What is it really like to train as a professional race car driver? Bianca Bustamante reveals her intense training regimen.
Motorsports is arguably one of the most technical competitions in the world of professional sports. The factors that can affect just a single result seem endless — from steering feel to downforce to tire degradation (and a whole lot more). This is why the preparation racing drivers must put in before a race weekend can often seem equally endless.
Take it from Bianca Bustamante, who is now racing in the GB3 Championship and driving more powerful cars; as a professional racer, she can attest, “The training sessions are very long and gruesome.”
But what exactly does it take to train for a sport that has so much to do with commanding a machine that moves at breakneck speeds?
The 20-year-old Filipina gives us an insight into what it’s like to train as a race car driver.
Off the track
During training camps, the extensive periods of work she puts in before beginning a race season, Bianca trains seven days a week. “That’s probably the toughest you can get,” she says cheekily.
She begins each day at 9:00 a.m. and starts her morning with the mental side of her training regimen. As a race car driver, the mental aspect is one of the hardest parts of the job, and this is what they first focus on. But what exactly does it entail?
As Bianca reveals, “[It involves] a lot of mental training. Peripheral vision, reaction time, the adaptability and capability to feed information, to gather information as quickly as possible. And also how to remain calm in the car even when you’re dealing with stress.”
Practicing reaction time drills, reading information on the car, visualizing the tracks and all its braking points — these are just some of the key focus points Bianca and her team focus on during her morning training sessions.
From there, she gets into the more physical part of the job, which has become crucial in the lead-up to her GB3 Championship preparation. The GB3 car is much faster and more powerful than the cars she was driving in previous seasons, and as such, she has been spending a lot of time in the gym.
“We’ve got the afternoons, which is normally lifting, heavy lifting for muscle gain,” she reveals. “And we do core strength. We do our neck training. We’ve got forearm training, which is very important for grip strength.”
Building muscle and gaining strength is, of course, incredibly important in such a physically demanding sport — but it isn’t everything.
Cross-training is something that Bianca emphasizes as just as crucial. After her gym sessions, the former F1 Academy race winner explained that she spends extra time trying new sports.
“In the late afternoon, we normally do some sort of exercise that helps us be a better athlete by doing other sports…It also means that you have to learn other skill sets from different sports,” she shared.
Trail running, free diving, bouldering, and golf are just some of the other sports Bianca has gotten into as part of her cross-training. This benefits her as a driver both physically and mentally; cross-training can improve her cardio, coordination, and mental sharpness.
Already, this is a huge load to take on — and it does not even yet cover the time she spends on the track.
Hitting the racetrack
With a heavier, faster, and more powerful car to race this year, Bianca Bustamante notes that the most important part of her training is the time she spends behind the wheel.
“I’m driving down the straights faster. I’m cornering faster. So I think it means that it is more physically demanding and physically taxing, which is obviously not an easy thing to adapt to because it’s racing one of the sports where no matter how hard you train and how much you work out, the best way to get fit for racing is to drive the car.
“For example, even though you train in the gym every single day, but you don’t run, you still can’t improve your running capabilities. And racing is very similar to that. The only way to improve is to keep on driving.
“So I think as we go on to the season, we will just progressively improve and get better. And I think the biggest thing that I really had to adapt to was the speed, first and foremost. And second of all, I think is the mental stability that I needed because I needed to be composed in the car, even when I was struggling or even when I am physically tired or physically exhausted.”
It is tough, yes. Bianca Bustamante does not sugarcoat it. But even on the toughest of days, and even through the fatigue she sometimes has to push past, she still finds motivation from the fact that as a racer, every day brings a new experience.
“I’m like bright-eyed, wide smile every single time. I am really like just filled with lots of emotions. Obviously, driving the car is the best bit, but the progress, like I’ve always said, it’s the progress that makes everything so worth it.”
Banner images from Bianca Bustamante on Instagram.