We are available seven days a week from 8 am to 5 pm during our winter driving school season. You may register online year round, or by phone during the early fall prior to the upcoming winter season.

We are open seven days a week from mid-December through the first week of March. The only day we are closed is December 25. We are always available by telephone or email during our off-season. Our telephone number is 800.WHY.SKID and our email address is team@drivingsciences.com. If we do not answer immediately, we will return your message shortly.

Please be sure to bring your valid driver’s license or learner’s permit. Wear clothing and shoes comfortable for driving, and bring a good pair of sunglasses.  You will not need bulky items such as coats, bags or boots, as you will be in a warm car or classroom all day. Please do not bring additional personal items that you may leave behind in our vehicles. 

We operate during a very short winter season with a limited number of seats. When you complete your registration, you remove one or more of those seats from availability to others. Consequently, we have a strict cancellation policy for all of our classes.  Knowing that your plans can change, we will refund you according to the following should you wish to cancel:

You may cancel up to seven days before your First Gear or Second Gear class and receive a full refund. If, however, you cancel for any reason within seven days of your class date, you will not receive a refund unless either you find someone to take your seat, or we are able to resell your seat.

Our Third, Fourth and Fifth Gear classes require a 30-day cancellation due to intensive demand, preparation and scheduling. We will refund you in full if you cancel a performance class up to 30 days before your scheduled class date. If you cancel within 30 days of your class date for any reason, you will not receive a refund unless either you find someone to take your seat, or we are able to resell your seat.

Custom and corporate group classes are also subject to our 30-day cancellation policy.

No. We are a unique facility; there is none other like it in North America. However, under some circumstances we can create specialized programs at your location. Please call 1.800.WHY.SKID or email us at team@drivingsciences.com for more information. 

First Gear and Second Gear, our winter driving safety classes, focus on the everyday driver who wants to better negotiate snowy and icy roads. These classes teach you how to cope with slick surfaces during your daily driving routine.

Our one and two-day performance driving classes, Third,  Fourth and Fifth  Gear, are for the man or woman who loves to drive or whose job requires performance driving.  Whether you are an enthusiast, an aspiring racer or a current professional, our performance driving school will teach you proactive ways to make your car do what you want it to do in any given situation. You will develop the skills to make your car understeer or oversteer at will, and learn a variety of rally racing tricks and techniques to control your car at the grip limit. If you regard your vehicle as more than just a method of transport, our performance driving school is for you.

We also can create single and multi-day custom driving courses to suit your particular needs.

To attend a class at our winter driving school, you must provide your current valid learner's permit or driver's license, and bring a desire to improve your winter driving skills.  Parents or guardians of minors must read and sign a set of waivers before class. All mobile devices MUST be silenced during all class and track time. You will have time to use your device during breaks.

Yes! Our instructors enjoy coaching young drivers who have not yet developed undesirable driving habits. We recommend the full day Second Gear winter driving class for new drivers. We also recommend that the young driver have ten to fifteen hours of seat time before class. That way he or she will feel comfortable with the basic operation of an automatic transmission vehicle.

First Gear has about two hours of drive time, while Second Gear involves more than four hours. Our performance driving school involves more intensive multi-day sessions behind the wheel. Custom winter driving courses can be tailored to your specific needs.

Yes. Each year we provide our students with a variety of brand new Lexus vehicles equipped with Bridgestone Blizzak winter tires.

There is no deadline for registration for any of our safety or performance driving classes, but we suggest registering as early as possible to avoid disappointment. Online registration is available year-round and phone-in registration begins early in the fall.  Waiting until the winter season has begun may result in your desired class date being sold out.

Once you have completed a class at our school, you may take a half hour or one hour private lesson in the morning using either our vehicle or yours. Please call 1.800.WHY.SKID for more information and we would be happy to assist you.

We provide transportation only from our winter driving school offices at The Steamboat Grand Hotel to our driving campus and back.  We do not provide transportation from your lodging to our school.  Many hotels and resorts do, however, provide transportation for their guests. The City of Steamboat Springs bus system is also free to everyone.

The Bridgestone Winter Driving School is located in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, a ski resort town and ranching community in the beautiful Colorado Rocky Mountains. Our campus is a three hour drive from Denver and an easy 30 minute drive from the Yampa Valley Regional Airport in Hayden, Colorado. We are also about an hour and a half from the Eagle, Colorado regional airport near Vail. Note: Please use The Steamboat Grand at 2300 Mt. Werner Circle if using a GPS locator for directions.   Our classroom is located at the exterior street level shops at The Steamboat Grand.

