I just spent the last two days blasting around the full course at Monticello Motor Club. Wow... What a great time...
Here's some video that I took yesterday during my second run. I'm driving in the Green group (beginners) and in this run they had us combined with the Yellow group (next group up, with more experienced / faster drivers).
I shot the video with a V.I.O. POV camera that Todd from AWE was kind enough to lend me. It's a very cool little device, and being able to watch a playbacks of my runs is absolutely priceless. I can see my own mistakes and what I need to work on. I only wish I had time to review the videos between runs. Maybe next time.
I know I've still got a lot to learn, but I am very pleased with my progress and consistency. I'm also pleased that I was able to hold my own with the Yellow drivers. I'm really getting hooked on the track. That could be a bad thing....
Good stuff! Why wasn't I hearing any tire squeal on that 180 degree turn right before pit out?
That's the carousel. Good question. I can only guess at the answer.
First, the turn is slightly banked, so the car stays pretty well where you put it. But that can't be it totally because by day two I was fully drifting my car on all four wheels on exit and though I could feel the slip, there was no squeal. I'm guessing it's a matter of the speed, tire compounds and surface properties. There were only a few places on the track where I would hear even the slightest squeal.
Good stuff! Why wasn't I hearing any tire squeel on that 180 degree turn right before pit out?
It was really nice to see you guys at the track. There were a bunch of Caymans there. As you know, the Planet Porsche group consisted of myself, Croc'ed, Stevie and titanium guy. The Cayman drew us together with three other owners that aren't active site members (yet); Eric, Glenn and Bill. Those guys seemed surprised when they saw a small caravan of Cayman owners show up just to say 'hi' to us CC guys. Later, during conversation, Dave and I were telling them what a great group of folks we have, and they seemed very curious.
Originally Posted by Feffman
I just happen to call my friend Dave Nagler who was with you at Monticello yesterday. Man was I jealous calling from work. SIGH!
[. I'm really getting hooked on the track. That could be a bad thing.... [/QUOTE]
So far I have had two DE track days at VIR near Danville VA. It is addictive, the car really feels great.
Some suggestions. I found it useful to study a track map, make a copy annotating cornering speeds and gear selection and braking points around the course. I also found video of similar cars with RPM, Gear, Speed details on U-Tube. All these were helpful before I arrived for the track day.
And once there, I worked on smooth. And when to go fast and when not to. My most often mistake was too early an apex. So far the instructors have been great. Looking forward to a day or two in September.
what a nice track Gator, wish I was there too, it also looked like a perfect track day. Good driving too, but you are right, once hooked, there is no hooking off May be we'll meet at one of the track days.
Typical newbie mistakes, braking and apexing early. I fight with the same issues. If you watched my videos, you'll see that I apexed some corners a little too early, and I wasn't tracking out as much as I should have. Part of that is because I would often intentionally come out of a turn off line, without tracking out, so I could be in a position to pass a slower moving car, hoping for a point by (you can't hear the instructor).
In my next run I learned that by apexing later in a couple of turns, I could carry a lot more speed. As I progressed, everything changed. Because I was gaining speed, I would have to brake earlier, and sometimes in places where a simple lift would have been enough before.
So much fun. I am very pleased with my consistency and slow/steady progress.
Feff, I met Dave Nagler at LRP a year ago, nice guy. What drew me to his car was the Tel-Vue sticker on the window. Being an amateur astronomer I am very aware of his family's business and own enough Tel-Vue Nagler eyepieces to pay for half his car. Very nice guy and am looking forward to seeing him again at another DE.
Here's some more video. This is day 2, run 3. I goofed after run 2 (the videos above) and totally forgot to stop the recorder. There was a 1/2 an hour between run 2 and 3, so the camera recorded 30 minutes of the folks parked accross from me. I didn't discover this until I was in staging and I picked up the recorder. That's when I realized I only had 9 minutes of memory left. So I dropped the recording resolution to 360x240 which increased that 9 minutes to 36 minutes. So, these vids won't be as clear at those above.
In this run, I improved in several areas, including:
I found a later apex in a few turns that worked very nicely
I was tracking out more completely, braking my habit of tracking out to the center to setup for passing
I was braking later
As a result of all of those items, I was carrying a lot more speed, and luckily I found a spot behind some rather quick drivers that allowed me to exploit it consistently.
I also experienced something totally new to me during this run; Brain fade. Maybe you'll pick up on it, maybe you won't. But I totally blew one of the laps due to a break in concentration that led me to make several mistakes in a row. I took it easy for a lap, then got back into the groove. Overall, this run was my absolute fastest, and favorite.
Wow... I just watched the last three vids I posted, and though I imagine that they may be boring for some of you guys, being able to see my runs played back is just an incredible benefit for me. I can totally see places where I need to improve and what I need to work on next time, things that I wouldn't have realized without video footage.
I am going to have to get one of these things (don't tell the wife ).
I think I am going to rig up a bicolor LED on the center of the dash somewhere that lights up Red when I'm braking, green when I'm accelerating, so I can better see when/where I am braking, and when I'm getting back on the go pedal.
Wow... I can't stress this enough. If your trying to learn, trying to improve your track skills, you need a camera setup of some type. This is just awesome. This should be required equipment. Helmet, tech inspection, camera setup. In that order. A camera should come way ahead of track pads, R compounds, racing seats or harnesses.
Thanks for letting me test drive the VIO setup Todd. (dirty trick really)
Oh no.... Man, I just realized something. The VIO has a date time stamp with seconds. I turned it off because I thought it was gaudy and unnecessary. Now I realize that if I had left it on, I would be able to calculate my lap times. Sh!t....! OK, I'm learning.... Next time.
I guess I can do the same thing off of the video time.... But the stamp would have been cool.
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May be we'll meet at one of the track days.
(dirty trick really)
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