JCP911S

I'd guess the top 1-2 guys in the PCA races are good enough to be at least, middel tier pros if they had the time or commitment. Its very hard to be on your game when you do maybe 1-3 days of driving a year at a given track, vs 10 or 20 hours a week of testing....

Those last few tenths of seconds are things like a touch of brake lock, a slight breath on the throttle entering a fast sweeper, or a twitch of the tail exiting a turn... very tiny mistakes that add up to alot of time over the course of a few laps.

Takes alot of repititions to iron those out of your driving.

MJR911

Jon,
PLease don't let me discourage you man, not my intent at all. we're all out here for slightly different reasons and the most important is still to have fun unless your name is Schumi!

Geo

All I know is that there is always someone better than me out there.

At racing school I was 2nd or third fastest, but the guy who was the fastest blew me away like I suddenly dropped a cylinder.

I've had a kart that was really fast and I could drive it quite well - again second quickest. But the guy who lead the series was in another league.

I know I'm quite competant and can still learn well, but I'll never be exceptional. You are SO spot-on about "a skill level so far beyond you, that you can not really comprehend what that entails" it isn't even funny. I know that with the right equipment and a lot of work I can consistently be at the front in some series or another. I also know that it's only because there aren't enough of the truly talented people running in the same series.

Racing has a funny way of really teaching these things. I'm not putting down DE, and I know you have lap times to go by, but there is nothing like truly going at it with someone only to be schooled effortlessly and definitively to truly underscore it.

BTW, I think too many people make too much of spec series. Spec cars are not all created equal. You only have to look as far as Spec Pinata. There are truly talented people running there with outrageous budgets that turn out far better cars than most. Spec does NOT mean same.

BTW, this thread, this question, is the best I've seen on Rennlist.

RXDOC

I agree 100%. The run group comparison can be very misleading! I have 1.5yrs of DE (10-12 DE days) under my belt. I am a very average driver with a very, very fast car. Passing (almost) every other car in my run group does not say much about my driving skills. Almost 550HP, AWD helps ALOT. I know for a fact, take away my TT, and I will be one of the slowest drivers in my group.
Hitting Warp Speed down the straight is my specialty.

M758

Yes spec does not mean 100% equal, but anytime you have spec class the reasons for being up front or in the back have much more do with driver skill than the car. In any series where the cars are ALLOWED To vary in significant ways like tires, hp, and weight, it WILL be harder to judge "who is fast" vs who has the better cars. For years folks argue about how much of Schumi's speed was him and how much was the car.

In spec series the car plays a smaller role in this equation. I'd rather race in class where a home built motor is 5 hp short of the "best" vs 30-40 hp shy of the "best". What it allows me to do is beat a number of the lesser drivers. If a lesser driver has 30-40 more hp they must be really bad to lose out, but at the club level 5 hp means quite little on the track.

Personally I have raced on my home track and have been surprized by some racers. I have seen guys with cars that have 200 to 300 more hp than I and I yet they hold me up on the race track. There really is not excuse for a 944-spec car having a racing battle with viper, yet I have done it. Of course that may not say much about my skills as compared to the lack of the other driver's skills. What I do know however is that I consider myself fast since I am very competitive (inside that golden second) with the other folks in my class.

JCP911S

So true... the difference between being "really good" and being "the best" is like an ocean... I think there are some people whose brains are just wired differently... they just function on a different plane...

Also, to me "spec" just means "no excuses"... not "equal".... some people just put in more time money and commitment... and deserve to place higher... it is humbling though...

DE there is just too much variance between cars.... it is fun though.

RedlineMan

Indeed, faster CARS. All that takes is money.

Indeed, faster DRIVERS. All that takes is what Sunday is prodding us about. I'm one of those NAs!

I have never timed myself. This is due partly to "following the rules" for DE. This is also because timing yourself only tells you where you are, not how to get where you are going. I prefered to educate and tune my inner driver so that I could feel what was going on. Feel what was fast.

Having said that, I feel that I have reached the point where timing myself will not make me just another go-fast wannabe playing with himself and his toys. Timing oneself only becomes truly useful when that self cannot parse the tiny increments by feel anymore.

If you're talking drivers, fast only counts in the corners. Anyone can be fast in a straight line, but that's the car. It takes nothing but money and a heavy foot. I judge my speed by those around me, as that is all there has been for a DE driver with no timer. Running in Red with 147hp shows you a lot about who is fast, and who is simply wealthier than you. Being generally the lowest HP car in group - usually by no less than 100-150hp - and seeing who pulls you in the CORNERS (a few), who merely keeps pace (many), and who slows you down (more than you'd think), is the gauge for me. My films show a surprising equality to some much more powerful cars. THAT's my guage.

And yet, I know the top club guys are besting me by 3-6 seconds per lap. It's about comfort and commitment. They have a higher degree of both. I'm pretty happy!

