Is anyone running with National Auto Sport Association (NASA) at VIR Oct 27? It'll be nice to talk to other Z members to trade tips and ideas.

 

While I won't get the chance to race at VIR this weekend, I'm happy to be racing at the Rocky Mountain SCCA season finale here in Colorado. Good luck at VIR (what a track!), are you running w2w or HPDE?

 

I'm in HPDE 1. This is my 2nd time out. It looks like a rainy weekend so this will be my first rainy condition. Good luck to you as well.

 

Lucky, bloody YOU! VIR is one helluva track and while I have no on-track suggestions to offer, I will say that there are some specific suggestions for the paddock. First, bring some small sections of plywood for putting your jack or jackstands on. Particularly if it rains, you'll need a firm surface to jack from. Whether it's a piece of cardboard or a dedicated padded track pad, bring something to lie on, as the paddock isn't all paved. Bring extra DOT 4 high-performance brake fluid and a bleed bottle or pneumatic bleeder (I use the Griot's garage one) to bleed your brakes after a session. VIR is a high brake use track and that's an area the Z usually excels at.

 

dkmura, I see it's been a while since you've been there The paddock has been fully paved a couple years ago, which is nice in terms of no more dirt to worry about, but also now their security is monitoring closely to make sure noone is jacking cars directly on the asphalt. Plywood is necessary for any sort of car raising.

As far as brake fluid goes, I've been thru all kinds, including RBF 600 and 660. Nowadays I use exclusively Castrol SRF. Yes, it's priced equivalent to unicorn tears, but it's worth it. I no longer need to bleed more than once every few events. If you're bleeding your brakes after each session chances are that 1) you are using inferior fluid and 2) you are abusing your brakes.

 

I'll be there! White 350Z #811. Running TT since no-one else racing in ST4 this weekend.
Look forward to meeting you!
Crawford

 

Actually was a at VIR just two short weeks ago. The Z team I was with was paddocked in a section that had paved roads, but just chip paved off the surface. Plywood was a must on that surface! I've been to many tracks, from Cal Speedway to Pocono in my career and some have fully paved surfaces that are fine to jack up on, but not VIR. This weekend I'm going to LaJunta Speedway in SE Colorado and while it's not nearly the facility VIR is, at least the weathered paddock is fully paved and good to work on.

Good to hear about your experiences with Castrol SRF too, as I've been using RBF 600for some time now. But regardless of what type of brake fluid I've used, SCCA w2w races are usually longer and intense enough on brakes that a simple four wheel (partial) bleed at the end of the day helps ensure that problems don't crop up. Maybe I'll have to convert over to SRF, but the other w2w racers who win on a regular and use SRF all seem to be doing at least one partial bleed at least once a day.

 

I'll look out for you. I'll be in a grey 350z #650.

 

Ok, you must've been way in the back by the false grid, that's the only area that's still not fully paved. I agree, their paving is rather soft, which is why they are patrolling trying to keep people from damaging it further.

I'm a bit surprised by the end of the day bleed rituals :P, I'm assuming those are more precautionary than necessary due to soft pedal feel. For OP's DE event I think it's overkill.

 

You're right, we were assigned an area just to the left of the small red/barn/bathroom near the pre-grid area. As for the "precautionary" brake bleed, we know very little about the OP's choice of brake fluid. It could range from hoping last year brake change will suffice, all the way to a fresh brake bleed with unicorn tears. Better to recommend the conservative route, rather than be faced with a brake pedal that goes all soft after the second session on track.

 

I am using Brembo 5.1. I did 1 event in March.

 

Agreed. There are two golden rules to abide by for track events
1) Don't skimp money and time on prep, it's never worth savings in the long run
2) The more tools you take with you the less tools you'll need

 

If you haven't done another flush since March, I suggest doing a partial bleed at each corner before the event. The thing about learning new tracks is we tend to overuse the brakes while learning it. The less experience you have, the more over braking usually happens. From what little I know about VIR, it's a track with some heavy braking areas, some corners with trail braking to help rotate the car and some medium braking areas as well. I want perfect brakes to start out the day, as they are ALWAYS the key limiting factor on a track day.

 

That sounds good. I'll do a touch up tomorrow. I think there's more trail breaking areas or that could just be taking it easy and not doing a lot of heavy braking. I do struggle with trail braking. That's on of the things I'm going to focus more on.

