I Had A Claustrophobia-Induced Panic Attack In A Rally Car

This year was the first time I got to attend the Velocity Invitational at Sonoma Raceway in Northern California. It was a fantastic weekend full of cars straight out of my dreams. As part of the event, I was scheduled to do a ride along in a rally car driven freeride mountain biker turned rally driver, Brandon Semenuk. Things didn’t go exactly like I thought they would though.

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Photo: Mike Noga Velocity Invitational

One of the vendors on hand at Velocity this year was Dirtfish. If you’re unfamiliar, Dirtfish is a Washington state-based rally driving school. One of their partners is the Subaru WRC team, who was on hand at Velocity this year with a trio of WRX rally cars, one of which is the newest one based on the current gen WRX.

Photo: Mike Noga Velocity Invitational

I and two other writers were invited to go for a ride in that car with Semenuk driving. We were stoked, of course. My time slot was last so I got to see what I to expect while the others went ahead of me. While waiting around I got fitted for both a racing suit and a helmet.

I’m not the smallest guy, in both weight and height, so they had to do some digging to find the right size suit for me. What they thought would be a baggy suit was actually just roomy and comfortable enough, especially considering that I had other layers of my own clothes underneath.

Photo: Mike Noga Velocity Invitational

After getting an equally big helmet and being fitted with a HANS device, I was fully suited and ready for my turn. Getting into the WRX rally car took a bit of effort. Again, I’m not the smallest guy and while the car had regular opening doors, a full cage meant having to step over it into the seat. They claimed to have made the seat a little wider for media drives, but there was NO lateral movement in the seat whatsoever.

Once I got in the seat I started to feel strangely anxious. I passed it off as excitement for the drive, but things got worse though once I was snapped in with the racing harness and fitted with the HANS. I was freaking out inside and realized that I had to get out. I kept my composure, and politely asked if I could have a minute to step out and take a breather; in my head I was actually screaming. The Subaru team obliged.

Image: Mike Noga Velocity Invitational

I tried getting strapped in again and this time was a bit better, but the claustrophobic anxiety was still there. I tried staying more calm once the harness was all ready to go, but ultimately I couldn’t do it. Semenuk was super chill about it the whole time, as was the entire Subaru press team.

The whole ordeal got me thinking on whether or not what I just experienced was something else any other rally or racing driver had gone through. I managed to find out that in a way, it was.

Our editor in chief Rory Carroll put me in touch with Kate Stevens, a friend who happens to be a rally car co-driver. She’s unique in that, despite doing what she does she suffers with motion sickness. I got to speak with her and ask her about the ins and outs of sitting right seat.

She told me it takes a lot of mental discipline. If she focuses on getting sick, she’ll be sick. She told me she’s been able to work through it as something like getting sick and puking could derail a whole rally. While she hadn’t heard of or known anyone to experience anything like a panic or claustrophobic attack, she told me she wasn’t surprised that it happened given the confines of the car and all the equipment. Even with all of that though, she said that if you’re into motorsports and want to be a driver or something like it, you can’t let any of this stop you. If you love this stuff, you’ll find a way. She said she hoped that I could try getting into another rally car someday to give it a go.

Even though I didn’t actually end up going for the ride along, and it sucked having to go through a panic like that, I came out of it with a different perspective. It was great to get insight from someone that actually does this stuff all the time. It made me feel better and I’m starting to think that I will actually give this a go again someday.