I just keep my eyes on the road and both feet on the wheel...

 

Unfortunately, not much opportunity to practice in Houston, but learning to ski bumps definitely helped with looking and thinking ahead.

This year I had a choice between a week in Vail or 2 3-day events at COTA in Feb and March.

I chose COTA. Heading back in 2 days....

 

Great choice....if only the weather would cooperate. Of course you do like the rain:-)

 

I have video proving otherwise. ;-)

 

Since I started doing DE 3 years ago, I have always been able to find a new thing or two that can be practiced on the street. They can be done safely, and the effect really shows the next time I am on the track. Here they are, sort of in chronological order.

Seating position. Now the first thing I do stepping into a new car is to adjust the seat as I would for track driving. Good bent at knee, shoulder blades on seat back rest and wrists drip over 12 o'clock of steering wheel.

Left foot planted on dead pedal whenever not working the clutch.

Hands on 9 and 3 position of steering wheel. Resist the temptation to shuffle as much as possible.

Lift the right heel off the floor on braking and practice modulation, for example chauffeur stop. Contact the brake pedal with ball of the foot, not toe (I have small feet, size 7.5).

Heel and toe downshift.

Late apex. On my commute there is this divided parkway that has 2 lanes on each side, and it has lots of long sweepers. When there is no traffic, I will start from the outside lane, pick a very very late apex for a sweeping turn, and try to turn the steering once, very little, and keep the steering angle fixed and see if I can hit the apex well.

Looking past the car directly in front of me. Pay attention to the 2nd or 3rd car in front me and what they are doing (e.g. braking).

Left foot braking. In my subdivision there are speed bumps. I started practicing there. When there is no vehicle behind me, I would left foot brake to slow down for the speed bumps. Oh the first few times are embarrassing! I believed I stalled the engine more than once. But it gets better in about a month or so. Like heel and toe, I think it would take me years to develop in to second nature, and I don't want to use it on the track until then. But I am to able to use a simpler form of it on the track after 3 months of practicing on the street. This past weekend, I was able to lightly tap the brake at the end of VIR's back straight consistently and gently with my left foot.

 

Ha!!!!

I can't wait to drive your car again with the latest suspension bits...

 

My non - skiing DE friends get so tired of me saying this same thing!
"Do you ski?" is one of the first questions I ask when instructing.
Watching the lines the top tier FIS World Cup ski racers take in the GS, DH and Super G races can also be beneficial.

Leaving for Vail in the morning!

 

Feet?!

 

When I was instructing motorcycle road racers, one of the major causes of vision issues was the racer thinking of corners as isolated events instead of looking at them as part of a system of events. Once I got them thinking of the corners as connected, they usually found themselves thinking about the next corner much sooner which caused them to look down the track farther.

 

If you don't mind, I'd like to steal that for use with my students. I already link the obvious complexes, but really they are all linked and it is a challenge to get their eyes up.

-Mike

 

Def a work in progress! With the rubbing issue they raised the rear 1/2" which made the back end appear to be possessed by a demon. It was really fun to drive, though! ;-)

The rubbing continued, so the sway bar has been adjusted and we are waiting on custom end links.

 

I'm sooo jealous (envious). Make sure and hit Rasputin's Revenge for me!

 

Really appreciate all the feedback. I was practicing on the street some, but definitely not to the level you guys recommend.

I used to see the daily commute as a necessary evil. Now I see it as practice time.

 

Mike,

Once the racers got good at this, and saw all the turns on the track as connected, they were able to think ahead better and plan passes multiple corners in advance.

 

I've heard an instructor compare it to watching a little kid do connect the dots; the bunny looks all jaggedy as they go from dot to dot.

Once they get a little older and figure out that it is supposed to look like a bunny they start rounding out the lines as they go from dot to dot because they are looking ahead to where the next few dots are and it starts to look a little bit more like a bunny.

Always made sense to me. I can't do it, but at least the idea makes sense to me.