Get behind the wheel of ‘Big Rig’ on an American truck driving experience! Clive Shaw has been trucking in his Kenworths for years now and these showcase rigs are perennial favourites at truck fests and shows around the country. This is your chance to actually drive one!
Clive first came up with the crazy idea of importing an actual American truck from the United States in 2011. After many many hours of work (and a lot of stainless steel polishing) Clive’s first rig which came all the way from Tennessee was as shiny and smooth-running as the day it first pounded those American highways.
Pretty pleased with the result and with several Best Kept Super Truck Awards on his dashboard Clive decided to do it all over again. So Clive is the proud owner of the only pair of Kenworths with matching livery in the UK and has added to his collection with a Peterbilt and even a Kenworth previously-owned by none other than Burt Reynolds.
Now (as the famous American soft drink Christmas advert goes) they’re ‘coming to your town’ with American truck driving experiences at Henstridge Airfield in Dorset and at Donington Race Track in the East Midlands.
And yes these trucks are most definitely the real thing. They boast 500bhp+ and have manual gears. Using the Eaton Road Ranger transmission this means that with lo and hi gears you have 18 in total. Yep you read that right…e i g h t e e n! As you might suspect driving one of these mahoosive American big rig trucks is not like driving your average car so each experience begins with a 10-minute in-cab briefing then 5 minutes with your host driving so you can see how it all works.
Then it’s over to you for 15-minutes on the track with you at the wheel. If you opt for the extended experience you get another 15-minutes attempting some of those classic trucker manoeuvres like reversing into a bay.
Whether you’ve always wanted your 10:4 Smokey and the Bandit moment or just love that classic snowy winter scene with the brightly lit Kenworth delivering truck loads of festive cheer we think you will relish the chance to have a go at an American truck driving experience. Dates are limited so don’t hang around!
