redtopz

Yeah I think I'm doing about 120 mph at that kink usually. The only times I've had trouble in the past couple years was on the first lap when the tires are not up to full grip. That was a big one though... Thanks to Buttonwillow for keeping the dirt flat and level out there with no dips, bumps, or big rocks.

The stock car driver knew where to put the car to prevent a pass and make it wide and "loose" when it was beneficial to him. I was impressed with the overall handling of that car and how forgiving it is. Probably a fun car to drive.

Robert R1

Were you not able to make it out to the Runoffs this year? Didn't see your name in the signup sheets.

redtopz

Hi Robert, thanks for the post . Long story! Here's a summary. I had my 25th wedding anniversary in July and I'm turning 50 in a couple months. At this time I took a look at myself and reflected about the state of affairs and realized, I'm fat and out of shape! I've been an athlete my whole life and naturally pretty lean and fit. But now I was 182 lbs at 5'11" with a belly. So I decided to lose some weight figuring that I was only around 5 pounds overweight. The first 5 came off quickly and then I went on a 50 mile backpacking trip with my dad and sons and lost another 5 pounds. On the trip I was talking with a friend who was doing triathlons and I had always wanted to try one. So when I got home I started training for a local sprint triathlon which is coming up this Sunday. Now I'm down to 164 pounds which is what I weighed in college . No muscle loss, only fat. I didn't know I was carrying that much fat, but I had to buy new shorts and pants because I lost inches off my waist. I have been doing resistance training for a couple years, but no cardio. I've been training for the triathlon for around 6 weeks. I'm not a swimmer, so that has been a big challenge. I used to be into cycling and I used to run track also, but no swimming.

So basically, I got side tracked this year and have decided to put racing the vette on the back burner (not to mention family priorities with a daughter in college and 2 boys in high school). I will try to maintain my limited skills by racing the miata once in a while. I did enjoy watching the Runoffs live on Sunday! Here I am a couple weeks ago at a Supermiata race. Hope you are doing well in the old country! Cheers.

Robert R1

That's cool Bill! Health is easily ignored yet most important. I'm about to start Insanity Max which is a HIIT workout as I quite enjoy those and I get to compete against the people in the videos which always motivates me more than going solo.

Tried outdoor karting here for the first time. Way more fun than any indoor bay area track I've been to. Basically like normal track driving but higher G's. I honestly enjoyed it as much as any vette trackday so my goal is to slowly make my way to the many outdoor karting places in the UK. Next time I go, I plan to rent a 2 stroke race spec kart which should be about 6-8 seconds a lap faster than the corporate arrive and drive 4 stroke karts. That should be good fun.

Proper track driving will have to be sidelined for some time.

redtopz

Oh yeah, outdoor karting is a blast. I love it. When I was driving my best I was karting with my son at a local outdoor track. It's quite physical and fun exercise too.

I also started doing high intensity interval training a year or two ago, but with weights. It's a pretty simple old school approach that I do in my backyard. Mostly weight resistance with squats, deadlifts, shoulder presses, pull ups, etc. Probably similar to cross fit, but at home. That really helped get some strength back in my legs, back, shoulders, and core. Since I started doing more running, cycling, and swimming I've done less of that, but still try to do a couple days a week. It's ironic that as I've lost weight and exercised more I have way less aches and pains and no longer take ibuprofen like I used to.

Tomorrow morning is my first triathlon and I'm excited for it! I talked one of my buddies into doing it too. A few weeks ago I wasn't sure if I would be able to swim well enough but after hitting the pool 3 days a week for a month, I've improved enough to feel more confident in the water and it's a short swim. Looking forward to seeing what putting all 3 events together will be like in a small triathlon. If I enjoy it I'd like to train for a longer one next Spring either olympic distance or half ironman depending on how my calves hold up with more running (scar tissue from old injuries).

Also over the winter I will need to get back in the corvette and do some testing for SCCA next year. I'm kind of bummed things didn't work out for Mid Ohio this year because I think my car would have done well on that track. But next year is at Indy so that would be a cool event.

Robert R1

My buddy's got into Ironman's and is obsessed with them now. Fair warning, they will take a lot of your time if you do get into it. He's always training it seems like.

I'm gonna try to get a tough mudder in within the next year. I like the idea obstacle course elements of it and probably get some of the guys here to do with with me which will make it more fun.

In car news, the deal on my C6Z feel through so I've decided to keep it and get out to some UK tracks and Spa next year when the weather warms up again. That's the worst bit of being here so far!

