Attended Abu-Dhabi? What did you think of the V8 Chevy's ?

[Maxx]

I'm interested to hear from anyone who went to the Abu-Dhabi GP and saw the V8 race, especially the one on Sunday. I thought it was an awesome spectacle.

I should confess an interest as I am coaching a couple of drivers in that series and have been involved with it for a couple of years now.

These should not be confused with the more slightly powerul but MUCH more sophisticated V8s that race in Australia, there are brutes with little in the way of sophistication. The drivers, far from being learners are very experienced and succesful racers and the standard is quite high. Many of the racers racer in Europe and around the world in Porsches and many other hi-spec GT cars, there are ex WRC guys and many of the guys in the series have stayed with it for the last 2-3 years as it's such fun series.

To me race 2 was like the very last Touring Car (BTCC) of the season but on steroids, cars side-by-side drifting through corners, in some instances BOTH cars off track. I have some onboard from a recent test day. Both from one of my guys Raed Raffii, his first time in the new class a (LS6 engine) cars. The firsy some reasonable laps and the other following Saudi Drag/Drift Champ and Street Racer bad boy Abdul-Aziz Al Yaeesh who, having had the best from his tyres, decided to get some drift practice.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Vteus3dlE0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbIynIin31I

So, if you were there or saw it on local TV, what did you think of it?

Maxx

[Man-At-Arms]

Could have done without them TBH
Looked more like Vauxhall Vectras !!

But I was in the west stand when of them caught fire
didn't have the camera ready though ! Bugger

[Mattt]

To be honest, I enjoyed them more than the F1.

Tight racing, there was a battle for 3rd/4th IIRC that was brilliant.

It seemed utter carnage though, and they were making full use of the tarmac run-off areas - cutting corners etc (which I was surprised at as there seemed to be no action taken against them).

[huffysteve]

Raed did not look to impressed with the drifting

[Asterix]

We thought they were a hoot, great comedy - we were surprised that they let 4 year olds drive though...

[jellison]

Any details of the actual cars (someone said LS6 ooooO). Not sure why people get driver coaching though. Surely if you do, you know you don't really have the natural aptitude for it.

[Dan Friel]

Was great racing and probably the best of the weekend, if a little too dicey at times.

[Jungles]

jellison said:

Any details of the actual cars (someone said LS6 ooooO). Not sure why people get driver coaching though. Surely if you do, you know you don't really have the natural aptitude for it.

Lots of race drivers get driver coaching, even in F1. Majority of top rally drivers have been coached at some stage of their career too.

[jellison]

Jungles said:

jellison said:

Any details of the actual cars (someone said LS6 ooooO). Not sure why people get driver coaching though. Surely if you do, you know you don't really have the natural aptitude for it.

Lots of race drivers get driver coaching, even in F1. Majority of top rally drivers have been coached at some stage of their career too.

I doubt very much if Loeb, Kimi, Jenson, LH, Gronholm, Colin Mc, etc ever had any, you get my drift.

[Britcar David]

Tiger Woods has a golf coach and Roger Federer has a Tennis coach, why should motorsport be any differant?

[K50 DEL]

jellison said:

Jungles said:

jellison said:

Any details of the actual cars (someone said LS6 ooooO). Not sure why people get driver coaching though. Surely if you do, you know you don't really have the natural aptitude for it.

Lots of race drivers get driver coaching, even in F1. Majority of top rally drivers have been coached at some stage of their career too.

I doubt very much if Loeb, Kimi, Jenson, LH, Gronholm, Colin Mc, etc ever had any, you get my drift.

Can't speak for F1, but all the WRC drivers have coaches - in fact Hirvonen has extra tarmac coaching before each tarmac rally, (this year from Markko Martin) as do most of the scandahooligans and the Stobart boys use a guy called Rob Wilson for all their coaching.

Loeb's had extensive coaching on gravel and M-Sport have just retained Gronholm to be a coach for next year.

[Maxx]

Britcar David said:

Tiger Woods has a golf coach and Roger Federer has a Tennis coach, why should motorsport be any differant?

It isn't, but it's not so "obvious". All of the above named professional drivers have had and still have Driver Coaches, last count I think Lewis had 6, all for different aspects of his "job".

Do not confuse a driver coach with an instructor, clearly Lewis rarely has someone sit alongside him on circuit telling him where to brake, turn etc. BUT they do ALL have driving coaches that work on their driving skills, hang around Bruntingthorpe long enough and you will likely see Kimi & Co whizzing round in a Passat with Rob Wilson alongside.

Circuit & Driving Skills based instruction is still a big part of driver coaching but it encompasses many other areas. Examples are race strategy, not when to stop for fuel but what options you have at each corner for attack & defence. Data Analysis, specifically looking at driver performance, this is quite a big part of what I do but some coaches don't get involved with this at all. Video analysis and review, psychologiocal issues, fitness, nutrition, decision making. I could go on and on, I never sat in car once in Abu-Dhabi but was working pretty much flat out 12hrs a day, including a 5.5km track walk in 40C!!