Directions to Bridgestone Winter Driving School

*Take US Highway 40 (Lincoln Ave.) to the Mt. Werner Road exit and turn toward the ski area.

*Continue on Mt. Werner Road. At the second traffic light (Pine Grove Road) you will see a free remote parking lot with shuttle on your right. Parking here is one option.  If you continue on the same road, you will see more free open-lot parking on your left (five-minute walk to our office located at the street level shops at The Steamboat Grand).

*For paid parking across from The Steamboat Grand, continue through the roundabout to the parking structure, which is the immediate right past the transit center. All day parking is $20.00, but rates may go up at any time, and probably will.

2300 Mt. Werner Circle Unit C7, Steamboat Springs, CO 80487   970.879.6104

Our winter driving school safety techniques are applicable to every type of vehicle regardless of drive configuration or type of vehicle, be it truck, SUV, car, motor home, emergency vehicle or garbage truck.  If you use good technique, all drive configurations will respond identically. If, however, you use poor technique, different drive configurations will respond very differently to your input.

To assist you in planning your trip to attend the Bridgestone Winter Driving School, we have compiled a list of lodging options, many of which offer discounted rates* to our students. Simply click on the name of the lodging option which interests you.

*The Bunkhouse Lodge

*Fairfield Inn

Comfort Inn

*Hampton Inn Steamboat

*Holiday Inn

*Mountain Resorts 

*Moving Mountains

 One Steamboat Place

*ResortQuest Steamboat Vacation Rentals

*Sheraton Steamboat Resort

*Steamboat Grand Resort

*Steamboat Hotel

Steamboat Resorts

 The Highmark
 

First Gear: up to six students
Second Gear: up to twelve students
Third, Fourth and Fifth Gear: up to eight students

Custom: whatever your needs dictate

We start class precisely on time every single day no matter the weather, so please be considerate of others and take into account weather and road conditions. Leave yourself plenty of time to park your vehicle, find our offices and complete your paperwork.  If the weather is inclement, our classes will still run.  We are always available by phone to help with directions.

If you do not arrive in time for the classroom session, you will not be allowed to participate for the safety of others. We will do our best to fit you into a class on another day when we have remaining unsold seats based on a 24-hour notice period. No exceptions.

Moral of the story: be on time.

We begin building our tracks in December using hundreds of thousands of gallons of water to form the ice base layer. When Mother Nature gives us snow, we use graders, plows and other specialized machinery to create a snow and ice surface lined with snow banks. It is a painstaking, time consuming process that produces a winter driving facility like no other in the world. This is real terrain, not a flat frozen lake!

No. In order to keep prices as low as possible for everyone, we do not offer any discounted winter driving classes.

We would be happy to create a personalized gift certificate for any of our safety driving school or performance driving school classes. There is no better gift for any driver than one of our courses - you could be saving a life with your generosity. 

Some insurance companies offer discounts to students who have successfully completed one or more of our driving school classes. Please contact your insurance company to inquire about your particular policy.

No. We require payment in full upon registering. Click here to review our refund and cancellation policies.

Second Gear, our most popular winter driving course, is designed to allow you to develop the reflexes and muscle memory needed to perform the basic skills offered in our First Gear program, as well as accident avoidance techniques at an intuitive level. This is achieved through more advanced hands-on training and generous practice sessions on our track. This class is offered seven days a week during our season from 8:45 am to 4:30 pm, and lunch is provided. Click here to register for Second Gear.

First Gear is an abbreviated winter driving safety class with limited practice time in which you work on low-speed acceleration, braking and cornering exercises. First Gear classes are offered as a basic introduction to winter driving techniques. Due to time constraints, practice is limited. First Gear is offered on a very limited basis from 10:30 am to 2:30 pm; please call for availability.  We can arrange special group classes, so please give us a call if you have 4-6 people who wish to take any of our winter driving classes together. Click here to register for First Gear.

Lunch is included in all classes except First Gear. First Gear runs through the lunch hour, so please make sure you have eaten beforehand.

We can also provide specialized catering for our corporate/custom clients (additional charges will apply).