How'd the triathlon go?

redtopz

C6Z at Spa?

Triathlon was a blast. I had a goal of finishing in around 1 hour 10 minutes plus some time for transitions from swim to bike and bike to run. So maybe around 1 hour 14 minutes? But once the race started, I felt really good. The swim went by fast and I passed around 10 people. The bike ride was cold and a little windy. The wet swim shorts made my thighs stay cold. I was passed by one guy in a headwind but on the 2nd lap started feeling better and passed several other bikers. Then the hard part was the 3 mile run at the end. The transition from sprinting on the bike to running is tough. Especially the first mile. But I ended up passing the same guy that passed me on the bike and then kept a pretty solid pace of 7 min/mile for 3 miles. So I ended up finishing way ahead of my goal in 1 hour 7 minutes flat including transitions. This put me in first place in my age group and 8th overall out of 68 people. I was surprised at my result.



I can see this being addictive like you said. The training is time consuming and fun. I only trained the month of September for this event so now I'm going to step back and build a stronger aerobic base moving forward. I have 2 races I want to do next year in March and June. I'm trying to get my sons to think about doing one with me. One is a swimmer and the other is a runner.

Robert R1

Congrats man! Once a competitor,always the competitor Getting addicting to being healthy isn't the worst thing in the world after all.

If you can turn it into a family affair with your sons, I think your fun factor will increase exponentially. My 2yr old got a rideon remote control car and he's love it and is obsessed with cars in general so we're off to a good start here.

redtopz

That's cool. My boys don't have much interest in racing, but I didn't either until I was 40 . One son is definitely interested in the triathlons next year. Should be fun!

WARNING: HEALTH AND NUTRITION BLOG BELOW.

Quick story: I was at a sub shop today waiting for a sandwich and couldn't help overhearing this man talking about his health problems. He was overweight and limping and another guy asked him what was wrong. He said he had gout, plantar fasciitis, sleep apnia, and other problems. He was of course drinking a large soda. He went on to say his doctor told him he was going to die in his sleep and he was stopping breathing 500+ times per hour in his sleep. The doctor recommended pure oxygen and a sleep ap device. But the doctor apparently didn't say anything about fixing what was causing all the problems - obesity.

The past few months for me have been pretty much life-changing. Like most things I do, I get obsessed and think about nothing else. With my free time I've been reading and researching probably 8 hours a day for the past few months. It started when I read a book called The Obesity Code by Dr. Fung while on vacation. My wife is a medical doctor and she was reading it. Everyone should have to read this book in high school. It debunks the old Food Pyramid which has caused an obesity epidemic around the world. And it promotes the healthy benefits of intermittent fasting, with is simply not eating for 24 hours once in a while. This has numerous benefits, such as increasing growth hormones, burning fat, decreasing insulin levels in the blood, and increasing insulin sensitivity. Sugars and processed/refined carbs trigger strong insulin responses. Insulin removes sugar from the blood, but it also prevents the burning of fat stores for energy and causes excess calories to be stored as fat. Continuous eating of sugars and carbs eventually causes insulin resistance and can lead to obesity and type 2 diabetes in addition to a number of other diseases. I found this info very interesting and decided to try cutting out sugars and refined carbs as much as possible, and intermittent fasting once or twice a week.

I started at 182 lbs and my first fast lasted 40 hours. It was pretty tough, mainly getting over my craving for sugar. I did drink coffee and tea. I lost 4 pounds right away. Then next one was only 24 hours and much easier (dinner one night then don't eat until dinner the following night). Another book about this is Eat Stop Eat. My results were fast and easy. I went from 182 to 165 lbs in a couple months and my muscle strength did not change (ie. no muscle loss). I randomly decided to stop at 165 lbs because I feel good at this weight. What I didn't realize was that most of my excess weight was hidden as visceral fat. There have been many positive side effects of this weight loss. It triggered a desire to workout and get in better shape. I also now know that sugar was causing inflammation in my body with many negative impacts. Like I said before, I feel like I'm always on ibuprofen now because nothing ever hurts or aches. And I'm not snoring at night anymore which is either from losing the weight or consuming less sugar or both. My resting heart rate this morning was 46 after a cup of coffee and I literally feel like I did at 30 years old. So it's hard not to share this info if it can help anyone else. If I read this blog 3-4 months ago I would likely have shaken my head and said something like "this guy's another health freak and none of this applies to me". But trust me, if you don't know about this then educate yourself. Maybe most of you already know this stuff, but it was new to me and I thought I was pretty well informed. For some people it will improve quality of life and for others it could literally reverse diseases and save lives. I'm sick of how our health care system has a pill for everything but never addresses the root causes. You don't hear about fasting or cutting down on sugar/carbs to live a healthy life, because that's free. Nobody profits in that. Oh and it's "too hard". Better to have a population teetering on the edge of sickness and needing an endless supply of drugs to keep them alive but chronically ill. It's pretty messed up.

