Total Car Control - Advanced Driving Course
Discussion
I've just spent 3 days with Ivan at Total Car Control in my Alpine A110 (2022 base model) last week which involved two days at Millbrook and a final day on the public road. If anyone is looking at seeing what their car can do in a safe environment with expert tuition and also raising the bar of their whole approach to driving and car control I fully recommend checking out TCC. I wanted to post here a few comments about the car and what I learned about the A110 during these days, specifically around driving modes and their effects.
The two days at Millbrook were basically damp to full wet and we also had a session on the wet steering pad so I got to really see how the car behaved with regards to traction in the different modes.
First, Sport mode (I never use 'normal' for any level of spirited driving). In Sport with a soaking wet surface you might think the Alpine's rear wheel drive/mid-engine/short wheelbase would be a handful unless you're careful with your throttle inputs. I expected similar but after trying at length to get the rear end of the car to play I can say that lots of throttle and a decent amount of steering lock simply results in understeer. The ESC basically kills the throttle in a safe/predictable manner which is good to know and file away. Even a Scandinavia flick with a boot full couldn't unstick the rear.
On the Millbrook handling circuit the car is lovely to balance as you can pivot the nose into a corner with a little bit of trail braking and power out knowing the systems are there to help if needed. Even in terrible weather conditions the amount of traction the car on Michelin PS4's can find is really impressive and even in my most comfortable 'swift' lap there's lots of performance still left in the chassis as demonstrated by Ivan.
So onto 'track' mode (ESC track). This was a surprise as I expected a lot more leniency in the traction control with visions of perfectly held drifts but ESC track really doesn't operate like that. Yes it will let the rear step out under power but it will quickly rein it in. This isn't an Alpine version of BMW's MDM mode where you can more or less dial in a drift angle. It still felt very safe and manageable but it does allow a lot more sensation of driving from the rear which I find much more fun and involving. You can play with small levels of slip angle knowing the systems will step in and kill anything severe. The downside is you have to deal with what can sometimes feel to be an unnecessary jolt when changing gear which Alpine felt the need to engineer into the system in track mode. It's a tiny issue though imho.
Finally with ESC off. Ok so now there's no guardrails at all. You can spin the rear wheels (and the car) easily. What this set-up highlighted for me was that the turbocharged engine's degree of throttle responsiveness and noticeable lag does add some challenge to catching and holding slides in the A110. I didn't feel I had a direct, uninterrupted connection between my right foot and the engine to really feel dialled into the cars behaviour. I found the band between bringing the slide under control and spinning it completely was pretty narrow. If anyone out there is drifting and power sliding their A110's easily Chris Harris style they're a much better driver than me and/or have picked up a lovely set of knackered rear tyres which I'm sure would help things a lot.
I also let Ivan have a go as I was interested in his feedback and his additional comments were that the car layout makes it very agile with a low polar moment of inertia so this is not the ideal car to use if you want to turn up and compete at drift competitions.
Lucky that's not my use case ;-) and my comments about lag really only spoil this one aspect and isn't something I'm ever concerned about on the road or even on a track day. As we all know on this forum it's a fantastic car and this course just highlighted it further as I got to tap into much deeper levels of performance than you ever should use on road.
Anyway hope that was of some interest and if you want to check out the courses further the website is https://www.total-car-control.co.uk/.
The two days at Millbrook were basically damp to full wet and we also had a session on the wet steering pad so I got to really see how the car behaved with regards to traction in the different modes.
First, Sport mode (I never use 'normal' for any level of spirited driving). In Sport with a soaking wet surface you might think the Alpine's rear wheel drive/mid-engine/short wheelbase would be a handful unless you're careful with your throttle inputs. I expected similar but after trying at length to get the rear end of the car to play I can say that lots of throttle and a decent amount of steering lock simply results in understeer. The ESC basically kills the throttle in a safe/predictable manner which is good to know and file away. Even a Scandinavia flick with a boot full couldn't unstick the rear.
On the Millbrook handling circuit the car is lovely to balance as you can pivot the nose into a corner with a little bit of trail braking and power out knowing the systems are there to help if needed. Even in terrible weather conditions the amount of traction the car on Michelin PS4's can find is really impressive and even in my most comfortable 'swift' lap there's lots of performance still left in the chassis as demonstrated by Ivan.
So onto 'track' mode (ESC track). This was a surprise as I expected a lot more leniency in the traction control with visions of perfectly held drifts but ESC track really doesn't operate like that. Yes it will let the rear step out under power but it will quickly rein it in. This isn't an Alpine version of BMW's MDM mode where you can more or less dial in a drift angle. It still felt very safe and manageable but it does allow a lot more sensation of driving from the rear which I find much more fun and involving. You can play with small levels of slip angle knowing the systems will step in and kill anything severe. The downside is you have to deal with what can sometimes feel to be an unnecessary jolt when changing gear which Alpine felt the need to engineer into the system in track mode. It's a tiny issue though imho.
Finally with ESC off. Ok so now there's no guardrails at all. You can spin the rear wheels (and the car) easily. What this set-up highlighted for me was that the turbocharged engine's degree of throttle responsiveness and noticeable lag does add some challenge to catching and holding slides in the A110. I didn't feel I had a direct, uninterrupted connection between my right foot and the engine to really feel dialled into the cars behaviour. I found the band between bringing the slide under control and spinning it completely was pretty narrow. If anyone out there is drifting and power sliding their A110's easily Chris Harris style they're a much better driver than me and/or have picked up a lovely set of knackered rear tyres which I'm sure would help things a lot.
I also let Ivan have a go as I was interested in his feedback and his additional comments were that the car layout makes it very agile with a low polar moment of inertia so this is not the ideal car to use if you want to turn up and compete at drift competitions.
Lucky that's not my use case ;-) and my comments about lag really only spoil this one aspect and isn't something I'm ever concerned about on the road or even on a track day. As we all know on this forum it's a fantastic car and this course just highlighted it further as I got to tap into much deeper levels of performance than you ever should use on road.
Anyway hope that was of some interest and if you want to check out the courses further the website is https://www.total-car-control.co.uk/.
jont- said:
Nice review. What sort of geo have you got? I found the factory geo very understeery, but having had it adjusted by Spires it's a lot more balanced now.
Yeah I've got geo done by Spires as well as Life 110 springs and a few other bits. Agreed the geo makes a big diff and I wouldn't call the car understeery at all now. The conditions I was playing in were pretty extreme and it's was more a reflection on how the cars systems really make it quite difficult to provoke the rear unless you're really trying.Really interesting write-up - thanks for sharing.
Only had our 2022 'S' since December so not had much chance to play with it but have got the geo sorted. It came with the Cup 2 tyres and it had no problem going sideways at every opportunity in the cold & wet weather. Now on CS7's as recommended on here and it's much more civilised (and predictable!).
Only had our 2022 'S' since December so not had much chance to play with it but have got the geo sorted. It came with the Cup 2 tyres and it had no problem going sideways at every opportunity in the cold & wet weather. Now on CS7's as recommended on here and it's much more civilised (and predictable!).
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