nubby

iTrader: (6)

There's a lot of posts about people's first DE experiences, but not too many about people's second experience. Hopefully someone finds this interesting, or gets inspired to give a DE a try.

My first DE was with Porsche Club as a complete novice (Run Group 1), and the second was also with PCA in Run Group 2, this time without an instructor. Both were at Mid America Motorplex.

Saturday started out rainy. First turn of first lap in the rain I almost spun the Evo. Okay, settle down... Still driving really conservative and last lap almost spin it right in front of a corner worker station going onto a long straight. Talked to my instructor from the 1st DE and he asks me "Are you braking into the corner?" "Nope." "Are you on the gas in the corner?" "Uhhh.. I'm pussing out and kinda coasting in." "There's your problem." He was right, I had too much weight on the front, and with the wet, slick track, it really amplified any mistakes in weight distribution.

Run two was even wetter, now with standing puddles, and I was passing some of my group. Couple of squirrely moments, but much better than first time out.

Run three was about the same track conditions as run two, and I was faster and starting to kick everyone's butt. This is on 2-year old Advans with very little tread left.

The heroics wouldn't last though.

The rain stopped and the track dried out for the last run of the day. It was the worst session I've ever had. I was making mistakes everywhere. I couldn't stay on line. No confidence in the car. Pushed harder, and just ended up scaring myself. Went home pretty discouraged.

I thought about it when I got home, and decided instead of feeling bad that I drove so poorly in the last session, I'd take to heart the fact that it's a DRIVER'S EDUCATION event, and try and fix my mistakes.

First run of day two I followed my instructor and his student using them as a pace car so I wouldn't be tempted to drive too fast, and try and concentrate on doing things right. The first run was great even though I got passed by every car on the course, some more than once. My line improved 100%, I didn't scare the hell out of myself, and no mistakes. I was all smiles.

Run two I picked up the pace a little, and things were starting to click. My line improved even more, even though the pace was up I was looking farther down the track. Worked mainly on not looking right in front of my car in decreasing radius turns, and picking out my turn-in.

Run three was a bit faster yet. Now I started using throttle-lift oversteer to get the Evo pointed where I want it since my line was much improved. Now things are getting really fun. Only got passed by a Ferrari 348, a 911, and a *cough* Cooper Mini S.

Run 4 was a 30-minute session, the last of the day, and it all came together nicely. I was faster yet, was well in control, and had some fun by using throttle-lift to rotate the car where I didn't really need to. Well, it's fun to hear those rear tires howling, and it was the last session.

Other high points:

Watching corner workers dig a Viper out of the mud with shovels on the first day. Watching the same Viper drive onto it's carrier at the end of the second day with mud all over it again.

Getting passed by a Ferrari 348. The guy had some sort of aftermarket exhaust on it, and it sounded just beautiful, and was loud as hell. If you gotta get passed, let it be by a sweet sounding Ferrari.

So all in all, a great weekend. Still a bit confused why I did so well in the rain, only to suck so bad when the track dried out. My only guess is the rain slowed me down, and I wasn't behind the car.

Here's a few pictures from the second day my friend took. And yes, that Cooper soon passed me after the picture.

Kayaalp

iTrader: (1)

Wait a minute...this was your SECOND event ever and they signed you off to SOLO? WTF were they thinking? I swear, some PCA chapters are just insane with this stuff. How are you expected to learn without a skilled instructor on your side? This is not only dangerous, but the student gets seriously short-changed.

It used to take literally YEARS for people to get signed off. I ran with an instructor for maybe 2-3 seasons (10-15 days per season) before getting signed off. Nowadays, I keep hearing stories of people getting signed off after a handful of schools. It's crazy.

Emre

PVD04

iTrader: (23)

In my experience (not participating, but watching) it seems that the novices far outnumber the instructors, preventing them from working with the novices for much longer than 1 or 2 days. I will be participating in my first DE on September 15th with PCA Milwaukee chapter. I have watched a few with my father (he has been driving 911s since 1985) and now I finally have a car that I can take on the track. With the Milwaukee region, the attitude on the track is very conservative, which lends itself to people driving solo sooner than they may have otherwise. The biggest problems would likely come from novices getting pushed by more experienced drivers or pushing themselves to hard due to lack of experience. At every DE I've watched the organizers emphasize the importance of staying conservative and not racing, but rather enjoying your car in a controlled environment.

-Paul

djh

Good point. At a lot of events the instructors get dropped off in the pits and run back to the grid to find their next student. If they want to run any of their own sessions they don't get much of a break (and wearing fire suits they can get pretty ripe!). I enjoy getting signed off for the last couple sessions in a day, but I wouldn't get nearly as much out of it if I didn't have an instructor at all.

