Progress on VIR Full
 

Put together a side-by-side video of a lap from my first DE track day ever in the 2017 GS and my current best lap on VIR’s Full Course. My first GS track day was also my first track day at VIR and first in a car with more than 200hp. My previous track days were in a stock 2000 BMW 328i (hey, it has the Sport Package…). My brave instructor for those first two days had a Porsche Cayman GT4 and did a great job introducing me to the track and belied the Porsche drivers hating on Corvettes stereotype.


Amazing to me that a car with world class performance is so accessible to a novice driver. As I’m learning from this forum, the C7 is just continuing the awesomeness of the C5 and C6 generations. Even on that first day I was lapping other cars in the novice run group. Attributed to the car, obviously not to my driver skill.

I didn’t figure out how to enable PTM until after the first event. I kept pressing the center button to “select” the PTM mode, which was actually disabling PTM.

I credit the Corvette Owners School for helping me make that first leap toward understanding what the car can do and dropping 9 seconds off my lap times.

I went from 2:22 in 2016 to 2:13 in 2017 to 2:09 in 2018. Only had 2 track days in the GS at VIR in 2018. I think I would have dropped at least another second if I’d had one more day. My focus this season will continue to be on fundamentals including keeping my eyes up. One classroom instructor at VIR has said you should look at the Oak Tree flag station (T12) approaching T10. I’m usually hyper-focused on getting the car slowed for T10. Also need to do a better job of managing front tire temps. Delaminated a set of new MPSS in two days.

My plan is to keep the car stock until I’ve reached the point where I’m close to the car’s stock limits. I also don’t want to upgrade anything until I’m sure I can tell the difference. Premature optimization – so to speak. For those of you that have been doing this for years are you still seeing lap time improvements each season that can be attributed to improvements in driver skill as opposed to car upgrades? What’s a “typical” improvement over a season? Has anyone else purposefully delayed upgrades to keep pace with driver skill? I know that the margin of error decreases as you approach the car’s limit so there is a good argument to be made for keeping a reasonable cushion between how hard you push a car in DE and the limit. The tire/suspension/brake upgrades are not just for going faster, they also make it safer. I’m curious how experienced drivers think about this progression and decide when it’s time to upgrade.

Really enjoying all the build threads on this forum.

I completely agree with your approach and you've done a great job improving it looks like. You're doing it the way it's supposed to be done and the way that will end up with the best result.

I tried to keep my car as stock as possible for as long as possible. The dimensions that would push me to an upgrade were:

1) Safety
2) Cost
3) Reliability
...
...
...
...
500) Performance

Many times you'll end up with performance benefits however. I actually wish they didn't many times as it allows for more consistent data comparisons, but the top 3 factors are more important.

1) AP Brakes - first mod I did to the car and it was because of the cost of CCBs. I actually really liked the CCBs from a performance standpoint. Never tried a stock iron setup so I don't know.
2) Scrubs - This was a reliability, safety, and cost issue for me. I can get a very close lap time out of a set of Cup2s compared to the Pirellis, but the Cup2 will likely delaminate during an event based on my experience when pushed hard. On top of that, I sometimes double stint this car with my wife and that just puts too much heat in the Cup2 or SS from my experience. I've tried everything to try to manage them better and couldn't find something that prevented it.
3) DSC box - This really firmly falls into the performance side as the track goes, but there were reasons from 4-500 on the list that contributed to this. The only thing that makes this less of an impact is I have a '16 and most of the track rats also have the DSC or have a newer C7Z with the suspension cal update. Nonetheless...

Obviously all 3 have a big impact on the capability of the hardware.

On top of all that, the single best performance improvement was spent in hours (days?weeks?months?) of time investing in understanding advanced data analytics and vehicle dynamics, buying and reading every book I can get a hold of, and learning from folks much smarter than me. It wasn't a "car mod" but is most definitely a driver mod. PDR, Cosworth, VBOX, AIM, lots of time on a lift, skidpad, etc.

