fears, empowers them with abilities, and endows them with an aura of impregnability, in addition to creating better drivers (and pleasing parents), it might just create a lifelong customer.
If our recent experiences at the school are any indication, BMW may have cracked this bag of mixed nuts.
Due to a rather bizarre confluence of timing and birth control failure, we have five nieces between the ages of fifteen and seventeen. We’d originally intended to invite all of them down to the Palmetto State for this dynamic educational experience, but the three eldest suddenly acquired weekend jobs—no small feat for this nearly unemployable generation—so we ended up with just two: first cousins Whitley and Finley. Darling, whip-smart, and extremely close, these girls each maintained a 3.9 grade point average, but had about as much practical driving experience as Toonces the Cat.
“I had a one-week course,” Finley said. “We were on the road for ten hours.”
“I’ve driven in parking lots and on neighborhood streets five times,” Whitley stated proudly, adding that she’d also, “sort of watched a boy play Mario Kart.”
Like most members of their cohort, both girls had received their driver’s permits well after the appointed birthday, and like all Millennials, they both maintained excuses that absolved them of culpability. “My mom wouldn’t take me to the motor vehicles office for months, even though she works in the court,” Finley explained, rolling her eyes. “My little sister always sits in the front seat,” Whitley said. “That’s why I failed my permit test the first time. I didn’t have enough experience watching my mom drive.”
Given their neophytism, we were interested to hear about their automotive fears. During a lobby bar interview prior to the program’s official kickoff dinner, they listed them out readily: Intersections. Rush hour. Driving in the rain. Driving in the dark. Driving on the highway. Speeding tickets. Slowing down. Speeding up. Maintaining a constant speed. U-turns. Parking. Old people. Hydroplaning. Sudden stops. Yelling moms.
“Teenage drivers,” Finley said, finally.
“Aren’t you two teenage drivers?” we asked.
The girl spit a cherry stem into her Shirley Temple. “I would be scared of us.”
As if in preparation for—or mockery of—what was to occur the following morning, the kickoff dinner took place at a go cart track. A plethora of posted signs advised that patrons must be over sixteen years of age, 54 inches in stature, and in possession of a valid drivers license. Fortunately, South Carolina is a right to work state with gutted regulatory agencies, so none of the employees, and few of the patrons seemed to meet those requirements, and no one cared.
Add this to the girls’ list of automotive concerns: driving these underpowered, metal-bumpered lawn mowers. “I’m really nervous,” Finley said as we waited in line, suffused in the sweet scent of improperly burned fuel. Or, not. “I will kill her first,” Whitley said, pointing to a girl at the front of the queue. We reminded them that this was not The Hunger Games. But our theory was quickly undermined when Whit was rear ended and slammed into the guardrail on the first lap, and had to be rescued by one of the underage pit workers. As we exited the track, an acne-riddled boy with a blond trash-stache pulled a fake gold chain from inside his t-shirt, brought a crucifix to his lips, and kissed it.
Finley and Whitley had, even combined, the least amount of driving experience of any of the fourteen youngsters in our module. Many of the other kids possessed actual licenses, and had been driving for a year or more. Some of them had already bought their first car. Some of them had already totaled their first car. We wondered aloud if anyone was attending based on a court ordered mandate.
During the hour of classroom instruction that opened the first day, the instructors revealed that just about every element of our teens’ extant automotive knowledge was either fallacious or dangerous, or both. This included: how they should sit in the car, where they should sit in the car, how they should hold the steering wheel, where they should place their feet, how they should adjust their mirrors, how they should hold their heads, how they should look through the windshield, and where they should be looking. We were thankful that our nieces had only had a handful of hours in which to develop their disastrous habits. Mao’s Cultural Revolution took ten years. We hoped that this class could reeducate our nieces in the course of the weekend.
Our hopes had every chance of being fulfilled. On the first day alone, the girls and their peers were seated in a caravan of 300-hp BMW 335i sedans and led through a wide variety of skill-based activities, including slalom runs, panic stops, lane change maneuvers, handling courses, inclement weather spin/skid recovery, and a distracted driving exercise. Our nieces are both rule followers—Finley because she seeks the external adulation (and ammunition) derived from doing things properly, Whitley because she’s easily distracted and requires the extra structure—so they were vehement about adjusting their seats and mirrors before each activity, and taking to heart the individuated direction from the instructors, provided via two-way radio.
