The meeting referenced had nothing to do with timing laps. I don't see those devices as the issue - it's the drivers personalities.

 

I look at my lap times, but only after the session is done and I download it to my laptop. During the session I try to drive as fast/hard/precise as possible but at the same time as courteous as possible. I happen to be driving a slower car (Spec Boxster) which means I'm usually looking to give early point bys to the faster guys coming up on me. As long as I drive by those principles lap times take care of themselves.

Like someone else said lead/follow/chase is the most fun you can have in a DE. Hope to do some of that with other Spec Boxsters this weekend at Summit Point.

Jeff

 

I've done the same thing. Focusing on getting that car that is just in or out of your reach is much more distracting than a lap timer. I agree with your remedy as well. This is one area where experience improves things and the enabler is training to be safe from the start and developing good judgement. With good judgement comes the ability to self identify a flag screw up and take corrective action. We are people, we make mistakes. Character is how we deal with those mistakes.

That said, the real key to being able to run fast laps in traffic is having a group that is good at passing. I've set PBs in traffic with timely point bys. Also, recognize in heavy traffic, the true measure isn't PBs, it is average lap times and relative performance. Some of the funnest sessions I've had is when a group of 4 or 5 of us move through a pack of 15 or cars with good passing.

Personally, PBs don't matter to me so much anymore as average lap times. I'm happier about running a 1/2 dozen laps within 0.5 seconds of my PB rather than knocking another 0.1 off a single lap. (Don't get me wrong, "PB" weekends are still great, but I've shifted perspective).

Just my $0.02.

-Mike

 

One more thought - ever since starting to club race two years ago HPDE seems much more relaxed to me. I used to want the slower car to get out of my way. Now its like "I'm here for fun and to work some things out." I wait. Sometimes I wave for the slower car to follow me. Sometimes I observe what a slower car, with a potentially better driver, is doing.

Compared to the high pressure of a race weekend an HPDE event is just fun and takes away any aggressiveness I might have. Wonder if other club racers feel the same way.

 

Perhaps a bit off topic. I've noticed that my TraqMate predictive timer isn't all that accurate. It's shown "+0.3" and the lap has been 0.2 longer than PB. It's shown "-0.2" and I've set a new PB. Both of these about 50-75 yards before S/F. Perhaps newer devices like AIM are more accurate.

I've resorted to glancing down at the running lap time before the entry of T12 at TWS. If it's below 1:32 I know I've got a good lap going on and the point I look at has next to nothing going on - very safe even in a passing situation.

-Mike

 

This is the philosophy that has to be spelled out to every driver. I tell people at the driver's meeting, "This is not club racing. If you catch someone who is slower, you have to wait for them to give you the pass. We're all out here to have fun. If you don't want to wait or drive like a jerk, go racing. I will kick you out."

 

Haven't used my traqmate for a while, moved on to AIM, but doesn't -.2 mean you are .2 sec below your best lap time, i.e. faster, and +.3 mean over your best lap time, i.e. slower??

 

Since starting TT I don't look at my lap timer, my eyes are up and I am concentrating on my next turn, until I come out of turn 16 at Sebring. I also know how my lap is going by how I have executed the previous 15 turns.

In HPDE I glance at it at start finish just for grins as I almost always have traffic to contend with.

Peter

 

That is correct. Just like F1!

 

It's early (i.e., one day) but switching my goal from best lap time to average lap time and my focus from "go fast!!" to "do things well, one at a time" has resulted in my average lap times dropping and getting closer and closer to my best lap time.

Having a laptimer, to me, is an unrelated fact to driving safely. Personally, I've found I'm not good enough to have the distraction in the cockpit, so don't have it visible while I'm driving and just look at it in the paddock. But plenty of people can glance at a laptimer and still drive safely at speed.

 

I feel the same way about my DE weekends now after a few years of racing. I spent about half my season this year doing lead/follow sessions trying to help others find more pace. The added benefit is when you are leading and trying to hold the gap with them is good practice for racing, with less pressure as you know they won't dive bomb you.

As far as the timing at DE's, IMO there is a time and place for it. I've seen and ridden with a lot of drivers that are worried about their personal best time but can't drive two laps identically or think being 2 feet off an apex is acceptable. Unless you can hit your points your lap times don't matter.

Personally unless I am instructing a racer, I could care less about their lap times. I can tell you how hard they are pushing the car from being in the right seat.

 

Not mine. Perhaps it is a setting, but negative means slower. Verified on the cool down lap, take your foot off the gas and the negative just climbs like crazy (going more negative).

The mode my predictive lap timer runs in is relative to the PB stored in the unit. The less negative the number, the closer to the PB the lap will be. If positive, the lap should be better than a PB.

-Mike

 

IMO, this another one of those issues where there are tradeoffs and variability, so there's no simple answer. Without data, we can't really say how lap timers might affect driver behavior on average, and the effect may vary from one driver to another (and may even vary for a given driver, from one session to another). Chasing a time could promote aggression in some cases, but running a timer could also promote focus and precision, and prevent complacency and lapse in focus, in other cases.

In the absence of an obvious positive or negative effect on driver safety, my thinking is that we should let individuals make their owns choices as far as timing, with the understanding that if, for example, an instructor clearly sees that running a timer is making a student less safe, that student could be asked to turn off the timer. When one of my students runs a timer and I don't see any adverse effect on their driving, I don't comment on the timer, though I do sometimes wonder why they want to create evidence of how slow they are.

 

Having attended the event and participated in the meetings the OP referred to, here's my opinion for what it's worth... I observed a general lack of awareness in the upper run groups I'm not accustomed to seeing at a PCA DE event. I think the organizers generally did a good job--with the exception of a confusing meeting about extended passing--and it boils down to drivers not showing each other courtesy. I found myself stuck behind cars for not a couple corners--but a couple LAPS...! In the red run group! Absolutely ZERO to do with use of lap timers.

 

+1 Bingo!

I don't know the region in question but last year I was asked to instruct at LRP when I was still in white and had zero instructor experience. I declined. Now that I am a provisional instructor, and see all the training I have been put through with the Connecticut Valley Region, I am doubly glad I declined that day. Instructing is not easy!

Regions that promote too quickly are doing themselves and their drivers a disservice. CVR takes crap sometimes about being strict with promotions and accepting out of region instructors, but from what I have witnessed, there hasn't been a case of someone being misjudged. You have to earn the promotion all the way from green to red. Just showing up does not earn you a promotion.

I was HPDE3 with NASA and when I joined CVR I was at HPDE1. It pissed me off at that time, and I thought about quiting, but in retrospect that is right where I belonged!

Totally agree.

If there is no one in front of you, and a car in back of you through more than one passing zone, you should be back in instructed because you don't have the requisite situational awareness to be a solo driver.

Again, to comment on my experience with CVR, there are some damn good drivers who are in lower horsepower cars. Most give a point by early so that they don't break your momentum. I have to do the same for the Cup cars. This weekend I'll be at LRP with my 944 and will be pointing EVERYONE by!

Courtesy trickles down.