Kudos to you and hopefully I get to share the track with you sometime.

Kudos to you

As an instructor with NASA-MA with VIR as my home track, it's great to hear your attitude on the car and mods. Too many thing they need to mod the crap out of everything. With the C7, especially the GS you need nothing other than maybe brake pads and fluid. Do you have standard or comp seats? As you get faster you'll find the seats are good, but not as good as a race seat. I intended to leave my Z51 bone stock, but am now setting it up for TT2. I've done pads/fluid, AFE bars, and now doing the seat and aero last.

You mention books, any suggestions? Thanks

Thank you. Exactly the kind of info I was hoping to get. I've enjoyed the PDR videos from both drivers of your car. I'm curious to know how the track day trash talk goes in your house :). I'm disappointed to hear about the Cup2s delaminating. I'm trying to get my wife to join me at the track and we would also be driving the same car. Guess I'll have to look at upgrading the wheels/tires sooner than later.

I haven't had any trouble with the stock iron setup. Running Ferodo DS2500 pads. However, I haven't yet purposefully tried to compress braking zones so I will eventually need a more agressive pad at least.

I did the MSRC calibration upgrade and I do think it made a difference.

Thanks. Agreed on the GS being track-ready - that was the main reason I chose the GS. I have the comp seats. They're good enough for now, but having ridden with a few instructors that had proper race seats I can definitely see the benefits.

I'm sub'd to your build thread - really good info.

I agree with the cup 2's delaminating. Last set was two days. I think the MPSS's are a better choice with a little less performance

VIR is amazing, it’s worth the investment. I was instructing with Ferrari Club on Monday/Tuesday and just never get tired of that place. Keep digging!

I have 2017 GS, and it is factory stock except brake pads. I am curious about the benefit of the factory magnetic shock update and DCS controller for track use.

I thought the magnetic shock update improves the Touring mode, which I don't use.

The DCS controller has mixed reviews on the forum. Some like it, and other don't. There is always one for sale in the parts section. Also, doesn't it void warranty?

The first book I read was "Ultimate Speed Secrets" by Ross Bentley. It's a great book that's easy to read for the novice, but as you re-visit it, has many concepts that you continually work on.

A good book to start with data analysis is "Making Sense of Squiggly Lines" by Chris Brown. This gives a good progressive approach to using data to self-coach.

The book I spent most of my time with this winter is "Analysis Techniques for Racecar Data Acquisition" by Jorge Segers. Very detailed and covers advanced topics. Easier if you have a math or engineering background. I've read this cover to cover once and I'm about halfway through going back to apply concepts practically to my driving and understanding of the vehicle dynamics. It will also make you want more and more instrumentation so be careful :)

A quick plug for Poor-Sha's youtube channel as well "HiPoDriver". He has a lot of great content as most already know on this forum.

Get comfortable with the tools you're going to use. In the C7 world, it's a lot of Cosworth so being able to use Pi Toolbox and the GM app is critical. I use both. Also, for several of the mobile apps, they will do an export to .vbo. That means you can do some data analysis in Racelogic's Circuit Tools. It's easy, but not as capable as Pi Toolbox. A lot of folks use AIM as well so learning Race Studio 2/3 is good and there is a ton of great content on youtube.

Also, if you ever feel like you plateau, hire a coach, get an instructor in the right seat, review data with someone else. You'll find a place you can get better. Make a list of those things and tackle one on the next session. Look at data in between sessions if possible, but at least at the end of day during a mutli-day event and you'll find the time just continues to fall.

This is what has worked for me. I hope this helps!

Thanks! The season is starting this weekend for me. Hopefully I'll have some good track time to share. I put headers on the C7Z over the winter and changed the shifter. The stock shifter was bent which explained the issues I was having with finding 5th gear last year. I got tired of going through cats on the track too which is why the headers went on. I really wish I didn't have to do that. The car is too loud (although it sounds amazing) for my tastes now on track. I'm sure it'll make for some good videos though. Also, I didn't really want any hp improvement even if it's only 10-20 based on the dynos I've seen. I didn't have a better option though if I wanted to keep at least a hi-flow cat on the car that would hold up on track (at least I hope).

