ron_dargenio

Great thread. I taught myself the double clutch first, then progressed to heel-toe. Made it easier for me. To illustrate, I would be in fourth gear on a straight stretch of road. Back off the gas, clutch in, gear lever to neutral. Clutch out, rev the motor. Clutch back in, gear lever to third, clutch out. All pretty deliberately.
I repeated this many times till I was able to execute the downshift very smoothly in a variety of gearchanges, like 4-3, 4-2, 5-4, 5-3, 5-2, etc etc. Only then did I add braking and heel-toe to the mix, still in a straight line. Then when really comfortable I began doing this for turns. It really is second nature now. I've never had to replace a synchro.

Tomorrow I will be meeting Dave at New Jersey Motorsports park and really psyched about it!

Veloce Raptor

I am looking forward to it, too, Ron!

onefastviking

So do you ever shuffle steer VR ? Maybe preset your hands ? If so, when do you consider it an acceptable practice ?

Veloce Raptor

Sure do, if I have to use extremely large steering angles at extremely low speeds. For example, in the paddock, or backing out of one of the TWS garages. As Greg pointed out, we really don't have the sorts of tracks that we frequent that require it at speed, IMO.

Just to be clear, I was not saying Bassam was doing anything "wrong". However, IMO, any technique on track where you let go of the wheel and/or have to change hand positions in order to straighten the wheel is sub optimal.

I also use it frequently in street driving under the same circumstances.

guardsredcab

Great idea for this thread Dave. Very helpful info from lots of folks. Thanks for your time coaches.

Veloce Raptor

Thanks, Greg, see you soon!

Veloce Raptor

Been traveling a bunch lately, Watkins Glen, Sebring, NJMP, etc. I have wanted to put a number of PM's, email conversations, and face to face conversations had over the last few weeks up here for discussion and comment, so here goes.

"why does my GT3 understeer so much when I apply throttle coming out of a corner?" (paraphrased)

One thing I discovered when delving deeper with this person was that he routinely goes to gas rather hard coming out of a corner. I pointed out to him that 911's will quickly & readily lift their nose when throttle is applied to suddenly, since the rearward weight bias is dramatically increased. When there is some steering angle, the front tires end up with a whole lot less grip, and thus understeer is often the result. Problem solved when he was a bit more graceful applying the throttle next time out.

"why am I having difficulty heel/toeing now that I am going a lot faster?" (paraphrased)

This individual wears thick-soled athletic shoes in the car for DE's. I pointed out to him that the better he gets with a faster corner entry, the more important a swift, clean downshift & blip becomes. Thick soled shoes remove nearly all sensitivity as to how much brake & blip we are using every millisecond, and thus it is very easy to either over-blip, under-brake, or worse, apply brake & gas at the same time even before blipping (which was happening a bit). IMO a thin soled shoe like a racing shoe would increase his sensitivity & awareness, and really aid swiftness & precision on his heel/toe downshifts.

"how do I make myself consistently look farther ahead?"


A common problem many folks have when really trying to elevate their vision on track is target fixation. They find something to look at coming out of T11 at the Glen, for example, like the start/finish tower....but they stare at it. I would suggest instead that they see it while they scan left right up down left mirror right mirror center mirror gages etc. Elevating vision means looking at things farther ahead...but not staring at these things & then missing the car that is inside them at turn in for T1.

turbo911cm

^^^ this is why I subscribed to this thread. Good stuff

24Chromium

Are there any tips or techniques you can offer as to how to gain a feel for the proper entry speed?

Bob Rouleau

Chrome, yes. Learn to look into the corner while you are braking. Many people tend to fixate on entry cones or brake markers etc and as a result over brake because they can't see the corner. A useful exercise is to approach a corner at a comfortable constant speed and take the corner WITHOUT braking. This gives plenty of time to "see" the corner. Most are surprised at how quickly they can corner with a stable car. Gradually increase speed until you feel you are near the limit. This also teaches the value of a soft brake release to have a balanced car at turn entry and or trail braking as advocated by VR above.

Think of it this way, as we approach a corner we ask ourselves "how fast can I enter". If the part of our brain that helps make that decision could talk back it might say "what corner, I don't see any corner" - because the driver is NOT looking into the corner early enough.

Pros have their heads turned, looking into the turn while they are braking, trusting peripheral vision to deal with the side of the car near the track edge.

Hope this helps ...

Veloce Raptor

I would say that first of all, maximum safe potential entry speeds are usually much, much higher than most folks would ever believe. Riding with a top level driver is often eye opening. This is IMO the easiest way to see/feel the potential of the car & the corner. If this is not possible, look for video & data from such a driver, preferably in a car similar to yours. If this is also not possible, one way to get a feel for being closer to potential is whether you are able to get to throttle immediately after releasing brakes in a corner, or whether you need to pause briefly while the car takes a set. Some folks advocate either gas or brake, no in between. However, at top level entry speeds there is often a need for a small gap between brake release & throttle.

In addition, Bob is spot on with regard to vision. Look into the corner early, while on the brakes. In fact, I try to coach to looking for track out while still on the brakes, and than optically scanning between apex & track out starting at the end of the brake zone. This really helps smooth the hands, and slows down the "film strip" of how fast things come at you when you increase entry speeds.

24Chromium

Bob & Veloce Raptor, thanks for the feedback.

Long story short; I upgraded my brake pads and fluid, which was awesome, but I had so much more stopping power, I was coasting and/or on maintenance throttle before turn-in. In other words, I was braking too early. Then, I had some issues with pads and fluid over a few track weekends and that sapped my confidence, since I wasn't sure if the brakes would slow me down, I was now braking even earlier.

But now, all is back to good again as far as the brakes, however, I'm strangely unable to mentally reset my brake markers and adjust my feel for the proper turn-in and entry speed. I spent a long time studying my Traqmate data. I found that I was much earlier on the brakes and my entry speed was much lower than in all my previous events. Even worse, I wasn't getting on the throttle earlier to make up for it. And this is for nearly every single corner!

I'm seriously frustrated! Any more advice?

Veloce Raptor

One thought: keep your existing (early) braking points but work on reducing your brake pressure every lap (when traffic allows), thus preserving more entry speed w/o scaring yourself silly. Once you see how stable your car is with a lot less braking, you can adjust your brake points to suit your preference. To me, the key is not how early or late we brake, but how much we brake & how soon (and how smoothly) we release the brakes.

EDIT: here's a video from a few months ago at a track with some heavier brake zones. My goal was to be smooth on & especially smooth off the brakes, to keep the car stable, and make it work better on corner entry.

Veloce Raptor

Thank you for the kind words!!

C4S/GT3

I've never experienced this phenomena!