At 14 years old, Leon has done exceptionally well at ARDEN this year to such an extent that they are looking for him to race in a F4 championship next year. Last weekend he was sent to the Anglesey race track to take his Association of Racing Driver Schools race licence test.

Here is what Leon had to say "After being introduced to the examiners we were taken to the briefing room to outline how the day would progress. Each driver would be allocated an examiner and there would be 4 sessions on track followed by a debriefing after each session.  After the first session there would be the written tests, of which two sections needed a 100% pass rate, these needed to be passed before the following track session could take place. Thankfully the revision I did paid off! I was allocated the Mazda MX5 much to the disappointment of the two other drivers who had hoped it had been their allocation. It was the only rear wheeled drive car so more suited to the F4 rear wheel drives, the two other drivers were GT drivers so it worked out well for all.

The second and third track sessions concentrated on instruction, handling and track positioning. The time in the SIM practicing the circuit has certainly paid off as comment was made on the excellent accuracy of track positioning and consistency of the sessions. All thanks to great training that I have been given by the whole team at ARDEN.

The last session was the driving test with no instruction, and all had to be right, five practice laps and then the last two laps had to be perfect. A sigh of relief when I was told that I had passed to a very high standard. Maybe a bit more practice on the down shifts on the manual car gearbox though!"

PE teacher, Mr Henderson said" We are hugely supportive of Leon and look forward to hearing about his training during the October half term at Banbury and Silverstone, with more testing in the F4 car at Snetterton race track on 25th October. Like we are with any other elite sport performers, we will tailor his studies to fit around his training schedule."