My wife and I are very competitive, but in a good way. The nice thing is we always have good data for comparison so we challenge each other. We'll see a lot of leap frogging happening across an event and we're usually within a couple tenths of each other's FTDs in equal conditions. I still get to claim the weight disadvantage. She won't listen to that though. My wife is also really good at convincing others' wives to give it a try :)

I know a lot of folks like the stock iron setup, I've just never tried it. The DS2500 has good feel, but I tracked them once because I had no other choice and experienced pad fade and ended up eating through those pads extremely quickly. As you said, as you ratchet up your braking, you'll want to move to a pad that is meant to deal with the abuse of the track in a heavy car with lots of power/speed/grip. I really like the DS1.11 and will be trying the DS3.12 this month in the fronts. I tend to get a bit more rear lockup before the front so I've usually tried to get a more aggressive pad in the front. I made an change this week though that will probably reduce my front brake grip a little so I may not have that bias issue anymore.

I personally don't know how the stock program works in either the original or the update. I just haven't driven a car hard with the update so I can't compare.

What I can compare is the stock '16 controller with the original programming to a DSC. I did this back to back at VIR one event. The biggest thing is how the car handles irregularities in the track and the curbs. They just don't unsettle the car anything like the stock controller when I have the DSC in the car. I can attack areas of the track with the DSC that require me to be more patient and settle the car with the stock controller.

As for warranty, I'm sure if you had a suspension related issue, they wouldn't honor your warranty on that issue with the DSC in the car. The rest of your warranty is in tact. Also, it's about 20 mins to replace controllers so I would just take it out and make sure the problem still happens with the stock controller before going to the dealer.

Check out Jim Mero's description of the improvements to the stock MRC:
https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...ibrations.html

From the post, Jim Mero says the following about Track Mode in a FE6 GS:This description is consistent with what I experienced after the update.

I have a similarly annoying exhaust issue on my GS. The automatic LT1 cars have an extra set of exhaust valves in front of the muffler for limiting AFM related drone noise that frequently fail on track. I've lost count of how many times they've been replaced under warranty. IMO there isn't a good fix available right now. Hopefully by the time my warranty runs out there will be some options that don't require hacking the computer or fabricating valve mounts.

Very cool that you both can enjoy track days together. Hopefully I can get my wife to the track (most likely Summit Point) this season at the same time you guys are there.

DS1.11 is my planned next step. I've read that staying with Ferodo for both street and track makes it less likely there will be pad material/rotor issues switching back and forth.

Knock on wood my AFM valves haven't failed. I do have a set of the EdgyVette sims for when they eventually do. For some reason he stopped making them.

Your car is auto? How's the trans temp with the latest iteration of coolers? (Big cooler rear with fan and aux cooler up front) Do you manually shift with the paddles or put it in Drive?

Yes, auto. The max trans oil temp I saw last August at VIR was 239F in 80F ambient. I've never had to slow down or short shift to manage engine or trans temps. I manually shift with the paddles. I didn't like how Drive mode would downshift in the middle of a corner.

I wish I had bought the EdgeVette sims when they were available.

Curious what it'd do on a 100 degree day and if the dual coolers really fixes it. A local buddy who tracks his 2015 A8 base (not a Z51) just added the LG deeper sump pan to increase fluid capacity.

How's the response time for a commanded downshift?

One nice thing is if you do have the sims you can buy the "Z06" aftermarket version (if you went aftermarket) that doesn't have provisions for th AFM valves at all. KISS. Of course you could do that and just hack your existing valves out of the exhaust and zip tie them somewhere.

Great shifting, you use the gears very well :thumbs: