Cost of track days

[Chris Hinds]

I've often though about doing a track day but having never been very up on circuit driving, I don't really want to invest in a car for the track until I know it's "for me". Has anyone hired a Caterham or a Boxster from some of the companies like Want2Race/SWRacing/BossRacing etc? Looks like £500-£1000 depending on if you want a full or a half day... which seems not that much different to getting someone and fitting it out...

[Munter]

Chris Hinds said:

I've often though about doing a track day but having never been very up on circuit driving, I don't really want to invest in a car for the track until I know it's "for me". Has anyone hired a Caterham or a Boxster from some of the companies like Want2Race/SWRacing/BossRacing etc? Looks like £500-£1000 depending on if you want a full or a half day... which seems not that much different to getting someone and fitting it out...

I've not done it. But I'm pretty convinced if you just want to do one or two days a year, perhaps don't have lots of spare parking at home. Hiring makes sense.

If you want to tinker and upgrade etc, obviously you have to have a car. But those of us who just want to thash a car about for a day and find our level of ability, hiring is looking attractive.

[ecain63]

Speak to Dave Woodall of opentrack. He has a hire Caterham as well as access to other cars.

[E-bmw]

My man maths just wouldn't work at all if I justified as some are above.

I exclude the headline costs of the car and initial upgrades, as would have done that TD or not, car is a fairly heavily modified R53 with 235 bhp.

Brake pads £300
2nd hand T/D tyres £200
and I will get a full year of driving & 6 TDs out of that

Petrol £100/day
Entry £150

So with servicing I am around £500/day

As I am advancing in years at some point soon I am expecting to become sensible & sell the car & rent for just a few days a year.

[QBee]

ecain63 said:

Speak to Dave Woodall of opentrack. He has a hire Caterham as well as access to other cars.

Find a like minded friend to share the car with you - I find that drive a max of 3 hours on total on a track day, so a shared car, 20 minutes each, makes for a fun day at a more reasonable price. And if your stomach will take it, you can always passenger when not driving.

You can get 2 way intercoms for very little money if you want to talk to each other while on track and in the car together.

Bookatrack.com is the name that comes to mind, and they are based at Donington IIRC

[Camoradi]

V6todayEVmanana said:

Camoradi said:

I'd never really considered the full cost of a trackday, but mine is something like...
On track fuel -£60
Oil £60 / 6 days = £10
Tyres - £500 / 15 track days = £35
Other fluids and consumables (pads etc) circa £20

Wow, the tyres on a Caterham survive 15 track days? Or am I reading it wrong.
My GTV (heavy v6 at the front) maybe survives 2 or 3 full days

Curiously, do you drive the Caterham for trips or weekend "chores" too?

I actually did get 15 days out of a set of Avon zzs tyres. I can rotate front to rear and also do about an equal amount of clockwise and counterclockwise circuits. Having a measly 130 bhp on tap helps too! I don't use it at all on the road the last few years, and invested in a decent trailer to haul it around....

[jm doc]

QBee said:

ecain63 said:

Speak to Dave Woodall of opentrack. He has a hire Caterham as well as access to other cars.

Find a like minded friend to share the car with you - I find that drive a max of 3 hours on total on a track day, so a shared car, 20 minutes each, makes for a fun day at a more reasonable price. And if your stomach will take it, you can always passenger when not driving.

You can get 2 way intercoms for very little money if you want to talk to each other while on track and in the car together.

Bookatrack.com is the name that comes to mind, and they are based at Donington IIRC

Bookatrack have been taken over by W2R and they use Ginetta's for hire. They are really well organised and look after you and will provide free tuition, I would highly recommend them. I agree that it's best to share a car, makes the cost much more reasonable and if you're inexperienced you will get more than enough driving that way

[Shrimpvende]

I'm a bit late to the party but can shed a bit of light as I've just done my first track day in my Clio Trophy, which was bought mainly with track days in mind.

I've done track stuff previously but never in my own car. On top of buying the car, I bought/did the following to set me up. I guess these costs will be spread over how many track days I do. My track wheels are Speedline 2118's, they're quite heavy but designed for motorsport and really strong.

- Dedicated set of 15" wheels and Michelin PS3 tyres (fantastic) - £700 lightly used from facebook Clio 182 group
- OMP full face helmet - £75
- Puma speedcat shoes - £75ish

My car was already fairly ready for track stuff already being polybushed with some light engine mods, nearly new DS2500 pads and grooved discs. I booked it into a specialist to do the following the week before:

- Brake fluid flush for performance stuff
- Coolant flush
- Geo setup

This came to about £160 including the fluids. Really lucky I did this as they found one of the clips on a coolant hose was loose, which could have spelled the end of my day out on track. I'd already done an oil change myself using a service kit from Renault Parts Direct for about £35.

