ProCoach

Matt Romanowski

I would not tell you a specific time on this. In my experience, in new cars with ABS and different tires, there is a range that is acceptable. I would not expect 200 ms to be acceptable in anything driven on the street short of a few supercars. The chassis is not stiff enough and you can de-accelerate the tires faster than the weight will transfer causing the tires to lock. That is the start of ice mode. As an aside, you can do the same thing with pad selection if the fronts have too much bite.

Back to brake application, this is the idea of "drama" that Dave Scott talks about. When you transition from gas to brake, it has to be as fast as possible. But, when applying the brake, it has to be at a rate that the chassis will accept. There is a great video of Frank Consteneau (I'm sure the spelling is wrong) at Watkins Glen were on the initial application of the brakes into the Bus Stop you hear a quick squeal of the tires. That is right on the edge of being too fast. If you drive a stock 944, you can easily build brake pressure far too fast for the chassis and you'll feel the tires start to lock before the weight has fully transfered.

Great topic. It's a technique and tool that driver's need to learn. I get people to drill trying to build pressure faster and faster until it's too quick. Like shock sweeps, it's important to learn how each rate affects the car and then figure out what is right.


This is a fantastic use of your system! If you've played any other sports, you'll know you do drills. In baseball, you'll do batting practice, take grounders, take fly *****, etc. In driving, you have to make the same sort of drills to get better. What you did was make a great drill that you're able to get an immediate feedback loop and quantify your performance. Perfect!

Matt Romanowski

No doubt. Great use of the squiggly lines too. No way to get these numbers from the video.

jakermc

Great stuff here, thanks.

Looking deeper into my own data at Sebring, Jan Heylen hit max PSI between 0.3 and 0.5 seconds. I think the differences between corners (and between tracks in ProCoach's data) could be related to grip levels in various corners. I am in the 0.6-0.7 range. Part of the difference is he left foot brakes and I right foot brake. He actually said that my speed trace was good for right foot braking. I can probably get to 0.5X with my right foot but will need to learn to left foot brake to get the rest.

Higher force will come with practice. As I learn to brake deeper and take advantage of this car's capabilities, the 'Oh Sh*T' moment will help me press hader, as noted by ProCoach. I have already noticed that impact in my data.

Coming from my 996 street based build with boost and street ABS I am finding I have to completely relearn how to use the brake pedal. In that car I had to tip into the brake pedal lightly as first, and then a hard consistent press down to threshold braking, which happened before ABS engaged. If the initial application was too hard I would hit ice mode so initial speed and total force was a controlled exercise. I am now trying to erase that muscle memory and do the complete opposite!

ProCoach

ProCoach

Matt Romanowski

With practice, I would expect you can quicken your right foot. Like Peter said, the rise time is from no brake pressure to brake pressure, not from throttle to brake. In the brake pressure rise, it's not foot dependent. In fact, I find that unless you're a well practiced and focused left foot braker, many are better with their right foot as it has more fidelity and practice. Left foot brakers often have overlap of their throttle and brake trace - it's actually one of the easy ways to see how someone uses their feet.

As a general rule, I would rather have a great right foot braker than a average left foot braker.

ProCoach

boxer-11

That's what I was aiming for -- deliberate practice I just finished reading "Peak" and I found it convincing. You're right about other sports: as a wannabe tennis player I'm used to set-piece drills from that context. I'm actually surprised that there aren't more people talking about [physical not mental/visualization] drills to focus in on specific skills for racing and high performance driving; drills that don't require an actual track specifically...wish there were more.

Matt Romanowski

There are ways to do it. In driving, you don't often hear of the deliberate practice sessions. I've coined them "skill builders" and work them into in and out lap routines. I mentioned them in the Speed Secrets podcast with Ross. If you shoot me an email, I'll send you a copy of the track map book I made and it has a great list in it. Once you see what I've come up with, I'm sure you'll have more that are tailored to your needs. Matt@trailbrake.net

Edit: I should add - this is much of why I say it's not always required to hire a coach to improve. With some self study and motivation, most people can identify some trends in their driving (James Colburn has a great YT video on this). Once you know what you need to work on, it's about designing a deliberate practice routine for it. If it's fast brake application - how are you going to improve it? If it's slow release of the brakes, what could you do? If it's not knowing the track well enough, what could you do?

For folks who have played sports at any decent level or really watched at a high level, they have seen the practice routines. Apply those to your driving. That is why things like skid pads are so good. It's deliberate practice. Same for car control activities like threshold braking, figure eights, vision exercises.

Read the book "The Power of Habit" and then think about how to apply that to your driving. Maybe we should start a book club? I have a pretty good list going on my IG page and I'm sure we can come up with more.

boxer-11

Thanks, Matt -- email on the way I'll look for James' video. Dave Scott's "drama" comments definitely resonated for me too, btw.

Funny you should mention "Power of Habit" -- that's on my Kindle one or two down the list Working my way through the Boyd book right now -- OODA: I think that definitely applies to maneuvering cars almost as much as jets!