Fooshe

iTrader: (42)

I will be up there instructing for the racing license school 10/11 & 10/12 when NASA is up there....a great technical course! I would like to get ther and do Speedventures event, too. Gotta check with the Ball and Chain first otherwise I get ...

sakred

iTrader: (4)

Hey good to see that your on here. Yeah im on some hoosier scrubs on thier way out. im also on stock suspension. from what i saw in your garage area our cars are pretty comparable. you also have stoptech's like me, which i kind of gathered from you tapping the brakes before the brake zone. dont worry I was in the same boat. you definately carried more speed through the chicanes leading into the "*****" you gapped me but i had a hairy sittuation in that section my last track day so im a little gun shy in that area. I have ran in the NASA time trials before but have never driven any of thier events seems they like to over book. whats this race liscence business and how do i acquire one?

Hammad

RKnight

I am on street tires and always wondered if going flat out thru that chicane was possible.I lift a little for it and the car always handles it well.

sakred

iTrader: (4)

I tried it last time I was out there. you can go through the chicane flat out but right after that when the road starts to turn right you might be moving too fast. Thats exactly what happened to me and my car started to move sideways and I was at the corner of the track already. braking at that point would result in an off. Theres a wall in that section of the track as well it doesnt look too friendly.

Hammad

RKnight

I just learned from an instructor out there and also from the owner of the fastest time attack 350Z in the nation , that the best line out of the chicane is to stay to the right apon exiting and the run a staight line down to the hairpin so you are braking in a straight line. Alot of people run out to the left after the chicane and try to make it a large sweeping turn into the hairpin but that requires braking hard and turning at the same time which doesn't work well. Maybe Eagle 1 can give us some insight.

Eagle1

iTrader: (2)

I have a "Track Attack" guide on driving the autocompetition course coming out this fall. Here is an excerpt on this section. I can go into more detail in the entry below his one (space limitations).
____________________________________________________________ ____

Turns 7 and 8. The Chicane is an exercise in transitioning weight from left to right and back to left as smoothly yet briskly as you can while maintaining maximum velocity through the corner. You have a reasonable amount of room on corner exit from Turn 8 to collect your balance, so the key is to be patient and wait on your turn in to Turn 7, and resist the temptation to “crab” early into the corner entry. Done properly you can maintain throttle, or just lift a little before turn entry and then ease back on to keep the rear settled, and “thread the needle” through this corner at over 100 mph.
(Beginner’s note: Concentrate on learning to induce the transfer of weight from side to side gently, not on going as fast as you can. You want to be able to make the car “take a set” predictably before you start increasing velocity here, or else you can find yourself going off track to the left on exit from Turn 8 at high speed.)

Turn 9. As you squirt through the chicane, it then transitions into a gentle but diminishing radius arc of Turn 9, whose primary purpose is to provide a braking zone and set up for the sharp button hook corner of turn 10 which then leads to a long infield straight section. Therefore you want to maintain velocity out of Turn 8, accelerating further into Turn 9, and then downshift from fifth to second gear under hard braking to the slowest corner on the course. Because the corner is a gradual curve leading to a very slow and sharp hairpin corner, you must be mindful of the instability perils of downshifting and braking while asking your tires to manage any kind of lateral grip challenge from turning. One approach is to be far left on the surface, make an initial turn in and straighten steering to a target point for making a second turn in to the button hook hairpin of Turn 10, and then brake and down shift in a straight line to the target turn in point for your corner entry.

(Beginner’s note: This is a deceptive corner due to its shape, and you can easily find yourself running out of track surface, braking force, foot speed/coordination for gear changes and directional options, all at the same time. Approach this corner slowly at first until you become settled into the optimal driving line.)

Eagle1

iTrader: (2)

OK, with the foregoing as an introduction, let us give this more indepth detail as it certainly deserves.

A primary focus in this exercise is the maximization of corner exit speed from the hairpin. To do that, we need to define the widest possible geometric arc.

An examination of the turn will demonstrate that you thus need an exceptionally late apex on the corner, and that in turn means a very deep, left edge turn in point, which point is well to the left of the center of the turn, a bit earlier than you might expect. The "mind trick" of this corner pulls you much deeper and to the right, and totally screws up your line and velocity. Don't fall for it or you will be spinning, or offing during track out.

