29 Apr 08
If you've ever watched any motorsport, from small club meetings to the heights of Formula 1, you may have wondered how you'd match up to the people behind the wheel.
Of course you could do better, but with the mortgage and the cost of bringing up the kids, there's no way you could seriously think about taking up the challenge of becoming a proper racing driver.
VXR Racing, Vauxhall's motorsport division, is hoping to address this. It is giving complete novices the opportunity to compete for the opportunity to race a real car in a real championship, via its VXR Racing Driver of the Year competition.
The 2008 competition is the second year of its existence, and entrants have the added impetus of being able to see the inaugural winner in action, taking part in this year's Dunlop Sport Maxx Cup.
John Allison, a 34-year-old mortgage consultant from Beverley in East Yorkshire, is an ordinary bloke with an ordinary job, but last year emerged to win the first competition, winning a season's racing in an Astra VXR, a prize worth £80,000.