My cousin is exactly my age and she was in a wheel chair last year with an auto-immune disease causing pain and inflammation in her legs so bad she couldn't walk. She was overweight also, but not more than many people. Long story short, she finally found a doctor who put her on a special diet and it 100% cured her. No surprise, the diet completely cut out sugar and refined carbs including potatoes. I'm convinced that simply cutting way down on sugar and refined carbs and occasional fasting would have done the same thing for her and can cure many of our modern day "diseases" that are really just a result of poisoning ourselves.

So that's my blog today about nutrition. Please read those books if you are interested. Now I'll move on to some performance driving and racing info. I just had a test day in my miata and had a bunch of thoughts and observations. How is a track day in a miata vs a corvette? How to get faster and is it you or the car or both?

redtopz

I'm in a writing mood today...

I bought my supermiata about 1.5 years ago. My first weekend in the car, I just showed up to the track and it was there setup by 949 racing. I hopped in and after 1 session I turned a 2:01 lap on Buttonwillow 13CW. And I won one of the races despite an ECU that was cutting power and a bad diff. The car was setup well and I drove well.
Ever since that weekend, I have started making tweaks to the car to make it faster (new ecu, new diff, new shocks, etc) but my lap times have steadily gotten slower. WTF? Is it me or the car? That is the question many people ask themselves. Fortunately I have been using an AIM Solo so I have data to look at. A month ago we had another race weekend at Buttonwillow and my best lap was only a 2:03. This was disappointing to say the least. So I had to figure out why I’m slower than I was. First, was it a loss of horsepower? Probably yes to some extent. My speeds are 2-3 mph slower on all the straights, but we are also comparing January weather to September so that is part of it. Looking closer at the data there are other causes. One is I never got a clean lap. Turns out it’s harder to get a clean lap at a track day in a miata than in a vette, because even when you have daylight ahead, it never fails that a faster car outguns you down the straight and then dive bombs in right before Turn 1 only to park it and hold you up in all the tight corners.

Looking at my data it was clear that I was losing a bunch of time exiting cotton corners and through the bus stop all the way through riverside. Was this car setup, tire pressures, or driving? So on my test day I tried to focus on those 2 sections and sure enough I picked up over a second in my lap time. Now I was within 0.6 sec of my best lap time. But no matter what I did I couldn’t match my exit out of cotton corners from my 1st weekend. Unfortunately I have no video of that session so I don’t know what I did. I am faster in every other corner now than I was back then but I’m still turning a slower lap time so that is related to weather and power. Testing a car is very time consuming. I was only able to test one or maybe two things in a day and even then it’s fuzzy.

Another factor to consider is am I just driving worse now than I was back then? Probably yes to some extent. I have not been putting in the time and effort like I was at the end of 2014 and early 2015. I was driving the car more consistently at the limit back then with less mistakes because I was simply racing more often. So even though I was putting together sections that were just as fast, my lack of consistency led to slower overall lap times. That's one of the things I love about racing cars, there's always room for improvement. The nice thing about racing is you have others to compete with. There’s almost always someone faster to chase on any given day.

But how do you know what your limit is? Should you stay within your limit or drive beyond your limit? I get asked this question from other drivers occasionally. My advice is to do 90% within your limit and 10% or less push it beyond your limit/comfort level. Staying within your limit is good basic practice and will result in steady improvement to a point as long as you are practicing good habits. When I’m in a big race, I tell myself to stay within my limits and let things come naturally. I don’t start the race trying to be a hero. That can happen if the time and circumstances are right and you are in the zone. So the only way to push beyond your limit and see if you are actually at the limit of the car/tires is to carry more speed at test days or regional races that don’t mean much. Brake less, lift less, more throttle. But when you do this, mentally prepare for corrections. Keep your hands light on the wheel and be ready to correct for oversteer or lift/brake if you are heading off track. Pushing the limits can be scary and risky, but also rewarding if you get faster and learn new limits. You don’t always want to drive beyond your limits because you will be a hazard, you won’t have fun, and you won’t improve. Similarly always driving within your limits will be limiting and boring.

Ross Bentley of Speed Secrets recently had an article about how to know if your car is at the limit or not. Basically he says if you are able to turn the steering wheel in the middle of a corner and the car changes direction, you are not at the limit. I remember seeing this for the first time when Randy Pobst drove my vette around T-hill and I was in the passenger seat. We went through T3 and T8 faster than I had ever gone and the whole time he was turning the steering wheel 30 degrees left and right to see what would happen and the car stayed on the same trajectory. I was in awe. It was after that ride along that I picked up over 10 seconds a lap the following year. Another thing Bentley mentioned was throttle application. If you change throttle application mid-corner and not much happens, then you aren’t at the limit. Lifting or applying more throttle should have an effect on your turning radius and yaw angle. This is one reason why I like to downshift to the lower gear while braking into a corner which is why heel/toe downshifting is important. Changes in throttle position have a greater effect on the car in a lower gear/higher engine rpm than visa versa which is an advantage at the limit. Some people say they don’t need to heel/toe downshift and can simply change gears in the middle of the corner. That works, but not if you are at the limit.

redtopz

One more.

What is more fun to drive at track days a miata or a corvette? Honestly for a track day I would say a corvette for the reason above. It’s easier to pass slower cars and find gaps to get clean laps in a corvette. And it’s more fun in general passing cars than being passed. Plus who doesn't like the sound and torque of the V8? However, given an empty track I would say it’s pretty equal because you can learn a lot and have fun in either car. Same with racing. There are advantages in a miata as far as getting fast in corners at an earlier stage than in a corvette for a couple reasons. One is you are approaching corners at a slower speed and it's easier to time braking and turn-in when things are coming at you slower. Secondly, if you don't get fast in the corners in a miata then you are going to be fu%&ing slow everywhere on the track! Corvettes can make up for slow corners with power. I can see why miata drivers think corvette drivers are not as good. First of all, this may or may not be the case and is dependent on individual drivers. However, it’s pretty common while driving a miata to be passed by many faster cars with inferior drivers. And many of those guys in the faster cars are clueless about their relative skill level.

Here’s an example. First lap in the 2nd session at Buttonwillow we are staged by lap time. I get mowed down by 4 cars on the front straight on the first hot lap right when I’m trying to run a 2:01 or faster lap. All 4 cars have big aero wings and slicks and much more hp. If you know Buttonwillow, then picture me in my miata trailing all 4 of these winged cars (bmw, S2000, Porsche, GTR) around Sunrise, buttonhook, cotton corners, bus stop, Riverside, Phil Hill, sweeper, all the way to the back straight before they pull away. This whole time I’m thinking about driving the limit and wondering why any of these guys have wings on their cars? They clearly are driving nowhere near the limits of their level of grip and the aero is only going to make it that much more difficult to get there!

I was thinking about "limits" while training for the triathlon. I only had 1 month to train and I didn’t want to “just finish”, I wanted to do well. I looked at the times from previous years and tried to estimate what I would have to do to match them. So going on long steady runs or bike rides for a month was not going to do it. Pushing myself beyond my limits would be a faster and more effective way to improve in a short amount of time. After a couple short easy bike rides, I decided to push my limits and test my conditioning on the bike. I rode 2.5 hours at a pace that was too fast for me and the last 30 minutes was torture. My legs cramped up, my butt was in pain from the seat, my blood sugar ran low and I “hit the wall” as they say. When I got home, my hands and feet got cold then my whole body got chills. I quickly ate some fruit and food and then wrapped myself in a blanket and went to sleep for an hour. This was on a warm summer day. So now I knew where my limit was the hard way and sometimes that's the only way to learn. After that, I let myself recover and did a week of interval training, short bike rides, swimming, and some running. The following weekend, I did the same 2.5 hour bike ride loop a little faster and feeling pretty good. The 3rd time I did the ride, I went harder again and finished 30 minutes faster with an average HR of 168 for 2 hours a week before the triathlon. I’m convinced that pushing myself like that on the bike is what made me faster at the triathlon. A week after the triathlon, I decided to slow things down and start building more gradually within my limits. I did the same ride at an easier pace of 154 bpm average HR. But to my surprise, I ended up completing the ride in the same amount of time as the 168 bpm "hard ride" and 30 minutes faster than my first ride when I hit the wall. So pushing the limit paid off and now riding within my limit is faster and easier. Same goes for a race car.

folsomlarry

Bill,
Great write ups and congratulations on the Triathlon results. I have always got a laugh out of the people who do one or two track days, complain that they are being passed so they want more horsepower and a big wing. Most people would be better off learning to race in a small car like a Miata so you learn to push the limits in the corners, not just stomping on the gas peddle in the straights. The Ross Bentley article highlights are really interesting.