The precise "target" point will vary depending on your car and its cornering/braking profile and capability. But basically, this is what I do.

From the far right edge, and I mean with the tires right on the edge of the pavement heading WOT down the approach to Turn 7, we wait wait wait on the turn in, until (taking into account the delay in response of the car to your input by a few fractions of a second), you can feed in right to left steering crisply with a line that barely clears the cone/apex on the left and has you aligned AT the cone on the exit apex.

Why "at" rather than to the left? Because as soon as you have the "set" and the nose is aligned at your target, you feed left to right steering and as the weight transfers to the next "set" there will be lateral load transfer that will drift you slightly to the left, and you will just "kiss" by the exit apex cone on the right.

Keep your head UP in this section. There is a great temptation to look down through the cones and drop your chin. Do not do this. Keep the throttle down, eyes up and sweep smoothly to the left edge, rotating your vision to the right and picking your corner entry mark. Align the car from left to right towards that mark, straighten steering, and then at your predetermined braking reference point, straight brake and downshift, using all of the grip of your tires to slow you.

Once you get to your turn in point you will be going pretty darn slow. If you are comfortable trail braking this is a good turn to do it. You can rotate the rear easily, even inducing it with a little more steering flick, as long as you can use those "Jackie Chan" hands and quickly counter steer and ease back on throttle to transfer weight to the rear and hook up.

Hope that helps.

Eagle1

iTrader: (2)

PS. It is impossible to be on the right or inside of the turn on exiting the chicane, because at 100+mph the lateral inertia is pushing you hard left towards the edge, and indeed you will eventually be limited in your negotiation of the chicane by the speed carried through it which the suspension and tires can handle and still keep you on the track surface during the track out phase.

BUT, once you catch the track out to the left, then indeed you point farther to the right rather than follow the outer edge,and describe a straight approach to the corner rather than a sweeping curve on the left edge. This takes you "inside"by a rather significant number of feet. But you are not turning, you are going straight and the turn "comes back to you".

The interesting part of this, in my view, is that the eye of the needle phase is very subtle and smooth, and it is all set up by the driver on turn in to Turn 7. Done right, and aligning to the correct target point, you can stay foot to the floor longer and really gobble up huge ground on other cars, or the clock, because you also use your rubber most efficiently with a straight braking run, making that shorter and more stable.

This also makes for a cleaner, more predictable and repeatable fast corner exit from the hairpin, the advantage of which you carry all the way down the infield straight to the compound turns of 13/14.

As for what makes this real challenging for beginning drivers, you have multiple gear drops, high speed, a tight hairpin and threshhold braking all rolled into one. Simple focus points will be to have your braking and turn in points clearly defined. Work on heel/toe pedal work which is critically valuable for this turn. As you get your turn in point identified....TURN YOUR HEAD 90 degrees right over your right shoulder to mark your corner exit apex and track out line and steer to it. This especially makes it very much easier to catch and control some slide or slip, and you WILL HAVE SLIDE AND SLIP in this turn if you are pushing at all. But if you do it properly, you will be going very slow when it happens and thus the potential for a bad off or encounter is significantly reduced, and your chances to recover are very much improved. This is a VERY fun turn once you get past the cheek clench it initially induces. This straight line approach does a lot to achieve that.
Cheers,
Ed

Eagle1

iTrader: (2)

A turn that is somewhat of the same genre as #10 at CalSpeedway is the Andretti Hairpin, Turn 2 at Laguna Seca. For that turn the lateral inertia pushes you to the right edge. You are going quite a bit faster though, maybe 130-135mph, and downhill. Theturn is much bigger radius, has positive camber to mid track line, and is itself not level but downslope.

BUT, it can involve a realignment of the nose to bisect the straight and a late, hard straight braking run, and a slightly yaw of the nose with rear drift and counter steer. The difference is that you take that turn in many cars in third gear rather than the second gear for Fontana. But the throat gripping approach to a full hairpin in fifth gear at WOT is similar, as is the need to do a 90 degree head swivel to mark your corner exit apex, and not following the perimeter of the track edge on approach to the corner turn in point.

