"Bravery" is often confused with ignorance. You don't know what you don't know. You are either taught or accumulate experience (or both) in order to know.

Rest assured, even the best nannies can't refute or ignore the laws of physics, unless they're SO intrusive that then the driver begins to learn by driving JUST underneath the interventions. Which many do, in modern cars.

Absolutely. The reason why top level professional schools have cars that do NOT (or reduce the influence of nannies on the production cars that do) have nannies... And, why ALL the good curricula include car-control exercises first.

 

When I first started looking for a car on which to learn HPD I actually intended to buy a Miata, for all the reasons cited in this thread. But at 6'6" tall I found I couldn't fit in one...no way am I taking out the seat and sitting and the floor as I read some have done. So I had to settle for a 997 C2S...that's my story and I'm sticking to it!


However, I AM concerned about the learning I am going to miss out on by starting out with (1) a relatively powerful car and (2) a car with nannies, as I begin my HPDE this Spring at local PCA chapter events. Certainly, the nannies are to be turned off during skid pad instruction, but what about while on the circuit itself? Do instructors at these events have you keep the nannies turned off or leave them on? Obviously, it is safer in the short run to leave them on, but at the expense of learning. I would willing sacrifice speed in order to learn the right way...I want to learn to drive...the right way...not give the nannies a work-out.

 

I'm going to be a contrarian and call that article total BS!

It's not harder to drive a faster car. It's all relative. I think he is confusing the fact that faster cars are usually more stiff than a slower car, so require quicker adjustments at the limit. He's comparing apples to oranges. If anything, driving a slower car fast is more difficult. The brake zones are so much shorter, that you have to have less time to adjust than in a faster car. And if you get it wrong, you don't have monster power to pull you out of a jam.

The only difference I see is the consequences, like was mentioned. If you screw up in a faster car, you're more likely to find a wall.

Now somebody let me drive their GT3 and I'll show you it isn't any harder to drive fast.

 

There are way more experienced people than I am in this thread, but I can give you a perspective of someone who started with Need4Speed computer games and progressed to comfortably driving a 475HP GT3 with nannies off rain or shine and not break stuff in the process.

1. Look for a school/club that does both track and skid-pad/autocross. For example, BMW Club Trillium in Canada does that, but I'm sure many others do as well. Learn car control on skid pad (ideally not just a circle but also an autocross-style course with cone-marked "corners"). All nannies off there from the first session, ideally have an instructor watching you or in the car with you. Skidpad will let you develop car control rather quickly even in a modern car with lots of HP.

2. In parallel, drive on track way below where nannies become relevant and learn line, smoothness, vision, markers, consistency, passing etc. I suspect your instructors will want you to keep nannies on at least initially - it's a fast car without racecar safety level, after all. But that should not be really relevant initially because a good instructor should/will keep you below where nannies intrude until you know what you are doing in all other areas. If you are running into nannies or spinning out at this stage, take a step back and/or look for a different instructor.

3. Once you can drive consistently well without making mistakes on the track, start picking up the pace. By that time, your skidpad skills should be at the level where you can balance the car well are comfortable with oversteer and can use it to your advantage. So you should BE ABLE to drive with nannies off. But do it only if your instructor allows you. In general, always do what instructor tells you.

Now, once you feel comfortable driving at good pace with nannies off, there is a question of whether you should just keep them off all the time. I suspect many here would disagree, but I believe there is a legitimate use for nannies even when you can drive well without them. It's a street car after all.

For example here are cases where I used to keep nannies on (and still do sometimes - nothing to gain by going commando there):

1. Driving a new track for the first time on recon laps. Just in case - the pace should be rather slow anyway.
2. Trying an alternative line, where car control is not a factor (yet) and I just want to see if it makes sense geometrically.
3. Sometimes, driving after there was an accident on a track (red or black flag) or when I suspect someone may have dropped fluids. More than once I slipped in someone's coolant or oil when there was no debris flag waived. Nannies are magical when it comes to maintaining control in a puddle of oil. But most of the time in such cases I'd rather slow way down than turn on nannies and keep going fast.

A big word of caution is that if you combine driving with nannies and without them, when you turn them off, take your pace down a notch and work back up gradually (even if over 1-2 laps). Do not just get quick with nannies on, then turn them off and try to do a hero lap - that can end badly.

Hope this helps.

 

Stick to the story if you want, but I am 6'8", and can fit in a spec Boxster, 944, older 911, etc. All of these are non nannie cars. There were options if you were really looking.

That being said, enjoy the 911. I would recommend leaving the nannies on at the beginning, and once you are past the "sheer overwhelming overload of info, OMG Im driving fast on a racetrack" feeling and are starting to feel more comfortable out there, leave them on and start trying to become aware of when they are "saving" you, and try to drive a bunch of laps without triggering them at all (that may not be entirely possible in the newer cars) before even thinking of turning them off. I am sure your instructors will tell you the same.