Courageous and undaunted, the girls were willing to skid, slide, steer, and speed, regardless of circumstance (or the occasional lack of pavement). Part of this audacity was rooted their unformed frontal lobes, endemic to adolescent brain development and a deterrent to comprehending the potential effects of risky behavior. But part of it was their admirable and indomitable character. Finley is an experienced whitewater kayaker, known for her skills dominating rapids. Whitley is a talented actress and singer/songwriter, willing to jump up on stage before a hostile house (like our gathered family) with the alacrity of an improv comic.
“In kayaking, you could actually die,” Finley said, explaining her intrinsic hot rod tendencies. “Here, I feel pretty safe. It’s a good facility, and the instructors are really great. Also, it’s just grass you run into. You won’t drown.”
Whitley’s exegesis was more genetic. “I live with my dad,” she said, referring to our brother-in-law: a man who had sent her out into a busy Maine fishing harbor at dusk, in a canoe, by herself, at age eight. “Lots of exposure to fear there. You get desensitized.”
Yet they each had their peccadilloes. Despite her limited experience, Whitley had somehow developed a habit of using her left foot to brake, causing brazenly jerky cessations. Finley had a tendency to forget one key instruction, such as needing to stop the vehicle at the end of the run. Like most teens, she also had a tendency to be overly concerned with her appearance. Toward the end of one high-speed panic stop, while the vehicle was still rolling at a decent clip toward the instructors, she took a hand off the steering wheel, cocked her head in the rear view mirror, and adjusted her hair.
The girls attempted to combine all of their new skills in the day’s final event, The Point Run: a sort of obstacle course involving quick acceleration, rapid brakeless lane change, a tight water-soaked U-turn, further application of speed, a weave through a slalom, and a perfectly placed panic stop. Points were to be awarded for every mistake—each cone run-over, each target unattained.
“How can they tell if you’re braking or not?” Whitley asked, as she plowed through cone after cone. “Brake lights,” we reminded her. “Oh, right,” she said. “Wait,” Finley interjected when it was her turn. “Which one is the brake again?” We hung our heads in our hands. Between the two of them, the girls racked up nearly thirty points.
The second day of class was less about the teens practicing skills, and more about amalgamating their experiences into something that might one day resemble situational awareness. To wit, after a warm up slalom and some additional time on the rain-slicked skid-pad, they were sent out on an expedition, driving a row of X3 crossovers onto an off-road course. Jouncing off of the perfect tarmac, they were forced to confront circumstances even more unfamiliar than a wet highway: creeping up artificial cliffs, balancing on artificial cliff faces, stumbling down artificial hills, and clambering over artificial boulders. This enhanced real world experience frightened them. As they approached a narrow pond, the instructor’s voice cracked over the radio. “Crawl into the water like a baby.” Finley screwed up her face. “Babies drown in the water!”
More their, ahem, speed, was their opportunity to drive on the track in four exemplary BMWs: a nimble M235i sports coupe, a luxurious 550i sedan, a hulking X6 sport activity vehicle, and a shark-nosed Z4 hardtop convertible. Though they enjoyed all of them, the roadster was their favorite. “Can I, like, marry a car?” Finley asked. Whitley concurred. “I don’t think I’m ever going to be able to get used to driving my mom’s Subaru again.” When we returned to the paddock, I asked the girls to sum up what they’d learned so far. Finley volunteered. “Don’t have children, so you don’t have to buy an SUV.”
In the culminating Point Run, the girls demonstrated just how much they’d learned and how far they’d come. Whitley was among the few participants who achieved a perfect score, and even her two less ideal outings contained just one error each. But Finley showed up everyone in the class by completing all three of her runs with absolutely no mistakes. For this, she received a special round of applause from the group. “I’d rather have that convertible,” she said, as we left.
Overall, the adventure was a major success. The girls had gained confidence in their abilities, and acquired actual skills to back up their teenage braggadocio. Plus, they’d safely become aware of their personal limits and the limits of contemporary vehicles, a helpful means of curbing needless experimentation and errors.
But the biggest success for the brand arrived that evening at dinner, just before we headed to the airport. While everyone was sharing BBQ chicken wings, and debating their weekend highlights, we glanced over, and saw that Finley was on her phone, shopping for a used BMW online. “My parents told me the limit for what they want to spend,” she explained, clicking on a ratty, high-mileage 2005 325i coupe. “This is within the limit.”
The BMW Teen Driving School is held in Greenville, South Carolina and La Quinta, California. A one-day Teen course is $795. A two-day Teen course, like the one we attended, is $1295. Register at http://www.bmwusa.com/performancecenter.
BMW is also taking their Teen Driving School on the road in 2015. A condensed, two-hour version of the course will be brought to ten markets between now and the end of the year, and it is absolutely free. Find out when the Ultimate Driving Experience is coming to a city near you, and register for the free class at https://ude.bmwusa.com/