Mini Urban Drive : Ahmedabad Edition 2020 !

- Tirth Pandya

Remember the iconic Hollywood movie : The Italian Job ?

The cast drives around in Go Kart like Mini Coopers swiftly, slaloming & power sliding through the town ! Well, if you don't, then Bollywood has obviously copied the movie again by using Mini Coopers 😑 & the movie is called Players.

Mini India has introduced Mini Urban Drive which lets you get the Go-Kart like experience by means of various well planned activities. Mini Urban Drive is organized nationwide in various cities letting users push the car to it's extreme limit.

#UrbanDrive #UrbanExperience 

Yours truly was lucky enough to get invited to the Mini Urban Drive : Ahmedabad Edition which was organized on 18-19th January 2020 at Adani Shantigram. I selected the slot of 2:30PM on the beautiful afternoon of 18th January along with a friend of mine.

We reached the venue sharp at 2:30PM & started clicking some pictures of the cute Mini convoy lined-up for the fun & then had some refreshments.

The Line-Up

At 3PM our instructors for the day Nash & Amrut briefed us about the exercise:

1. Groups will be divided into the color of bands, i.e. Black & Red.
2. Each car will have 2 drivers.
3. Team Red will take the convoy 1, consisting of the hatches (Cooper, JCW).
4. Team Black will take convoy 2, consisting of the UVs (Countryman, Clubman).
5. Both convoys include 6 cars with one lead car of the instructor.
6. All the convoys are equipped with Walkies, so that the instructor can instruct the participants.
7. Convoy 1 will perform Slalom activity & convoy 2 will perform Extreme braking maneuver.
8. After both drivers perform the activity, the teams will swap convoys.

So, after briefing me & my friend (let's call him KD now onward) headed towards convoy 2 as we possessed the black bands.

We selected the Clubman & got ourselves comfortable with its driving dynamics. 

Clubman !

I have always been in love with the cockpit styled interior of Minis & it was happening all over again !

Beautifully crafted interiors on the Mini Flagship, CLUBMAN !

I toggled the suspension in sport mode, switched off the auto start-stop function (annoying as hell) & thought of turning off the traction control but didn't because, come on ! ( I did signed the undertaking).

Cockpit View !

The instructor took us over the track & showed us how to perform the Extreme braking maneuver which could be helpful in real world conditions.

Performing a Hand-Brake Turn

I tried 3 times in which I was successful all the 3-times & then we swapped the drivers.

After KD completed his turn, we headed towards the course 2 to swap the convoy & start the exercise 2 i.e. Slalom.

As we parked our Clubman, I literally opened the door & ran towards the Cooper JCW & I was successful to hoard the JCW for our next activity, Slalom !

Do notice the John Cooper Works badge on the chunky steering !

I again repeated the same procedure as soon as I got on the driving seat of the JCW, Suspension on Sport mode, auto start-stop turned off & Traction Control OFF (YES, I finally did it 😛). I was just baffled by the sheer power & handling of this Go-Kart ! Especially the Pops & Crackles upon the release of accelerator.

JCW - John Cooper Works

The same exercise was followed with intro laps around the track & then turn by turn Slalom. 2 practice runs & 1 final run which would be timed.

Slaloming in the Cooper S

Experiencing the Mini going sideways on the slightest of steering input & 320Nm pushing you into your seat is a delight to feel !

Do notice the smile on the face :)

My final Slalom lap was timed at 25.75 Seconds which was the best in our batch ! 😎

The day ended with some more refreshments and interactions with the instructors.

We clicked some more photos & decided to call it a day !

Mini gifted us a goody bag for participation in the Urban Drive Event which consisted of a lifestyle pouch from Nicobar & a John Cooper Works T-Shirt.

Goodies !

Enjoy some clicks from the event -

Do notice the British Flag

Another JCW !

Cooper S Convertible

On-board JCW !

Special thanks to Krunal Desai aka KD for doubling as my photographer for the day !

Finally, I would like to thank Mini Gallops Autohaus & Mini India for letting me experience this amazing event !!

Do checkout Gallops Autohaus if you are looking for new vehicles !

Thanks for reading !

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Yours truly !

Tirth signing off  !


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