petee_c

I am signing up for a 2nd trackday in a month. I'm driiving a pretty much stock 2001 Boxster S (6 speed) at the Grand Bend Technical Track near Grand Bend, Ontario.

I saw people adjusting their tire pressures on their car. I have ridden 600cc motorcycles at the track many moons ago, and I was told by more experienced riders to set the psi to 30-32psi cold for the street tires that we had.

I'm running Kumho PS31 tires now on the vehicle on 18" rims. I bought them last year because they had a good wear rating, comfort and road noise. (400-A-A), not thinking I would go back on the track.

I checked the tire PSI in the morning before I left for the track and I had them set at what was recommended on the label under the trunk 29 psi Front/36 psi rear

Peter

Wild Weasel

As a beginner level driver, are you going to events where you'll have an instructor with you?

I think it's a good exercise to start off as you are with the tires set to street pressures and then get them hot enough to be over-inflated to see how they behave differently. I remember very clearly the first time I got my tires too hot and I got on the brakes and the car was DIFFERENT and a bit squirrely and obviously not behaving as it had on the previous lap. My instructor asked what my pressures were and they were all up over 39 or so. (I know you don't have TPMS... so just expect this change to happen and expect it to be pressure related...)

I got off the track and let air out and the experience stuck with me. There's been days since then where I'd forgot to let out air and now know immediately from the feel of the car when the pressures are up too high.

So what if they don't get high enough to lose grip? Well there's still more grip to be had and a great way to tell if you're using it is to look at your tire sidewalls. Many high performance tires have little marks on them showing how far down you should be scrubbing the tread. If you're not getting to that point, then either you're not turning fast enough or you've got too much air pressure. Someone at the track will be happy to show you what I'm talking about and give you advice on how much air to let out or add back.

After typing all this out, that last sentence makes me feel I may have wasted a bunch of time when the best advice might be to talk to a more experienced driver at the track with a similar car. But now you know what you'll be talking about.

zedcat

For just your second track event, suggest discuss with your instructor. If things go well and you get some heat in the tires you may want to bleed the rears a few psi.

That said, I liked 32 front /34 rear hot on Hankook RS3 on my 04 Boxster S with M030 suspension.

petee_c

Yeah, next trackday I'll have an instructor with me for a few sessions.

I am spending money I think on instruction 1st before I put money into the car.

My 1st trackday in 5+yrs happened just a couple weeks ago. I struggled being the slowest in the intermediate group. I thought I would do better as I had some motorcycle track schools, and owned a 2000 CBR 600F4 as a trackbike for a couple seasons as a slow trackrider before I bought the Boxster in 2009. I had instruction on the 1st lap, and struggled for a couple sessions in the morning.

In the afternoon, I asked for some more help, and my laptimes improved from 1:34 avg before the 2nd instructor to around 1:30 with a 1:29 in my last session of the day.

If weather holds up, I'll be returning to the same track in early July, and will get some more instruction early on, and with different instructors. I think the 1st instructor I had was telling me too much at once and it was overload, expecially not having driven that course before. I got a lot more out of the instruction from the 2nd guy later in the day.

ExMB

I think you need to search and read on here prior to your next track day. You seem to come in with expectations and then are disappointed because they aren't met. Running a bike is completely different than a car.

Not sure what organization you did your track day with, you never said, but based on your description you were placed totally wrong.

Sboxin

Peter,
My son and I tracked our 02 Boxster S a few years ago - first with street tires and later with R Compound track tires.
We set the tire pressures based on an old Autocross technique - tread "roll over" - mark the side of the tire near the tread/sidewall with white shoe polish and see where the tread roll over occurs (at what PSI hot does the tread roll over into the sidewall - not sure I'm explaining it correctly . . . On the Michelin tires there is a triangle at the edge and that can be a marking point also . . . each tire brand and model can be slightly different in optimum PSI . . . We have used this technique to set pressures on our 911 race car too (and finally came up with a fixed number for the Hoosiers after some trial and error).

Good luck and enjoy your track outings . . . it's supposed to be fun . . .
Regards,


2002 Boxster S

petee_c

Yeah, I signed up late for the trackday (there were spots available, and I was waiting on the Long Term weather forecast to pan out before I plunked down $375 for the day.) It was a decently run trackday hosted by the Porsche Dealer in London ON. They used an outfit called Apex Driving to do the teaching.

I guess there were too many novices in the group for the number of instructors, so they put some novice drivers in the intermediate group and sent instructors out with us for the first sessioin. 2 siting laps with the instructor driving and then the rest of the 1st session with instructor in the passenger seat.

The 2nd instructor and I in the afternoon had good success, and he noted improvement in my driving from the beginning of the session to the end. I pulled off early to process what had been taught, and then went out for one of the last open sessions of the day... At that point, many of the drivers had left, so I could have kept driving, but was tired and satisfied with what I thought I was capable of on my 1st trackday in maybe 8 yrs(?). I did enjoy the day, and have plans to get out again next month.

Peter

911 Rod

It sounds like you were put in the wrong run group and that is not fair to anyone.

But back to the tires. A pyrometer would be nice because the goal here is to have even heat across the width of the tire.
I keep chalk in my tool box and mark the arrows on the sidewalls.

petee_c

I have an infrared therometer with laser, I will bring that to the next trackday.... I am researching the chalk and arrows bit as well...

dgrobs

I had been in that same situation once, where I was moved into a higher run group with my home PCA region and it happened to be at a track I was unfamiliar with.
Needless to say, I was so busy giving point by's that I couldn't learn the line. Spent the entire first session driving my mirrors, and I know I held up a bunch of better drivers.
I immediately moved back into my former run group for a session or two, and then back into the higher run group. The difference was huge.
911 Rod is 100% correct, it was not fair to anyone, including myself. I spent about an hour after that first session apologizing to all my friends for holding them up and screwing up their lap times.
Once I learned the line in the lower run group, I mover right back up into the next run group and all was fine.
Lesson learned the hard way, but learned none the less.

Wild Weasel

Huge props to you for moving yourself down!!

I was wishing a bunch of people would do that at my last DE. I went the entire weekend without ever once getting a clean lap in. It ended way better than it started but still... people should recognize when they're not even remotely keeping pace.

I might be competent at my home track but when going somewhere I've never been before, I'd definitely want to drop down to an instructed group. In fact, I intend to do just that next year if I get back to WGI.

gbuff

Peter, chalk is good for checking to see if your tires are rolling over enough/too much......FWIW I run streets on track and the factory pressures are 33 all round; I hit the track with 35F/33R cold. Sounds high but with my stock suspension with very little camber it balances tire wear with grip fairly well.......

So now that you've got your feet wet, it's time for Mosport Apex is doing a bunch of instructed days there throughout the summer, as is Driveteq on both tracks (and also UCR of course).

I was up last week and will be many more times--hope to see you there!

Gary
...currently in recovery mode from two grueling wet/dry days at Mid-Ohio.......

ExMB

Kudoos for

1) local dealer hosting a track day
2) local dealer hiring an event organizer

Thumbs down for

1) local dealer and conditions for driving
2) event organizer caving in looking at their pocket book
3) dealer and event organizer not adjusting run groups to compensate