Both of them cost huge amounts of time to the driver who has not analyzed carefully how to approach the corner, and broken it down into discrete elements that he/she can work on to improve their smoothness and control. Once you have that down, both of these "monsters" actually turn into friends, because they give you a spot where you feel you have an edge over most of your comrades. It is a fabulous feeling to be gaining five car lengths on somebody in front of you with every lap in just that section alone, and it really can be that or more.

Driving smart not only is safer, but ultimately a lot faster. And oodles more fun.

DO this with every turn, and you will be amazed at how much smoother and faster you become just because you did your thinking before you got on the track. (There is not enough time on track to do a whole lot of analytic reflection).

sakred

iTrader: (4)

I agree that the way you mentioned is the fastest way through the corner and is something i was teaching my students but if you go flat out your car will end up on the left and as you have mentioned is not where you want to be. I have however noticed that when you turn that sections into 2 straights, and take the turn as a "J" compared to taking it as a sweeping right hander with hard braking and a late apex that you atain a higher maximum speed with the second approach on the following straight.

Hammad

Fooshe

iTrader: (42)

I knew you were on some R compounds. On the flat turns your car was just holding on better and I had to slow a bit more than I would have liked. Sounds like the cars are similar other than tires and driver weight. As you may have seen, I am not exactly dainty. I bet I am giving up at least 120 lbs to you. Nevertheless, it was a good time having another Z car to play with since those GT-40's could have dropped us like a bad habbit if they knew how to drive.

Yeah, I saw a couple sections I made some time on you (1 & 2, the chicanes) and others were I gave it up (4 -5 combo, far west set just before the last turn to the straight) where you made it back. I would love to get a couple laps of RT seat trades offs so we could do a little feedback session for each other since the cars are basically the same. I think we could both benefit from it.

I usually breath the throttle just a hair about 100 ft. before the chicanes, but then I am flat out for the turn. However, sometimes I do end up further to the left than I think is ideal. It all depends on the jump I got of the 180 degree turn prior to that set. I find my speed varies by 7-8 miles per hour depending on the time of day and what my tires are doing.

Fooshe

iTrader: (42)

You beat me to it Eagle 1. Great insight for this section of track.

I find that time of day (temp) and speed of entrie dictates my line. However, no matter what you must nail that apex & exit point to maximize your speed for that infield straight.

Fooshe

iTrader: (42)

I also instruct for Driving Concepts (www.drivingconcepts.com). We are the school NASA uses for licensing recommenation, as well as BMWCCA. WE put on an intensive two-day school that is structured to take the experienced driving school participant to the next level and prepare them for the competitive racing environment. In our racing schools, the student drives their own street prepared or semi-prepared/prepared race car on track with other students in carefully monitored simulated racing conditions.

The program is open to qualified candidates only. Students must demonstrate completion of at least one High Performance Driving School, or similar progam, before being accepted to the Advanced Racing & Competition School. They can show multiple HPDE's experience in place of school attendence. The application form includes a section regarding your training/racing experience and this must be completed prior to being accepted for this course. *

These two days will tell you if you really are ready to go racing, if you really want to go racing and if you are really prepared to go racing. Lots of the attendees come in wanting to race and leave thinking that HPDE's will do just fine. Some come in wanting to do sprint racing and leave wanting nothing to do with that kind of competition and go into enduros. In either case, the two days are filled with eye opening, intense fun. I enjoy every class we put on.

Eagle1

iTrader: (2)

Thanks Fooshe. Much appreciated.
As Alan Johnson noted, and has been much quoted for saying, it is the corners before the longest straights that must be prioritized.

The genius/deviltry in Turn 9-10 of CalSpeedway is the feint or head fake it throws at you with 9, and the easy means of addressing it falsely by getting fixated with the chicane of 7-8 to the detriment of setting up 9-10 properly. Get 10 right, and the advantage is carried all the way down the infield to 13-14.

One of the other elements that delivers challenges to a driver/car at this track, and it is no mystery by now from the analysis points above, is that corners come in packs, not singly, and that requires some careful thinking and planning on how to attack the circuit with your car, and for the upper echelons of racing, how to set up the car with the inevitable compromises that entails.

Fooshe

iTrader: (42)

Again, well said Eagle. I could not agree more.