Getting seat time in the off season . . .

Just finished another fun season of autocross and HPDE. My goals for next season is to drop my time around my local track (Portland International Raceway) by about 5-6 seconds. Next season I will be investing in some more individualized coaching but I wanted to develop a plan for the off-season so I can hit the ground running next year.

First, my initial goal would be to increase physical fitness and reduce some body mass over the winter season;

Second, I have received great feedback from folks on the board saying karting (Rotax-type) is a great way to increas seat time, develop car control and enhance physical fitness;

Third, attend a driving school (Skippy, Bondurant, etc.);

Fourth, well I don't have a fourth. Any ideas on how to get some seat time or do more physical or mental preparation during the off season? Our local tracks here in the NW pretty much shut down during the winter months due to weather. One suggestion was to drive to places like Thunderhill which are more or less year round.

Or, as in certain sports, is it better to just take a break and enter the new season recharged?

Thanks for your ongoing feedback everyone.

/Rich

In reply to rcl4668:

I sure don't know what I should do to go faster, but I know the fun thing my boys and I do in the off season is go to Sykart, for indoor karting. They have enduros where I can follow faster drivers and learn a LOT. And yes, I'm kinda fat...so...that sure shows up in karting...even more than my Miata.

1. Buy beater.
2. Rallycross it.
3. ???
4. Profit!

Racing School Ice Racing Rally Cross Karting

Rallycross shuts down too (which I've never understood).

I loved Sykart so much that I bought my own gokart. Now I have unlimited seat time whenever I want. You should buy ones too Rich and Jeff, then we could race! :P Mine is a 6HP old-school one (weighs less than 100Lbs), so it's not as quick as a rotax or shifter kart, but it's setup for dirt/gravel or asphalt and it's quick enough to get into trouble.

I mostly "recharge" over the winter break as the car is always broken, and I'm pretty drained (I've driven in 14 events this year, plus attended 6 and instructed at 2).

karting, but before you buy, see if there's a 'serious' karting place around with clubs/leagues you can show up and rent, that way you can still work on your car when someone else's kart breaks...

Ice Racing

Ice Racing

A force feedback driving wheel and Fortza, Gran Torismo, etc.? I've got a Logitech and GT4 and, while its not perfect, I do think you can learn a little bit about picking the correct lines, picking up the apex points at speed, etc.

Javelin wrote: Rallycross shuts down too (which I've never understood).

wut? Rallycross season started last month in New England! The heck is wrong with you people in the upper left corner of the country?

Beats the heck outta me. Our local SCCA Regions are idiotic like that. Not only does Rallycross only run from March - October, nearly every single event is on the SAME DAY as the autocross! Sigh

If you ask me, Rallycross should be year-round (1 event/month), run on off weekends for AX, and be especially awesome in the winter. We don't even have Ice Racing!

New Hampshire motor speedway is pondering flooding a parking lot for ice race action...

I sent them a very long letter praising their forethought.

Now that would be interesting.

Raze wrote: karting, but before you buy, see if there's a 'serious' karting place around with clubs/leagues you can show up and rent, that way you can still work on your car when someone else's kart breaks...

My neighbor (former SCCA GT1 racer BITD) did an indoor kart league in order to get his mojo back. He did it at F1 Boston, which is a rather fun indoor karting facility.

DaveEstey wrote: New Hampshire motor speedway is pondering flooding a parking lot for ice race action... I sent them a very long letter praising their forethought.

i like the sound of that. boston bmwcca schedules probably 12 events every winter and gets in probably 1-3 on average because of conditions, so a flooded parking lot sounds like a great idea for reliability of scheduling.

Really I think sim racing is starting to catch on and become a viable option for added seat time. But, it has to be the right sim. The best one out there right now would probably be iRacing. Check it out you'll be amazed at how well they've replicated the fundamentals of car control. They also laser scan all of the tracks that are in the game which means that each one is replicated precisely down to the mm. So, it's a great tool to learn real world tracks and further hone in your racing craft, a lot of pro drivers use this software.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmYQ-LKh12g

For open wheelers I would suggest NetKar Pro.

Trust me, these are not your typical console games and are worth trying out.

As fun and cool as "sims" are, once around the block in my go-kart will teach you more about car control than an entire lifetime of iRacing. The only physics happening while playing a sim is gravity pulling your butt further into the couch.

Fun? Oh yes. Seat time? Not even slightly.

Of course nothing beats the real thing, but the question is what to do when you can't access the real deal as often as you would like throughout the offseason. I don't think sim racing should over take any real life events, but it is a nice supplement to everything that you're already doing. & there is certainly a complex and realistic physics model involved. Have you tried it before? I was skeptical myself until I actually gave it a go.

A lifetime of iRacing not teaching you much? Here's a short and sweet article worth reading here http://www.virtualr.net/greger-huttu-goes-real-racing-article/

I don't think you'll find anyone who could go around the block in a kart one time and then go on to set those type of laps in a Star Mazda at Road Atlanta. So, if sim racing isn't worth anything at all, then how could someone with 0 prior real world track experience pull off that sort of performance? What that article tells me is that you certainly can learn a lot from the right sim, but again it's only a supplement, a vauble one, but still a supplement.

WilberM3 wrote:

DaveEstey wrote: New Hampshire motor speedway is pondering flooding a parking lot for ice race action... I sent them a very long letter praising their forethought.

i like the sound of that. boston bmwcca schedules probably 12 events every winter and gets in probably 1-3 on average because of conditions, so a flooded parking lot sounds like a great idea for reliability of scheduling.

Where do they run the events?

DaveEstey wrote:

WilberM3 wrote:

DaveEstey wrote: New Hampshire motor speedway is pondering flooding a parking lot for ice race action... I sent them a very long letter praising their forethought.

i like the sound of that. boston bmwcca schedules probably 12 events every winter and gets in probably 1-3 on average because of conditions, so a flooded parking lot sounds like a great idea for reliability of scheduling.

Where do they run the events?

newfound lake in NH. i've yet to attend one or really have a viable vehicle to use more than anything. i think they work with the white-mountain bmwcca chapter as interest isnt a big as summer events.

oops looks like its 5 events scheduled from jan-march. here's the boston chapter ice-racing link http://boston-bmwcca.org/EventDescription/2010/ice-racing.aspx

Hmm I may have to spread my schedule some more.

The CRX is a beast with bolt tires.

jeffp wrote: In reply to rcl4668: I sure don't know what I should do to go faster, but I know the fun thing my boys and I do in the off season is go to Sykart, for indoor karting. They have enduros where I can follow faster drivers and learn a LOT. And yes, I'm kinda fat...so...that sure shows up in karting...even more than my Miata.

Jeff -- sounds like fun. I've heard good things about Sykart and will swing by. Looks pretty cost effective too.

In reply to rcl4668:

Go during the week, cheaper than weekends. And buy 3 sessions, get 4th free!

See you Sunday at PIR!

Last winter I did a considerable amount of indoor karting and it's amazing the difference it made. It really didn't take that long either before I was able to put in laps close to the karting pro's at the track.

Now I can go to a new kart track, and within a session or two I can put come pretty close to the top time (for day or month, records are still a second or so away, but those guys are amazing drivers...)