Tracking a slow car

I've instructed at various events over the years and the biggest myth is the horsepower. Spec Miata lap record at RA is around 2:41, look at various track day forums, people in M3s and Z06s are running anywhere from 2:38 to 2:45.

As a newbie you are going to be in either a student or novice group where passing is only allowed on the staights. When I instruct I tell students to ignore the mirrors until they get to a passing zone, at the passing zone you check the mirrors if there are cars behind point them by. It's that simple.

If you want to learn to go fast start with a gutless car, horsepower makes up for bad habits the same way super sticky tires mask choppy inputs.

The biggest plus though is it's just plain fun to the flog snot out of an underpowered car.

I've done quite a few laps in 700 horsepower cars and they are indeed awesome but they are not nearly as fun. Once upon a time I ran a pretty quick single seat car, also I've driven loads of high end sports cars but I can tell Mazda Miata is the funist car you will ever drive. This is the reason I'm racing a car 30 seconds a lap slower than the aforementioned single seater.

As for fun...the key thing is for the car to be "playful." If a car is well balanced and does exactly what you ask it to do, you'll enjoy it more than a car with lower lap times that needs to be manhandled and/or doesn't give feedback.

The second part of the equation for track fun is having a group of cars/divers with similar lap times to play with. It's more fun to run in a pack than to just run hot laps all on your own.

I started my track "career" about 20 years ago in a bone-stock E30 318is on 14" wheels. It was a slow car even back then. In 2003 I bought an Evo VIII and modded it to the 400 hp range. It was cool running down P-cars and being one of the "fast guys" for a while...but it soon got old. It was heavy and understeery. Chewed through tires, pads, and rotors. Sucked down a 5 gallon fuel jug every 20 min. I was spending $1000 on consumables every track weekend!

I eventually took the old E30 out of storage and got rid of the Evo. The E30 was just so much more fun. And I had a bunch of friends to run with, especially as SpecE30 got so popular.

Now I'm racing a 190E Cosworth and I initially built it to be competitive against my friends in their BMW CCA "J-Stock" cars. As the E30 M3 guys have been moving up into the "M3T" class, I've also modded my Cossie to match them.

Not only are Miatas fun on the track, but you're budget goes a heck of a long way when you're buying tires annually, rather than every other event. There is a lot to say about a ride that spends it's time on the course, rather than in the garage nursing a wound and emptying your wallet.

Whatever car you track, fast or slow, the car will always be a lot faster than you are capable of driving it. That is unless your name is Hamilton or Schumacher

Go out and have fun with the car you own rather than the car you wished you owned

You guys are a great bunch of enablers! Thanks for all the positive responses. I need to make this happen.

My Miata has 120K on it, but I've replaced a lot of original parts with OEM-equivalent stuff. The only improvements over stock are a set of Star Specs and an aggressive alignment. My goal was to win the local Miata club's autocross class for 1.6 stock NAs. The same driver nearly always wins. He's a great guy who has given me a lot of tips and let me ride along with him a few times. When I started, I was losing to him by 4 sec on a 50-sec course. Thanks to his advice and freshening my car to match his, I usually lose to him by 0.5 to 1.0 sec. Now that our cars are equal, I realize he's simply a better driver than I am and I think it comes down to smoothness.

Getting better is the main reason I want to do HPDE. I'm hoping maybe there's an instructor who can point out where I'm going wrong. As fun as autocrossing is, HPDE might be even more fun: higher speeds, more track time, and no self-imposed pressure to win 'cause you can't win a track day.

So as someone who instructs I'll share the most common things I find with new track day drivers.

The biggest thing is popping off the brake pedal in a rapid fashion. When you roar up to a corner stand the car on the nose then pop off the brake it unloads the front end. At track speeds the car will take 50-100 ft to recover. At autocross the car will unload the front end and recover in as little as 15ft so you never notice.

After that is to much throttle to soon; thismismespecially brutal in a gutless car because you have nothing but traction so all it does is raise the nose of the car and unload the front end.......the driver then winds on more steering.

Next is not looking far enough ahead usually brought on be target fixing. The tendency is to look at the turn in come then look at the apex cone then look at the exit cone, instead of looking all the way through the corner.

Learn to steer with the pedals; I.E. Trail the brakes to rotate the car on entry and then balance and change the trajectory with the throttle.

Tom

slefain wrote:

WildScotsRacing wrote:

chaparral wrote: Depends also on where you're going. Palmer or Thompson - great. Texas World or Road America - not so great.

Very much the case. The more technical the track, the less speed advantage the high powered cars have. Example: At Hallett track days, at the morning drivers' briefing the track boss makes a point of reminding the rich guys with their high-dollar street toys not to be an ass by saying something like, "When you guys with 400-500-600 horsepower a see a CRX or Focus or a Miata on your bumper for more than three corners in a row, I expect you to point them by at the next designated passing zone and let them go. Because half a dozen corners later they're gonna be completely out of sight and a half a lap ahead of you."

HA! When I did a Mustang track day at Hallett the main instructor said none of us there would ever be as fast around the track as his son in his stock Miata, and I believed him.

Yep. If you know the track Miata's are QUICK at Hallett.

I used to get put in the "fast" group in my 1.6 Miata.

Slow car fast is a lot more fun and rewarding then fast car slow.

