CSS \"v\" ESS (california \"v\" european)
 

Has anyone done BOTH the ESS and the CSS?
Be interested in hearing your views.

aws

Well being a bit of a training junkie I have done the following

CSS Level 1 - Rockingham
CSS Level 1 & 2 (2 day camp) - Laguna Seca
CSS Level 3 - Cadwell
ESS Blue - Snetterton
CSS Level 3 - Rockingham

Back to the question. First these are both very good schools and I learnt something new every time.

CSS is more structured, you start at level one, and have to take the levels in order, which some people do not like. I did not find this a problem.
Each level has five classroom sessions, with five track sessions immediately following where you practice a drill to re-enforce what you have been told. You work with the same on track instructor all day. So across the three levels there are about 15 specific skills that you will be working on improving. There are also off track drills

ESS also has classroom sessions focusing on specific skills, but a single class session might present more than one technique, and they do tie the track session to a specific drill. With ESS you do not have to start at the begining as they will let experince riders move straight onto the more advanced red and yellow courses.

Classroom sessions. CSS definatley has the edge here. It is not that the ESS classroom sessions are bad, it is that Andy Ibbott's classrooms at CSS are excellent, he is very good at getting the complex information across.

Track sessions. This was a much closer call for me. To a large extent it depends of which specifc instructor that you get. I prefer the structure of the CSS approach, but I got an incrediblely good on track coach at ESS. In a perfect world I wouldn have the ESS track instructor teaching at CSS :)

Overall I preferred CSS, but they are both good and it is quite close.

Thoughts

Experience / Fast rider

Starting at the begining at CSS. I have heard this question several times. In the end only you can decide, but although you will get the same class and drills, the on track instructor will be giving you different feedback and making you focus on different areas ie your weaknesses

Two day camps at CSS
These look very expensive, but trust me it is a completely different experience to the normal one day class. Twice the price, five times the experience

Rob

Rob,

"(2 day camp) - Laguna Seca" - that must have been awesome!!!!!!!!

Sorry for the slight diversion AWS but Laguna and Phillip Island are dreams of mine :-)

I go to Palo Alto in the course of my work, it's probably less than an hour to Laguna Seca from there - South down the 101 and turn right at Gilroy.

I've dreamed of being able to match up a business trip with a two day CSS camp at Laguna Seca - if only to find out where they put the 'turn-in crosses' on the corkscrew.

Haven't managed to make it co-incide yet, and if I couldn't do it 2 years ago when I had to fly to San Francisco every 6 weeks or so, I'm not likely to do it now when corporate travel cuts dictate that I've only been once this year.

Keep trying, Jools. It is a great, great track. I've done several trackdays there.

You can go off some people you know!

Yep, Laguna was awesome, 40th birthday present to myself. The corkscrew is great fun, but I found the most challenging corner to be turn 2 - Andretti Hairpin, tricky little devil :)

Rob