38D

I made no mention of laptimes in my post. It's all about relative speed. You may turn "fast" laptimes, but relative to your car, they are not that good. My point is that a guy in a 150hp 944 in the red run group may turn slower lap times tha you, but actually be "faster".

I believe that the best way for a DE driver to compare is to ideo your runs, extract the lap times, and then compare to the club race class you'd be in.

M758

That tells you something, but certainly not everything. If you are in DE it is really very hard to push for those last 2-3 seconds. There is the thing called traffic and general DE behavior to deal with. Most DE folks are not there to be on very limit in each corner all the time.

When I drive my car at a pace resonable for "DE" I am easily 2-3 seconds slower than at my full on race pace. In DE that sort of pace is not appropriate in many cases and also there is nothing to gain, but alot to lose.

In race group even just practice you want to push hard to expand the envelop to either get father in front or catch up to the next guy. In Qual or racing in need to push hard is obvious. In DE enviorment then goal is to have fun and be safe. Redline.. that 2-3 seconds between you and club race guys I am certain is the DE comfort factor.

Why push really hard in DE as there is NOTHING to gain. So you drive more relaxed and with more margin. Even when are driving hard it is nothing like a race pace or qualfying pace. Qualfying pace is frantic, hard and stressfull, each corner you take is so close to the edge that you really don't know if you will make it or not. If you took a corner and knew you were going to make it then you just may have left speed on the table. After 2-3 qualfying laps you are glad to slow down and drive more sedatly. When it comes to DE you really have no business driving like that.

Geo

Yeah....

Mine's a Cessna and theirs is an F18.

Geo

Yes and no. I know you know what I'm about to say, but for the sake of clarity for others......

What you wrote is true to a degree. However, people should NOT confuse speed down a straight with hp all the time. Lots of times it's just better corner exit and the speed differential that can produce in essentially equal cars can be mind blowing.

I think this is what Mark is basically talking about. You can be in equal cars with someone else yet they toast your butt down the straight so fast you can't believe it. But it happens. It's also one of the big sources of people either wispering or even yelling "cheater."

Perhaps we can paraphrase your message to:

Anybody can be fast down a straight with a fast car. It only takes money and a heavy foot. But to be fast down a straight with a slow car takes some serious skill.

Geo

BTW, this is one of the major differences between DE and W2W racing. In DE you might say, ah, the guy is a little faster, I'll let him by.... In W2W racing it's humbling truly finding out just how much faster they really are. There is no "letting him by." You're doing everything fair to keep him behind you and you just have NOTHING. He eats your lunch and there's nothing you can do. In the wild you'd literally be dead meat.

APKhaos

Its takes careful discipline to be truly fast in a DE environment, precisely because you have a situation where passing is controlled by a carefully managed set of rules. Under racing conditions, pure speed and track craft quickly sort out the field.

There is no question in my mnd that a spec series is a great place to start, assuming you are starting in cars not karts. True, the Spec Miatas seem to have morphed into a two class affair with the 'old' spec cars being eaten alive by the high budget guys. That aside, spec racing levels the field as much as possible, and makes it more of a driver competition. SRF is proof of that.

In the 944Cup, which is a small series when compared to SRF, the top five guys are separated by no more than a second in lap time, and often less than half a second.

Despite having times this close, you will often see individual drivers that are just flat out better in a given section of the track. That's the beauty of it. Once you have a guy pull a couple lengths on you in a specific corner, its up to you to figure our how to change your approach to that corner to avoid loosing two lengths of track position. Often times, its not going in harder but going in different. Subtle changes make a big difference once you are in Mark's Golden Second.

Its a constant learning process. I'm perfectly OK with the fact that pro teams aren't offering me rides. There are plenty of extremely talented club racers who have graduated to pro series, and are doing extremely well. The Autometrics team of Cory Friedman and Leh Keen are a great example. Mark himself pulled a 10th place in the SCCA National Runoffs first time out. Somehow I suspect that us amateur racers share the same general approach. Consistency, focus, and subtle changes really make the difference.

The ability to manage a wounded car really helps too. Maybe a thread about driving a partially busted car would be interesting. Sometimes you need to quit before you get hurt. Sometimes you can stay out there and still hold a position and score points. Making the right decision is critical.

JCP911S

I find that when you are chasing somebody racing, you push harder than you would ever do in DE, and I generally drive very hard in DE. Now pushing harder may not necessarily be faster... but generally that "last second" we have been talking about will require you to go beyond your comfort level.

IMHO until you get into a competitive situation, you will never know it is there.

JPhillips-998

This is a fun post. Wish I was not on a blackberry.

I got lucky a bought a car from Norm G. If I can come close to his times I'm doing pretty well. But track conditions change costantly so session to session comparisons are difficult let alone year to year. Consistently placing in the top few racers, turning laps within 10ths of seconds of one another, finding ways to make an uncooperative car be competitive are all measurements that I use.

My suggestion in "the" thread of having a pro laydown baseline times in their respective times made the most sense and seemed to offer the least amt of variables to me. Take the time closest,as a percentage, to the baseline and challenge over.