Most of all, enjoy!!!

 

An appropriate quote from Blake Smith, our former Chief Instructor, that we teach in Instructor Training School: "I can teach you to go fast in 2 years in a slow car but it may take 5 years in a hot car."

 

I'm in a similar situation with my Mini i.e no power or nannies, but after many years of driving I'm still in it for many reasons; yes, it's slow, but there is nothing more rewarding than being able to stay with a "fast" car through a set of turns....at this point in my "career" (easy to forget that this whole deal is just a hobby), that's gratifying enough.

That said, when I see some of the sheer speed some of these cars carry out there, it's easy to paraphrase Steve Stills after the band played at Woodstock: "I'd be scared s**tless to drive one of those!"

Gary

 

I've only ever had mine turned off for the IDS skid pad exercises. For those, you NEED them off and there's nothing to hit so it's all good and safe.

On the track... I won't turn mine off until I feel like they're holding me back. The first step is to recognize when they're doing anything at all. Any time mine have done anything, it's because they're bailing me out from some mistake. By the time they're doing their thing, the mistake has already happened and they're just helping me along.

So long as that's the case, there's zero chance I'm going to turn them off.

If the day comes where I'm good enough such that I'm doing things on purpose that they're holding me back from, then maybe I'll consider turning them off.

 

[QUOTE=MaxLTV;13980995

Hope this helps.[/QUOTE]



Indeed it does. Thank you

 

Great article but I disagree with two points:

1) the best car is actually not a Miata but a Porsche 944 on street tires since it is bigger inside and and there is more room between you and your safety cage
2) midcorner control is not only about maximizing entry and mid corner speed, it is also about the point at which you can commit to full throttle without having to back out of it. Especially on tracks with long traights like Sebring, your commitment to throttle point is essential to going fast - it's actually more important than mid corner speed

On top of the discussion about Nannies, let's not forget about the emergence of automatic transmissions (PDK) where the set of skills required to go fast is paired down quite a bit by totally eliminating the requirement to think about and execute good shifts. Just sayin....

 

I agree with most of the artcle. I have been tracking a 997 gt3 for the past 2 seasons. My skills have improved and nannies are off. But i still cant get myself to drive near the cars limits. I make up for mistakes with power after the apex and in the straights. Also, fear of damage to the car and my body hold me back. Im going to be tracking an F class boxster S with full cage and safety equipment this year to get back to basics and get faster because I'm driving better. Not because the car has more power.

 

You pay for you mistakes in time with slow cars, with $$ in fast cars...

Mike

 

It's been an interesting progression for me, driving the same chassis with very different power levels. For years I drove a 140 HP 944 Spec car, ultimately at a nationally competitive level. After about 6 years, I wanted to experience some real power, and built the now 500+ HP "Franken44".

I thought my challenges would be in getting all the power down/managing power oversteer, but that has turned out to be the easy part - the car handles that well, and fundamentally, the car reacts in similar ways to power application.

The more difficult parts have been the increased workload and corner entry. In a Spec level car, there are lots of parts of track that you are below the limit of the car - I could focus on releasing the wheel, the line, strategy, and being tidy, with lots of time in between to re-evaluate and reset. With 500 HP, kinks become corners, elevation changes you hardly recognized destabilize the car at speed, and time between corners becomes very short. The areas and times "at the limit" are more dictated by your right foot, and cajones, than just limited to major track elements. Areas that I just focused on straightening out become sustained times at the limit, at much higher speed. This is particularly true at the National Corvette Museum track. A lot more to process and tougher to drive with anywhere near the same level of aggression.

Missing a brake marker by a little bit in a Spec car is easily compensated by a little more slip angle, whereas staying into 500 HP a little too long gets real exciting!

Wheelspin on corner exit is not a big problem, but it took me a while to adjust my line for the different trajectory that picking up 20MPH between throttle application and trackout brings, Corners are no longer parabolic!

Driving a faster car is definitely harder, but to the R&T author's point, driving a slower car improved the learning process by decompressing it. I have a much better understanding of how much is left on the table in my faster car. Yes I am going much faster, but I know there is a lot left in redeveloping a similar level of comfort/aggression on corner entry and midcorner speed to my old Spec car.

 

No way. By and large, the faster the car, the harder it is to drive the laptime. There may be some exceptions; for example, driving a 991 Cup fast is harder than driving a FIA-GT3 car fast despite being a slower car, but such examples are the exception rather than the rule.

 

I experienced this big time at Buttonwillow Raceway in California. It's just so damn busy, couldn't even look down for Predictive laps.