Dave

josefmd

iTrader: (2)

I have been to five DE over the last several years and have been signed off at all of them. It was usually always on the second day. I don't think it is such a thing is insane! It all comes down to being comp to drive your car safely and have good judgement.
Nubby,
How did the PCA treat you with your EVO! I went to a DE at Mid-Ohio a few yrs ago with a 98 Type R and was treated like a second class citizen
I am thinking of going to another PCA DE at Putnam Park, IN in a few weeks with my 05 MR.

Take care guys,

Matt

hagakure

iTrader: (2)

I am not sure that it's completely necessary to go 2 YEARS with an instructor in your car before you are ready to be on track by yourself. I have done 11 open tracking events since October of 2004, and I was signed off to run solo in NASAgroup 2 by the end of my first NASA event. In the majority of events I run I am in the open passing group. I have had no incidents of note in these 11 events, and I am driving as quickly, with safety, as some people that have been doing this for 3-4 years. Everyone is different. I have a ton to learn, admittedly. But my car control has been adjudged very good by instructors recently, and I don't feel that I am in anyway a danger to anyone who is on track with me. good sense and driving within your limits go a long way towards safety at DE's. I've been in NASA events with "experienced" drivers who have been open tracking for several years that have scared the **** out of me. time and instruction is not a definitive answer for safety and common sense.


Percy

djh

Getting signed off sometime during a DE isn't the issue, it's not having an instructor at all. At least that's how I read

If you're reasonably in control then after a few sessions with the instructor you know what you need to work on for the rest of the event and you just need the seat time. But you (OK, I) really need an instructor to help set the "lesson plan."

Dave

nubby

iTrader: (6)

Well, I'll try and address all the posts, I hadn't checked back on this thread because it hadn't had any posts for so long.

Kayaalp: I'll have to respectfully disagree that PCA events are "crazy" in regards to safety.

Something that I didn't mention about the track, Mid America Motorplex, is that it's a very safe track. There are no elevation changes, and the run-off areas are just huge. The tire walls in some places are seriously hundreds of feet from the track. There really isn't anything to hit off-track at MAM, and this makes it an ideal learning track. Mistakes at a place like Topeka that could end in heartache, at MAM are just a source of embarassment and a good story. If MAM wasn't such a forgiving track there would be no way PCA would let me out on my own on a second DE, and I wouldn't want them to.

I've had two experiences with the Great Plains Region Chapter of the PCA, and I have only the most positive things to say about the safety of their events. They have a spotless record at MAM, a car hasn't even been scratched during a DE event. I would say the attitude of PCA GPR is actually very conservative, they keep a very watchful eye and have zero tolerance for anything they view as unsafe. Due to the layout of MAM, what works for PCA here probably wouldn't work anywhere else.

There's no way for you to really know what goes on at a PCA event at MAM, except to attend one, so if you're ever out in this neck of the woods I invite you come out, and see if you still hold the same opinion.

josefmd: Everyone in the local PCA chapter are just great. No snobbery whatsoever, and most Porsche drivers seem genuinely interested in the Evo. They've heard a lot about them, but I'm usually the first Evo they've encountered at the track. They fit the description of car enthusiast much more than most people I've encountered, at least in the fact they just like fast cars and like driving fast.

A guy in my run group went off track in a hopped-up Civic, and had to take off the front bumper to get all the mud out, probably took him an hour with the hose to get the car clean. He got lots of ribbing from the old-timers that he threw mud all over the track and had to ride back on the flat-bed, but in the paddock they were all talking about how competent he was with a wrench, how he put an Integra motor in the car, and were all happy to see him back out. The point I guess I'm trying to make is he got treated exactly the way the dudes driving Porsches who went off got treated, and I think that speaks pretty well for the PCA members here.

PCA events I've been told are more cliqueish than say a BMW event, but I've found if you just go talk to everyone and be friendly, they open up right away, and just want to talk about cars and driving. You can tell they have a little problem when they get passed by a Jap car, but they're all good natured about it. It's just part of the game.

machron1

iTrader: (1)

I don't understand what you guys mean by being "signed off" at Porsche club DE days. I've been to a few Porsche DE days at PIR and never had an instructor. My first DE day ever was with the Cascade Sports Car Club. My instructor gave me passing marks on everything but heel-toe (which wasn't a requirement, and I didn't know how to do it back then so I never tried). Anyway, he put "...would make an excellent race car driver" and since then I haven't had an instructor at any DE day since (except one of my friends is a Porsche club instructor so I let him ride with me for a session basically just to ride in my car, not to get signed off or anything). I always run in the advanced group which suits my skills and car performance nicely even on street rubber. I'm normally faster than about half the advanced cars.