Maxx

[Jungles]

jellison said:

Jungles said:

jellison said:

Any details of the actual cars (someone said LS6 ooooO). Not sure why people get driver coaching though. Surely if you do, you know you don't really have the natural aptitude for it.

Lots of race drivers get driver coaching, even in F1. Majority of top rally drivers have been coached at some stage of their career too.

I doubt very much if Loeb, Kimi, Jenson, LH, Gronholm, Colin Mc, etc ever had any, you get my drift.

Why not? Nico Rosberg received driving instruction from BMW during his time in Formula BMW, as did Vettel and Hulkenberg. John Pratt is the driver coach for Andy Priaulx. Jari Matti Latvala was a protege of Pentti Airikkala, who also taught Mikko Hirvonen, Richard Burns, and indeed, Colin McRae as well.

[Maxx]

Thanks for all your comments, both positive and negative. Most of the guys in the series are pretty good drivers, many competing and getting top 5 results in major european and world championships. The cars are brutes, yes, they have a tuned version of the LS6 engine, not sure on bhp figures but up around 450 I think with no traction control or ABS.

The cars were built by the series organisers and it is very much arrive and drive with the series machanics looking after the cars. Drivers do not alter the setup of the cars at all save for tyre pressures, the suspension is very basic with very little camber etc. They do have a sequential shifter but this is mated to a standard H-pattern mechanism. This is done to ensure a level playing field where driving and racing skill come to the fore.

The cars are Chevrolet Luminas, or Vauxhall Monaro VXR8s for us in the UK. They are not as sophisticated handling wise as your average club racecar and light years (in terms of handling) from their Aussie counterparts .. but they do have power, lots of it. The circuit didnt help with all it's sanitised run-offs, also the drivers had not driven the circuit AT ALL until qualifying so many were still learning the circuit during the race.

I watched the races on the circuit TV feed and thought it was excellent entertainment, good to have some actual overtaking and side-by-side racing happening.

Maxx

Edited by Maxx on Wednesday 4th November 15:04

[anonymous-user]

jellison said:

Any details of the actual cars (someone said LS6 ooooO). Not sure why people get driver coaching though. Surely if you do, you know you don't really have the natural aptitude for it.

I'm a big fan of driver coaching, I've spent days at MIRA on the wet handling course to improve my wet weather skills, plus time at Bruntinthorpe to work on the dry weather aspects and high speed handling techniques. It's really helpful to refresh your skills with a top coach, without realising it you can get into bad habits, my most recent one was not being patient enough with the throttle, by just 0.5s, so i wasn't exploiting the rear tyre slip angles as much as is possible. Without a good coach i probably wouldn't have picked up on that.

I was lucky enough to spend a week driving Pennti around on a WRC event a few years ago, and the things he used to do to teach the likes of Hirvonen how to drive around issues was really interesting. For example he used to stick a knife through the tyres sidewall and then get them to learn how to drive around the problem losing the least time, all skills that need to be developed in a rally environment. I know Rubens spent some time learning how to reduce understeer by initiating a very subtle Scandinavian flick, you can see some of the F1 drivers doing it if you know what to look for and after a race has run for a while you can see the rubber pattern showing the subtle arcs involved in doing this.

I personally wouldn't gain much from doing an on track style of coaching about lines etc, but you can always learn when it comes to limit handling techniques, i suggest if you have never attended a proper one on one coach, you try it, you may be surprised just how much you can learn. Having that kind of knowledge certainly helps me when I'm setting up a racecar with other drivers too, as i can understand what sort of questions to ask and can even help the drivers to change their technique to improve the laptimes without altering the car setup, that certainly is a bonus when you have more than one driver sharing a car during a race.

[Maxx]

johnfelstead said:

I personally wouldn't gain much from doing an on track style of coaching about lines etc.

Thats the thing though John, certainly in my case lines are maybe 10% of the process at most. Sure I can show you a better line on most corners but you need to understand why that line is better and it's only better if you are also doing the right things with the car at that time. Line is often a means to an end, you choose a line because for your car, thats the way to get the maximum out of the car. The line you take with a 400bhp Porsche is subtly different to the line you'd take with a 150bhp MX5 .. but only because that to use the potential of the car you need to be doing slightly different things with the pedals at different times.

If you dont marry the two together you dont get the benefit of the line. I do see the value in exercise based training and do some myself but if your learning to drive quicker on track you need to be on a track, driving quicker.

Anyway, thats enough secrets from me.

Someone did actually post some onboard footage from the race on Youtube : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecPbl2yB7ME

Maxx

[anonymous-user]

All i meant by that is I've enough experience of the circuits i drive to already know the lines or how to quickly work them out for a specific car or new venue, I've been driving on track for 16 years and before that was driving in rallies. I've done the odd sprint recently on courses made up on the day, one of the advantages i have because of experience is being able to quickly work out the required line. So for me driving technique coaching is of more value at this stage of my experience, I'm not saying on track line coaching is of no or limited value to others.