Best mode for Tail of the Dragon and Blue Ridge
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jun 2007
Posts: 270
Likes: 14
From: South Florida
Best mode for Tail of the Dragon and Blue Ridge
Going up to do the Tail and surrounding roads. I've been there a few times but with my Lingenfelter C5 which put down around 500 and was a manual.
Any suggestions on what mode to use? Also are you manually shifting or just letting the computer do the work? Thanks
Any suggestions on what mode to use? Also are you manually shifting or just letting the computer do the work? Thanks
Pro
Joined: Aug 2025
Posts: 604
Likes: 582
Let the trans make all the decisions. If you’re able to drive it spiritedly on the day you go, you’ll be busy with other things that actually require human input.
Burning Brakes
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 1,003
Likes: 279
From: San Jose CA
Track mode is NOT always the answer. It depends on the road. On a smooth road, I agree with you, on an imperfect or rough road I disagree. Here is why...
For some reason GM tuned the MRC different in the Track setting.
You would think as you go up in settings, the dampers would get firmer and more damped on both compression and rebound. However that is not the case. That theory works going from Tour to Sport damper setting, HOWEVER for some reason on the track damper setting GM tightened the compression, but loosened the rebound damping. You can feel it as you go over bumps/dips in the road or even going over a speed bump it is noticeable.
Last edited by CGGS; May 30, 2026 at 06:56 PM.
Instructor
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 142
Likes: 57
From: Los Angeles CA
Track mode is NOT always the answer. It depends on the road. On a smooth road, I agree with you, on an imperfect or rough road I disagree. Here is why...
For some reason GM tuned the MRC different in the Track setting.
You would think as you go up in settings, the dampers would get firmer and more damped on both compression and rebound. However that is not the case. That theory works going from Tour to Sport damper setting, HOWEVER for some reason on the track damper setting GM tightened the compression, but loosened the rebound damping. You can feel it as you go over bumps/dips in the road or even going over a speed bump it is noticeable.
For some reason GM tuned the MRC different in the Track setting.
You would think as you go up in settings, the dampers would get firmer and more damped on both compression and rebound. However that is not the case. That theory works going from Tour to Sport damper setting, HOWEVER for some reason on the track damper setting GM tightened the compression, but loosened the rebound damping. You can feel it as you go over bumps/dips in the road or even going over a speed bump it is noticeable.
Loosening (or speeding up) your rebound damping is the direct fix for shock "packing".
Understanding Shock Packing
Packing occurs when your suspension compresses to absorb a bump (e.g., a rock or a whoop) but doesn’t have enough time to extend back to its starting position before the next bump hits.
If your rebound is set too "slow" (stiff), the oil is choked, and the shock gets trapped further down in its travel with every consecutive hit. This makes the ride progressively harsher, lower, and causes the suspension to top out or feel dead.
How to Fix It
- Reduce Rebound Damping: Turn your rebound adjuster (usually a **** or screw at the bottom of the fork or shock) counter-clockwise ("looser" or "faster") by 1 to 2 clicks at a time.
- Test: Ride a section of trail or road with rapid, consecutive bumps.
- The Goal: The suspension should return quickly enough to track the terrain, but not so fast that it feels like an uncontrollable pogo stick.
Instructor
Joined: Mar 2007
Posts: 142
Likes: 57
From: Los Angeles CA
And I always use manual shifting. It's just way more fun and sounds cooler when the engine is always in the powerband. If you're in sport mode and autoshifting, when you come up behind a slow moving car and are off the throttle, it will shift up and drop the rpm's down to the 2,000's. I like to keep the rpm up to 3,500-4,000 because it sounds musical and aggressive and lets the slow moving car know that you want by.
There's only 2 times when I use auto shifting: 1) at the track or drag strip going for the best possible elapsed time. 2) when I want to maximize fuel mileage, such as a freeway trip or I'm low on fuel and looking for a gas station.
Last edited by Phimosis; Jun 1, 2026 at 04:39 PM.
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Burning Brakes
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 1,003
Likes: 279
From: San Jose CA
Looser rebound to prevent "suspension packing". Answer by Google Gemini:
Loosening (or speeding up) your rebound damping is the direct fix for shock "packing".
Understanding Shock Packing
Packing occurs when your suspension compresses to absorb a bump (e.g., a rock or a whoop) but doesn’t have enough time to extend back to its starting position before the next bump hits.
If your rebound is set too "slow" (stiff), the oil is choked, and the shock gets trapped further down in its travel with every consecutive hit. This makes the ride progressively harsher, lower, and causes the suspension to top out or feel dead.
How to Fix It
Loosening (or speeding up) your rebound damping is the direct fix for shock "packing".
Understanding Shock Packing
Packing occurs when your suspension compresses to absorb a bump (e.g., a rock or a whoop) but doesn’t have enough time to extend back to its starting position before the next bump hits.
If your rebound is set too "slow" (stiff), the oil is choked, and the shock gets trapped further down in its travel with every consecutive hit. This makes the ride progressively harsher, lower, and causes the suspension to top out or feel dead.
How to Fix It
- Reduce Rebound Damping: Turn your rebound adjuster (usually a **** or screw at the bottom of the fork or shock) counter-clockwise ("looser" or "faster") by 1 to 2 clicks at a time.
- Test: Ride a section of trail or road with rapid, consecutive bumps.
- The Goal: The suspension should return quickly enough to track the terrain, but not so fast that it feels like an uncontrollable pogo stick.
I understand this concept as I had MCS 2-way dampers on my previous GT4 and did all the fine tuning on both compression and rebound over about a 6 month time frame, trying about 30 different combinations. Packing only happens when your compression and rebound settings get too far apart from each other and out of the window of tuning. If you tighten up compression, you can tighten up rebound by the same amount and be good, just with a stiffer/less compliant ride.
GM follows this going from Tour to Sport, both compression and rebound stiffen and become more damped, but going to Track, they further increased compression, but relaxed the rebound. What I was expecting and what most people expect is the rebound to also further be stiffened. In track mode (at least to me) rebound can feel just a tad under damped when you are dealing with dips in the road. If you are on a smooth surface, it's no issue because you have the added support of more compression, but if you throw in dips or undulations, the rebound side feels just a bit sloppy.
Thread Starter
Racer
Joined: Jun 2007
Posts: 270
Likes: 14
From: South Florida
Just got back from running the mountain roads in NC and TN. For me, definitely track mode manually shifting. The car is much more responsive and fun to drive. I did use sport mode in traffic, but track mode does transform the car.
Drifting
Joined: Feb 2008
Posts: 1,676
Likes: 1,114
From: Chattanooga tn
Manual shifting and m mode or z mode/track mode. To be honest you won’t be able to really go too wild anyway unless you get super lucky so it doesn’t matter a ton. As you know the roads are tree covered so stay damp for a long time so the back end is gonna come out on you if you are really pushing it.