Going to Indy would be an experience. We have been invited back there the past two years for the SVRA event. Our car would not be competitive against the East Coast cars that our built to much different standards. The president of the SVRA says it is an amazing experience the first time you enter the speedway and actually take your car on the track. Hope you make it there next year.

redtopz

I've been continuing my training and seeing progress in running and cycling. Not so much in swimming but I haven't put much time into that. My runs have gone from 3 miles to 4, then 5, and now 6 miles several times per week. My pace has dropped by 40 seconds per mile and my legs are getting much stronger. I continue to push the weights a couple times a week to build/maintain muscle. I backed the training down last week to give my body a chance to recover and that made a big difference. I have a 5 mile race next Saturday which I do every year in Merced as a fund raiser.

As I've been training, I can't help but think about the similarities in how to improve in this sport compared with improving in driving a race car or any other sport really. The difference with hpde or car racing is it's hard to practice during the week so your time in the car at the track is limited. I can run and bike every day of the week, but maybe only get the car on the track 10 times per year. So how do you improve with such little practice? Similarly, how do you learn a new track and get competitive your first time there?

The answer is it's a mental game. Car racing is 90% mental. Understanding the fundamentals and physics involved is the key. The physical side is minimal although good vision, timing, and coordination are important. The difference between experienced fast drivers and slower drivers is mostly due to knowledge and understanding of what it takes to be fast. Learning the limits of your car and how to optimize those limits around the entire track. In other sports such as soccer, triathlon, football, the physical side is much much more important than in car racing. So you can use that to your advantage by training your mind to be a better driver even when you aren't at the track. Going to a driving school, hiring a coach, doing autocross, reading books, watching vids, practicing on simulators, learning how to analyze performance data are all good methods for improvement.

The other difference with car racing is that the car is just as important as the driver when it comes to performance. So there are 2 things that you must understand: how to be a fast consistent driver and how to setup a car to be fast and consistent. If you can do both then you will be successful. My background is engineering and I started in this hobby by enjoying working on cars. Then I later discovered autocross and hpde/racing. So I was gradually able to learn how to improve both my car and driving to the point where I could win races and set track records. This took a lot of thought and time. One thing to focus on if you are limited by time/money/energy as most of us are is the Pareto 80/20 principle. The Pareto principle as applied to sports states that 80 percent of your improvement/results/performance will come from 20 percent of the skills you focus on. The key is to know which skills represent that 20%. And which 20% of car parts/setup will represent 80% of the improvement in the car's performance. I've also applied this principle to learning new tracks. Which 20% of the new track will result in 80% of the lap time improvement?

The benefit of this principle is you can focus on just the big pieces of the puzzle that will reap 80% of the reward so you don't get muddled in confusion over dozens of details that will only affect 20% of the performance. So here are some examples. When it comes to driving skill, focus on the basics. Eyes up looking where you want to go, stay relaxed, feel what the car is doing, smooth inputs, carry momentum, and drive on the racing line. If you just do those things, speed will come. Once in a while you will have to push outside your comfort level to improve, but you can't lose sight of the basics. Now there are still 80% more skills to work on, but they will only improve the last 20% of your driving. Move onto those one at a time as you master the basics. With car setup, the 20% might consist of reliability (cooling and oil pressure), good brakes, good alignment, good tires, and good seat. That's really all you need for 80% of your performance. All the remaining stuff (aero, shocks, springs, more power, less weight, etc.) will help but only about 20% over a basic solid car driven well. When learning a new track, I try to find the sections where I can make up the most ground in braking or in technical areas. I like to focus on being fast in the slow/tight areas first. That will usually get me 80% of the way there, then work on the fast areas later for the final 20%.

Hope this helps and gives you something to think about in the off season.

TrackAire

Great info Bill. I've been thinking about off season training for HPDE now that winter is closing in on us. The best training IMO would be in car driving....but it is hard to replicate the muscles and hand eye coordination used on the track when working out in the gym, running, biking, etc.
So much of driving is mental, I see a lot of people getting slower and slower as the day goes on because they have trouble focusing and lose concentration, yet they are physical specimens that are in great physical shape.

