Of the many driving clinics I’ve joined in my long years in motoring, that was the instruction that made me realize that driving on rugged terrain -- or on paved race tracks -- is not a regular activity, especially for a woman. It not only requires a strange affection for difficult journeys, but also a strong confidence in your vehicle and instructor.

I was driving an Isuzu D-Max 4x4 with the commonrail engine, in the 20-hectare Isuzu 4WD Land in Pattaya, Thailand. Beside me sat my instructor, Keng, who is younger than my youngest daughter -- yet I listened to him. Around the area were 16 stations, each one designed to challenge -- and train -- a regular driver to control an Isuzu vehicle through difficult terrain representing those in the jungles of Thailand.

Only about 20 percent of those who take the driving course, though, will ever test their skills and their vehicles through jungle terrain. According to Jirayuth Adhidhebnarangkura, manager of Marketing Communications, Tri Petch Isuzu Sales Co., Ltd., most participants just want to learn a driving skill, especially with the popular Isuzu D-Max.

The Isuzu D-Max has dominated Thailand’s vehicle market with a 37 percent share last year. At the Bangkok International Motor Show this week, Tri-Petch Isuzu marked a record for the D-Max -- 500,000 units sold in a little over three years! The D-Max also made an earlier record of selling 10,000 units 10 days after it was launched in May 2002. (Pickups have 60 percent of the vehicle market of Thailand.)

With that kind of record breaking background it was easy to completely trust the Isuzu D-Max and the challenging terrain -- even if I had a right-hand-drive and my left arm was slow to react to a manual transmission. Besides, I thought, what could be the worst that could happen to me? Perhaps get stuck in knee-deep mud, or even roll-over at the 45-degree slanting slopes. I could take that.

But had I ever driven with one wheel hanging on air? I’ve never thought of that, but I suppose that’s what happens when you drive through an uneven and narrow route. When the vehicle dips almost on its chin, a rear wheel does not touch ground. It does not bother you when you’re driving, only when you’re following someone and you realize that like him, one of your wheels is also off the ground!

Naturally, you don’t keep that wheel flying for more than a moment. The D-Max, with a 3.0-liter engine, even on a constant 1000rpm, crawls through the route.

After Station 2, you feel the confidence of the D-Max, which Jirayuth said, was a complete showroom vehicle, without any modifications. The sight of a steep 50-degree hill, rising about five meters, intimidates me. I am about to pass that station but Keng holds my steering wheel firmly and says: "You can do it!"

I think he meant -- "the D-Max can do it!" -- so I stepped on the gas, watched the needle hover at 1500-2000rpm, and thought of what Jirayuth told me at the rest area: "Don’t gas too much, the D-Max has the power to climb that hill, even on low rpm."

For a while, I could only see the engine hood and the sky, and then the view of Pattaya. Next second, I saw only the ground, steeply sloping down. Just as I thought about the sensation of rolling-over, I took a mental note that my foot was off the brake pedal and I felt the engine braking.

The rest of the stations presented more difficult courses. There was a very narrow muddy trail where the knee-deep mud was not an option, it was part of the course! Crossing the mud, we changed from "keep steering straight" to the "special technique of left and right steering" to avoid getting stuck -- and walking back to the rest area in shame!

The most challenging was the 45-degree slope. Not only were we in a position that aimed to defy gravity, but even Keng had to help me hold the steering wheel to keep the D-Max from slipping off the slope!

Although I doubted many times if I could drive through some of those stations, I was confident that if those guys trusted me behind the wheel, then the D-Max would get me through -- even with a wheel off the ground!

Gender -- or my being a woman -- did not matter in the Isuzu 4x4 Land.