Seat time is the essential ingredient of improved driving performance. And good instruction is necessary for you to maximize that precious track time. Instructors nudge you along in right direction, correct error, and ideally lead by example by giving you some hot laps in their own car. There is no substitue for learning what a good line, threshold braking, and high-g turns feel like. What experiences contributed most to your own development as driver? What practice priorities, skills, or instructor advice did you find most useful? What were false leads and concerns? These are topics where both expert and novice drivers have equally valid insights. Experts benefit from years of experience, but may forget critical challenges that are immediate concerns of struggling beginners.

Well, Forum participants, let us benefit from your experience.

Bob 33

 

It seems as though you have a lot figured out already. during my last 2 events I asked to be put in a slower group then they recommended so that I could have an instructer ride along (and have time to ride along wih an instructer). The added insight I got, more than made up for having to deal with slower traffic.

On one occasion, I had the destinct oppertunity to have my instructers car break down. With me as passenger he took a session driving my car. It was a truley amazing experience seeing how fast my car could actually take the course. Very educational. These are the things that quicken the learning curve. I would rather learn from someone elses skill than my own mistakes.

It always amazes me to see beginner students shove off their instructors to ride solo after one or two sessions.

 

Brian, as you suggest, seat time alone, while useful, is best experienced with an instructor. Untutored experience may lead to bad habits that must be unlearned. My thinking about this was prompted by last weekend's event at VIR. While most of us have read about driving technique, have a sense of the basics, including an approximation of the best line, braking and shifting in a straightline, etc, experiencing hot laps with an expert is a revelation. Some hot laps with T1 contender Chris Ingle taught me a lot about decisive, consistant, precision driving, elegant lines, threshold braking, and the time dimension that comes only with experience. Course maps and even videos can't capture the g-forces of actual lapping, how fast and smoothly expert drivers can brake and shift, and what appropriate weight transfer feels like. Once this imagery is in place, you have a model to approximate. Also, I learned a lot from Jim 47 in earlier events. Once you have moved beyond the crisis management of first track experiences, I found it valuble to have a fellow Vette driver as instructor. It's important to have someone who understands the dynamics and remarkable capacity of your car. The best Vette line may not be the best Miata line. I'm fortunate in never having had an instructor that I have not learned from, but some hastened my learning curve more than others. I've also found soloing a nice complement to sessions with instructor in the car. When I know what to work on, I've found it less stressful to hone certain skills away from a critical eye. Accomplished instructors sometimes forget that it can take a bit of time to move from concept to performance.

A major challenge facing us student drivers is inadequate track time. It's like learning to play basketball while practicing only a few times per year on weekends. Hardly ideal and a program for frustration when high goals meet grim reality. I suspect that the best objective is to just go out there and have some fun, understanding that enough weekends placed end-to-end will yield progress if not a place on an F1 team.

Bob 33

 

I think one of my big breakthroughs and one I try to help students with is getting the entry speed to corners slow enough where they can really be smooth. I hear "be smooth" mentioned a lot but it doesn't mean anything unless it can be translated into actual driving skills. A good test is to see where the brake lights go off and and the throttle comes back on. Every corner is a bit different but, in general, you will see the better drivers back on the throttle much earlier and with a more subtle touch. A nice progressive, and early, throttle feed will give the best exit speeds, with a minimum of wear and tear.

I also feel that trail braking in a C5, while still having a place, is not nearly as helpful as in some other less balanced cars. In fact it can be downright counterproductive. When watching people at Gingerman it is very very common to see people still on their brakes when they would be much better off with having had the braking done and be back to a smooth throttle feed.

One way to really get the feel of this is to shift into 4th on the cool down lap and try not to use the brakes all the way around the track. See where it feels comfortable to start feeding the gas.

 

I am forunate in that I have never had an instructer that was not driving a vette . Jim 47 was my instructer at my first track event and is a big part of the reason I got hooked. I understand your frustration, with only 4-5 events per year it is difficult to build skills. But it is nice to see that over a year and a half past my first event I am still getting better. I also do not feel that I am loosing anything between events.

I have found that different instructers will center on different things. Some will ask for a slower better line which is fine with me.

One of the best suggestions I have had is to try to concentrate on improving one turn. Once you have it good then try to concentrate on improving the next. and work your way around the track. I find it to be more effective than trying to improve the entire line for the entire track at once.

 

For me the RESULTS of the breakthoughts are I sleep well the night before , I get board, or do my quaterly taxes on the long straights, and I feel at very comfortable in corners.

When this happens that means I need to step it up 2%. On each corner, brake 20 feet latter or go 5 mph faster into the corner Not both. going a few mph faster though into the corner and accelerating a little harder after the apex.

Having several different corvette instructiors has helped. Each has a little trick here and there to learn from. So I play spong and absorbe as much as I can.

The one key ingreadiant was smoothness. Be smooth all the time and hit the same marks lap after lap after lap. The lap times are comming down without trying.

 

Michael Schumacher agrees with you on this one, that's why you rarely see him turning in the best times in practice until the very end when he puts it all together for a few hot laps.

 

As mentioned by Richin Chicago, assumming that you are not downright jerky with your inputs, "smooth" is more a result of a lot of little things done well than a meaningful objective. Also, a lot of little things going wrong can cause things to unravel, and a mistake on one part of the course can slow you down or get spooky down the line, such as entering the esses wrong at VIR. That one can really synch up your sphincters! From experience riding with expert drivers and from their comments, it's true that beginners drive the slow parts of the course too fast and the fast parts too slow. The gee whiz part of my passenger experiences with good drivers come on the fast sweepers and esses, not the tough turns where everyone must go slow. No untimate analysis here, just some stream of consciousness impressions from my most recent outing and thing to work on for my next event.

Bob 33