How to become a rally driver in 48 hours – KALMAR Beyond Adventure Spirit of Speed.
Driving in the snow of Lapland at almost -30°C in Porsches that are – in some cases – more than 30 years old. What sounds like a pretty frosty affair at first turned out to be one of the hottest ways to leave the winter blues behind. ELFERSPOT were in Levi, Finland, and visited Jan Kalmar, the man behind KALMAR Automotive and Beyond Adventure. A two-day winter driving experience awaited us there with the Spirit of Speed, which is sure to leave no one cold. They’ll take you along on the journey and tell you our impressions of the – can be said much in advance – brilliant trip to the Arctic Circle.
Finnish Lapland offers the perfect scenery for drifts on snow and ice. The base camp for Jan Kalmar’s Beyond Adventure called Spirit of Speed is located in Levi, the largest winter sports area in Finland. There, 135 kilometers north of the Arctic Circle, the conditions for winter driving training are perfect. From November to March, snow and ice are guaranteed with temperatures sometimes well below -20°C. At Kittilä Airport, you feel like you’re visiting Santa Claus. There is so much snow next to the runway that regular operations would be unthinkable in Central Europe under such conditions.
From the terminal, it’s just a 15-minute drive to the accommodation. The route leads over icy roads along the World Cup ski slopes of Levi and through the Lappish forest. It becomes clear why Finland, despite not even having six million inhabitants, has produced so many world-class rally drivers. Even driving on the roads in Lapland is much more challenging than on the usually perfectly cleared roads of Central Europe.