However it does suck when you are on a P cars rear bumper for 3 turns and when they give you a point-by on the strait they only back off to 3/4 throttle and that isnt enough to pass them.

I run a 115 whp 2450 lb (includes driver and full tank gas) Miata and a 165 whp 3250 lb (includes driver and full tank gas) shiftable automatic Chevy Malibu.

Both run in the high 2:20's at VIR full.

In reply to Fr3AkAzOiD:

That is exactly what that reminder at the driver's briefing at Hallett is referring to when they tell the big engined guys to "let them go". The corner workers will not hesitate to hang the blue-and-yellow with a car number when they see a momentum car being held up. And, they call it in if they see a Vette give a point-by to a momentum car and then not back off enough to let them in front. It gets noted. Then, if the fast momentum driver complains about it, Mr. Vette gets one verbal warning. If he does it again he becomes a no-refund spectator for the rest of the day. It's one of the things that make Hallett track days really nice.

As the driver of a slow race car,(twincam Neon) the most frustrating thing on the track are turbo cars. I dread sharing a track with Evo/Sti guys. I even spoke to the stewards one day about a new guy in a 911, who was balking me every lap...under braking. Like, a guy in a Nazi ass engined slot car was getting in the way of a guy in a Neon...

Fast cars are only as fast as the guy in the left seat.

I did a track night in the FiST and while I was mostly just having fun, I was putting the hammer down as far as I could. There was a Spec Miata on track (or what looked pretty close to it) and it was in another league. I could chase it down coming out of a corner and down the straight, but after 3 turns it was so far ahead I never saw it again.

How do you give a point by, and then not let off enough to let the guy by? I gave a SSM car a point-by once on the bridge straight on Summit Point Shenandoah. All of my Miata point-bys since have been on the start-finish straight, or anywhere else, but I let that Miata by, even though I had to hit the brakes a little.

In reply to snailmont5oh:

Rich guys with more horsepower than sense and etiquette.

Last spring I was riding shotgun with Chuckles in his Cobalt SS at Hallett. We got divebombed right at the turn-in point for Turn 1 by a Viper ACR and we missed contacting our left-front with his right-rear by about 12 inches. I believe I let fly strongly worded exclamation. Mr, ACR got a talking to later, I believe.

In defense of the guys in high horsepower cars they don't realize how utterly gutless some of our cars are. When I've been badly balked by them, after a session usually stop by and say "at the drivers meeting when they said lift off the throttle they really meant all the way off" "your car at 1/4 throttle is still faster then mine" after that I usually start laughing because that seems to sink in.

Fortunately most drivers get the we are here for fun concept.

In reply to WildScotsRacing:

It's not hard for me to have more horsepower than brains (not so much on the money), but I believe in being honest when possible. And a point-by without a pass is just a lie. Automotive dishonesty is the worst kind.

In reply to snailmont5oh:

LOL! Ima have to steal that line! Which begs a question of philosophy in my mind. Which kind of automotive dishonesty is worse; giving a point-by without lifting enough to let the pointee get past you? Or a ricer with a bunch of "I look fast, therefore I am fast" looking stuff on his car, whether crapcan or nice, and a loud "I sound fast, therefore I am fast" exhaust who thinks he wins a street race by "intimidation" if the other car doesn't take the bait?

I knew I was slow (Civic at the time) so I was waving faster guys by, but I was also getting out of the race line to let them by. I thought I was being nice by not causing them to have to take a slower line or get out into the debris. I had a really nice gentleman in a REALLY fast Corvette come talk to me after my first session. He suggested that I stay on the line, that shifting over into the space that he was about to occupy at speed was actually much worse. Just stay on my line, stay predictable and wave him by.

After the next session, the Vette and Viper guys were giving me little "thanks" waves in the pits. Being nice, helping the new guy and not being an a-hole goes a long way.

Well said sir.

A couple of my friends do the western chump series in a civic. They win everything, all the time. Look up Scrap Attack.

In reply to WildScotsRacing:

Now that we're philosophizing; I think the worse lie is giving the point by that you don't facilitate. The other guy you talk about is just stupid. As soon as you educate him (or "show him what's up, yo"), he should no longer think that way, and start trying to find his way onto a track (or autocross course).

In reply to WildScotsRacing:

Also, you have reminded me of an incident which occurred 10 or more years ago between my '79 F-150 2wd/460 and a Beretta with a big sticker that said "unique" on the entire bottom half of his doors. There was stoplight involved, and my truck did something it hadn't done before or since; it chirped second. Well, as soon as that happened, and since he was so far behind, I tapped the brakes, and slowed back down. He blew by. I found him about a mile up the road, sitting in a parking lot waiting for me. When I pulled up to him, he said, "Man! I sure blew your doors in!" I was like, "Dude. I let out at 50. You saw my brake lights, right?" He said, "No way, man. I raced up to 125!" I told him that this truck was aero limited to 116, and if he wanted to go faster than that, I'd have to go home and get my car, and we'd find an unoccupied piece of highway somewhere. He asked what my car was, and I replied, "I drive a blue Ford Fairmont with a white vinyl top." The immediate answer from the back seat was, "No thank you, sir." I bid them a good night, dropped the truck into drive, and idled off, very pleased about my infamy.