So, I don't consider it insane that I don't have an instructor. I don't need one. I'm careful and haven't wrecked anything.

djh

The first couple times out with any club or at any track, nobody knows who the hell you are. I sure don't want to be on track with an unknown who hasn't at least had a "sanity check" by an instructor. There is also no way to really learn the techniques and tracks if your instruction ends at day 1. You're the one getting cheated in the end.

Dave

machron1

iTrader: (1)

maybe I'm a special case? My first Porsche club DE day and my second DE day ever I moved all the way up to the advanced group & was invited to an invitation-only track day with a different club because of how I handled my car on the track. That's the run group I am in at every other club's track day as well. Even though mine is normally one of the few/only cars with street tires in the advanced group I still spank tons of cars out there and I've never had a complaint/black flag. My CSCC instructor said I would make an excellent race car driver (his words on my grade sheet...very first time ever on a race track). I guess as always YMMV.

Anyway, I don't need someone in my car to teach me how to go faster. I just let faster people in other cars by me, follow them, and see what they do better than me. I also ask questions of people I notice are really fast. That's not what I would consider insane...

hagakure

iTrader: (2)

I'm not really interested in any more instruction unless it's from a race school, such as skip barber, etc. I've been to open track events where I have passed "instructors" in cars that were equally high horsepower to mine, etc. Just because you are an instructor with a car club does not qualify you as expert in many cases. There are a lot of clubs that need to seriously tighten up on their requirements for instruction, as well as the manner and consistency with which instruction is given. I was very fortunate that my first instructor, who was a very good one, by the way (Gordon Pun with NASA norcal), had an in-ear communication system for us to use. This enabled him to speak at a normal volume while instructing me, and not to add more "emotional volume" to an already stressful situation (first time on a racetrack). Think about it. It's your first time on a track, you have a multiplicity of stimuli to deal with; other cars, watching the flag stations, feeling the car, braking, accelerating and turning, and you have someone in the passenger seat yelling BRAKE!, Turn in NOW, etc......it's stupid. Instructors need to be prepared, competent, and consistent. I'm not convinced that DE's are a great environment in which to receive instruction at all.

Percy

Richard EVO

The first HPDE event I attended 2 years ago I was allowed to "solo" on the second run session of the day. I can't imagine even wanting to go to a racetrack if you had to have an instructor in your car all the time until you are "signed off" if that takes a long time. That's a ridiculously restrictive rule.

That being said, I don't think you can improve your driving skills in any serious way without good instruction. I seek it out even though I run in the Intermediate Group and occiassionally in the Advanced Group. If you don't get more instruction, you will just continue to practice and perpetutate your mistakes, an you won't be able to improve your lap times any more than marginally.

Also, I hate NASA events. Very little seat time and way too regimented, with all the cockamamie download sessions and that silly little book for instructor comments that you have to carry around. I just won't go to an HPDE event where my whole day is four 20 minute run sessions.

Finally, I have heard that Porsche Owner Club events can be pretty snooty to the likes of us EVO drivers, and they won't let you pass their $100,000 Kraut-wagens, even when you are riding their Germanic butts all around the track.

machron1

iTrader: (1)

The Porsche club here isn't that bad, just don't expect them to help you out with blue flags. Expect to see a blue flag if you just passed a Porsche though and he is still within eyeshot of the corner worker lol. I did have some problems with a certain Lotus Esprit V8 TT on a Lotus club day though that didn't want to let me by, I had to get a jump off the corner before the back straight & drag race him & barely made it past him by the end of the passing zone. He also spun that day & I saw his pretty yellow Lotus sitting in the infield w/ grass all over it lol.

I don't agree with your point that you can't get better without an instructor in your car, although an experienced race car driver would be very valuable sitting next to you. The HPDE instructors generally have never been in a race car and although experienced in HPDE, I think they are geared more toward helping the noobs from crashing and not getting that extra 0.1 seconds off your lap time. Not knocking them, they aren't getting paid or anything and kudos to them for volunteering their time, it's just the way it is.

djh

Ah, that's a little different then. So far every NASA instructor I've had has been racing, usually NASA and SCCA, for years. I mostly run with NASA (and in my neck of the woods you get 5-6 sessions, with at least one long session) and they operate on the assumption that you're aiming for a comp license.

Dave