Learn to race cars for free for a whole year. ' Why not', says Olivia Richwald, who tentatively tried out for a motor sport scholarship at Crost Circuit, North Yorkshire.

SPEED, sweat and the shimmering track; smoking tyres, grease, and champagne - that's the glamour of motor racing circuit, right?

But for most people, the lure of the Tarmac is just a dream.

It is such an expensive hobby and so competitive that it can seem only the rich, privileged or those with connections can make it in the sport.

For most of us, the rare treat of a track day or whizzing around a go-karting track is the closest we will ever come to being a racing driver.

But the Funcup Scholarship offers wannabe drivers the chance to compete for a year's free endurance racing.

The organisers look for raw talent, personality and potential.

Doubting I had any of those, I turned up at Croft Circuit, North Yorkshire, to try out for the scholarship.

The overnight rain - meaning slippery conditions - was blown away by brisk winds.

However, I didn't make a good start.

Competitors came from every corner of Britain, with one from Switzerland. I had come from Darlington and I was 15 minutes late.

A room full of spiky-haired, leather-jacketed young men smiled smugly as I walked in apologetically.

I was assigned to trainer Paul Swift, 27, from Darlington. He had become addicted to motor racing as a seven-year-old, learning tricks on his father's sit-on lawnmower.

Paul is a stunt driver who has worked on Top Gear and made TV commercials. But as we headed out onto Croft's premier league race track, I showed him a new trick - accelerating on the straight and switching from third gear to second, by accident, twice.

"I was ready to get out to be honest," said Paul when I quizzed him later. "You were very nervous."

I had never heard of the Funcup.

"It sounds like a Super Mario game," I told them - that didn't go down well.

The cars used in the Funcup endurance races are VW Beetle shells with Audi engines and they're fast, reaching 130mph on some of the faster races. Paul and I were in a fast Vauxhall Astra. The other scholarship contenders, one of whom was Lisa Williams, 19, from South Wales, zoomed off- like they were in a race, or something.

During my second session, I was overtaken five times. There were only three other cars on the track.

Lisa, 19, started racing in January. She said: "I saw it on the TV and said, 'I've got to do that,' so my dad bought me a track day hoping that would be it, but I love it. My friends think I'm mad."

Luckily, Lisa was putting all those spiky-haired men in their place, overtaking as many as were overtaking me.

Gradually, my speed increased from 50mph on the straight, to 80mph, and I think maybe even 85mph.

By the end of my fourth 15-minute session Paul graded me.

"I've given you ten out of five for improvement," he said, perhaps trying to balance out my lack of gear control and ignorance of racing lines.

"You're actually not bad at all now."

The afternoon gave us the opportunity to whiz a Caterham racing car around a set of cones, sliding the wide wheels round 180 degrees and skidding to a dusty halt.

It was like being ten years old again and creating skid marks on your bike.

At the end of the day, Lisa and two of the men were chosen to progress through to the second round.

Funcup organiser Dan Jones said: "You didn't do that badly. You beat six fellas."

"Excellent," I said. "I can't wait to tell everyone."

What I didn't confess to, until now, was the 33 who beat me.

Round one costs £239 you get an hour of track time with an instructor in a salon car plus the Caterham test. For more information, go to www.funcup-scholarship.co.uk

Team enjoys success

TEAM Scholarship competed in the first race of the Funcup endurance series this weekend at Croft Circuit.

The race lasted three hours. The team consists of Dan Jones, the scholarship director, from Prudhoe, in Northumberland, last year's scholarship winner, Richard Poynton, and finalist Carl Karopacz.

They came 12th out of 34 cars and were highest placed team in the race.

The Uniroyal Fun Cup race series was launched in the UK in 2002.

The races are all endurance and up to 25 hours long. There are seven races around the UK this year.

It costs about 15 a minute to race in a sprint race.

But the cost is only 50p a minute to race in the Funcup, which is sponsored by Uniroyal.