 

Apparently you were across from me and I didn't see you.

 

My weekend went great. Had a drifting moment in the rain when I couldn't put it in gear until later than I wanted and engine brake missing the Rev match and sideways I went. I was able to power out of that. Other than that 6 of 8 sessions were completely dry.

I was able to push the car harder. My instructor wanted me to working on braking. My the end of the weekend my instructor loved the Z because it doesn't punish you when you make a mistake and it's pretty well balanced.

I'm more confident in hard braking. I'm starting to understand how to trail brake. The Pirelli Pzero Nero is a good cheap tire starting off. It has a lot of grip and it gradually fades when it gets hot so I was able to adjust throughout the sessions. Even when they were hot I still had plenty of grip to come out of turns at high speed without too much lateral slide.

I keep forgetting to turn traction control off. Going into turn 1 I get the crunchy brakes but it's more annoying than harmful. Overall I had so much fun because I was more comfortable so I could really focus on braking, entering, and exiting. A tip I hear from everyone is don't shift to too much. Shifting is the next thing I need to work on.

 

Glad you enjoyed it, it's my favorite track and I'm looking forward to being there in 2 weeks.

Regarding braking, it's very common for drivers starting off to not brake hard enough initially, instead they tend to drag the brakes partially depressed into the brake zone and apply them harder towards the turn in point. This is typical street driving behaviour, however on the track it's counterproductive. You want to be right on the edge of wheels locking up (nowadays, right on the edge of the abs kicking in) as soon as you get on the brakes. This is what's called threshold braking and it has several advantages
1) Brakes work better when cool. You want to do most of the hard braking before the brakes heat up and lose efficiency. If you partial brake, by the time you get to the end of the brake zone the brakes are hot and not nearly as effective.
2) Brakes wear less when cool. By threshold braking and reducing duration your brakes will last longer.
3) Threshold braking will give you an excellent feedback on the brake point. If you partial brake into the corner you'll always be using the whole brake zone no matter where you start. If you threshold brake you'll be able to see if you are braking too early and losing too much speed before the turn in point.
4) If threshold braking from correct brake point you should be reaching turn in speed as you reach turn in point, this means you should be slowly reducing the brake pressure as the turn in point approaches. This make it way easier to do proper trail braking as your brake pressure is already minimal by the time you arrive at the turn in point.

Regarding shifting, it's really just 3rd and 4th gear all around and 5th only on the front and back straight. There are no turns at VIR slow enough to require 2nd gear. Eventually you might top out 5th and need 6th, but probably not on street tires.

 

I'm braking less than I have from my first weekend. I'm still having issues on brake modulation. It's either on or off. I'm having issues on some of the technical turns like 14 into roller coaster for the double braking zone. When I got it right it felt really good and I was able to blaze through hogpen to the front straight.

Hopefully I am off the waiting list at summit point in 2 weeks.

 

Brake pedal should be more of a "squeeze" than "punch", and "lift" than "release".

Turn 14 brake zone is uphill after the dip. This provides tons of extra traction as your car is pushed into the hill. In most cars you can start the braking after the dip as the uphill section begins. The key is to do some braking uphill, lift at the crest and then do finally braking at the top before the right turn in. As you get more comfortable you'll realize that you can carry significant speed up the hill and do most of the braking after the crest. It's really just a quick speed reduction on the uphill, lift for the crest, than hard brake into 14A.

The hog pen is probably the most challenging part of the track, mostly because the DE line is so much different from the race line. The DE line is to stay right up to 16 with a brake zone, stay left up to 17 with a separate brake zone, then turn in for 17 apex and 17A apex. In reality 17A apex does not matter one bit, once you get past 17 you should be looking down the front straight and making sure you end up all the way to the left by the time you reach it, even if that means completely missing the apex of 17A. Also, as you progress you'll start to cut 16 so instead of two separate brake zones you have one straight brake zone diagonally across 16 to 17 with just a bit of braking before the crest (if necessary) and most of the braking done between apex of 16 and apex of 17.

 

I give the brake a firm tap at 16a and don't brake again until turn 1. Right after 16a I stay to the left And turn in hitting the compression point at 16b at full throttle in 4th, apexing 17 and coming out near the concrete to the left. They taught us there should barely be braking after 14 until you get back to 1. That's my 2nd favorite part of the track.