What do you think about doing a race car simulation video game while walking on a treadmill, step climber, etc? My theory is you need to keep your hand eye coordination in check, but also realize that you are doing cardio when driving to shift, brake, control the G forces, etc.

I would think if you had a hand held controller to drive the car in the video game and set the treadmill to a basic interval type training, it would give you a pretty good feedback on how the added physical stress effects your laps times. If you're running laps just as fast on the high intensity part of the interval as the low intensity, that would be impressive and show consistency and physical conditioning.

The one thing that kicks my butt by the end of the day is the gas fumes I smell coming from other cars when I catch up to them. A lot of us run without cats plus everybody is at wide open throttle much of the time and a lot of raw fumes are coming out the exhausts. Maybe I'm just getting hyper sensitive to it, but I can feel a slight burning sensation on my face (like a mild sunburn) and still smell and taste the gasoline even hours after the event. Does anybody else feel like they're coated with a layer of gas fumes by the fifth session?

Any thoughts on the combination of playing a car racing video game while doing some sort of cardio?

Robert R1

Good points Bill. People focus too much on things like "trail braking to the apex" "throttle steering the car" at HPDE's because it more advanced, which sounds cooler to talk about and I guess builds street cred? but in reality there is probably more than enough in fundamentals to work on for most people.

As I have no car knowledge, I tried to pick a small piece to learn how it effects the car. For me, that was alignment. I'd try to learn from reading, asking others, running different settings to see it effects the car, my driving and how well I adapted to the car's behavior with different settings. Before I left, I was finally able to get my head around some of the concepts and settings which I felt good about.

redtopz

That's an interesting idea doing a simulator while exercising. Would definitely make the treadmill or stationary bike more fun! I'm sure it couldn't hurt. Here are a couple thoughts on the matter. I've seen a couple friends run a heart rate monitor while racing a car. During the race, their heart rates get up into the 150+ beat per minute range. This is well into Zone 4 training or high tempo exercise range. Some of that is due to the physical effort needed to control the car and handle the g forces on the body and some of it is due to the adrenaline and mental focus and stress. One way to duplicate this is to play another sport, whether it be basketball, indoor soccer, hockey, tennis, etc. Preferably something with continuous action unlike football or baseball. I've always been a proponent of cross training in sports. A few other ideas would include karting, martial arts, and downhill skiing. All these things can help people become better overall athletes.

Regarding losing focus as the day goes on I have a few suggestions. Stay hydrated with water and don't eat heavy meals for lunch. Avoid sugary foods and drinks. Prep the car early so you aren't rushed before the session starts. Another thing I like to do at the track to stay focused as the day goes on is to give myself some private time in my trailer to close my eyes, relax, and calm my mind before the next session. Maybe use some mental imagery about the upcoming session.

Regarding fumes, I only notice that when I'm stuck behind a car. Best option is to pass the car . Otherwise, my car is well vented and I have a NACA duct that takes air from the driver's window and blows it toward my face/chest.

redtopz

You bring up a couple good points Robert. Focus only on one or two things at a time and talk to people with more experience who are faster than you are or who have more knowledge in certain areas. And don't be afraid to try new things. Also like you said, you should be able to adapt to different settings and conditions if you have a solid grasp of the fundamentals of car control. One thing that was cool at the Bondurant driving school was their skid control car which used hydraulics to induce understeer or oversteer conditions and the student driver has to adapt instantaneously to keep the car on the course.

Robert R1

Honestly, if I hadn't gotten guidance from you and couple of other people I trust, I have no doubt my progress would have been much slower, if not outright capped at a slower pace. If you want to go fast, drop the ego and learn from others who have been there already.

The Bondurant car is a cool concept and probably a better way to teach students than to let them induce it on their own. Throw them into the fire so to speak.

Whenever I get back into the tracking scene again, it'll be be through driving schools and private instruction. The drawback to figuring it out on your own is picking up bad habits and then having those become your bottlenecks to advancing. I'm sure I've picked up a few already.

Good conversation.

redtopz

Happy New Year! I'm making a change this year and developing a facebook page to highlight my racing endeavors moving forward. Most of it will be auto racing, but also marathons and triathlons and training. Here is a link to the new page and I'm just starting to set it up. Give it a like and follow if you are interested!

https://www.facebook.com/redtoprace/