Donington was really wet on Friday so the wear on tyres was low and the pads didn't see much wear either. I'd also make sure that you have a decent jack and axle stands, breaker bar, torque wrench and tyre inflator. I got a little greedy on soaked Craner curves and managed to just nudge it into the gravel, that stuff gets everywhere so we had to get the car in the air and undertray off to even begin to clear it out!

Clio's are mega fun, when it was pouring down we were probably the fastest thing on track, the caterfields and RWD saloon's were really struggling for grip. PS3 tyres are great in the wet or dry, and in 15" Clio size are only about £65 a corner. I reckon I'll easily get another 2-4 days without having to change anything now, so roughly £100 on consumables per day?

[pingu393]

Having done two track days in my M Roadster, if I were to do another, it would be in something light, crap and disposible.

My enjoyment was trying to control the car on the limits of adhesion ("anyone can go fast in a straight line" scenario).

You go a lot further when you lose it at 60 than you do at 55 .

[ecain63]

pingu393 said:

You go a lot further when you lose it at 60 than you do at 55 .

Years old? Or mph?

[mmm-five]

pingu393 said:

Having done two track days in my M Roadster, if I were to do another, it would be in something light, crap and disposible.

My enjoyment was trying to control the car on the limits of adhesion ("anyone can go fast in a straight line" scenario).

You go a lot further when you lose it at 60 than you do at 55 .

You really don't want to see how far you got at 100mph+ through Island (Oulton) or Folly (Combe) or Schwedenkreuz (Nordschliefe) then

[pingu393]

ecain63 said:

pingu393 said:

You go a lot further when you lose it at 60 than you do at 55 .

Years old? Or mph?

Either

[nickfrog]

Shrimpvende said:

I PS3 tyres are great in the wet or dry, and in 15" Clio size are only about £65 a corner.

Your approach is very sound and your post very insightful, thanks. I have been toying with the idea of a dedicated Clio 197/200 for years and might eventually do that.

I am sure the PS3 are OK in the wet but I am also pretty sure that as your skills and apex speed improve you will melt them in 2/3 hot laps even on a mild dry day. Consider some kind of semi like 888 or AD08 or NS2r, they're only very cheap too in that size.

[xjay1337]

m135i here

Average day costs around 200 quid
Sometimes a hotel around 75 quid.

As for tyres and brakes, they last forever with correctly set up alignment and driving style. I did like 5 or 6 trackdays on one set of PS4 and also 12k or so road miles and still had some tread left.

As for brakes. I use RS29 and they last for ages. I'd say 10 to 11 full days plus the road miles in between.

[pingu393]

nickfrog said:

Shrimpvende said:

I PS3 tyres are great in the wet or dry, and in 15" Clio size are only about £65 a corner.

Your approach is very sound and your post very insightful, thanks. I have been toying with the idea of a dedicated Clio 197/200 for years and might eventually do that.

I am sure the PS3 are OK in the wet but I am also pretty sure that as your skills and apex speed improve you will melt them in 2/3 hot laps even on a mild dry day. Consider some kind of semi like 888 or AD08 or NS2r, they're only very cheap too in that size.

Showing my ignorance here, but I would expect tyre wear to lessen as you improved. I'd expect it to increase if your confidence grew, but your skill didn't.

[nickfrog]

pingu393 said:

Showing my ignorance here, but I would expect tyre wear to lessen as you improved. I'd expect it to increase if your confidence grew, but your skill didn't.

Yes sure as you get smoother you should mitigate wear but probably not by as much as the amount of added wear due to the significantly higher apex load/heat/speed that experience typically brings after the guy's first track day in his own car.

Edited by nickfrog on Monday 31st August 11:08

[xjay1337]

nickfrog said:

pingu393 said:

Showing my ignorance here, but I would expect tyre wear to lessen as you improved. I'd expect it to increase if your confidence grew, but your skill didn't.

Yes sure as you get smoother you should mitigate wear but probably not by as much as the amount of added wear due to the significantly higher apex load/heat/speed that experience typically brings after the guy's first track day in his own car.

Edited by nickfrog on Monday 31st August 11:08

The main thing that wears tyres I've found is excessive slip IE pushing through understeer etc.

[pingu393]

xjay1337 said:

nickfrog said:

pingu393 said:

Showing my ignorance here, but I would expect tyre wear to lessen as you improved. I'd expect it to increase if your confidence grew, but your skill didn't.

Yes sure as you get smoother you should mitigate wear but probably not by as much as the amount of added wear due to the significantly higher apex load/heat/speed that experience typically brings after the guy's first track day in his own car.

Edited by nickfrog on Monday 31st August 11:08

The main thing that wears tyres I've found is excessive slip IE pushing through understeer etc.

Both are exactly how I thought it would be. It's nice to hear that practice matches theory for once .

[Kent Border Kenny]

I took my R8 to Brands at the start of the year, thrashed it all day long, and reckon it used about £100 of petrol and about 1/5 of a set of tyres, so about £300 plus £150 for the day itself.

Nothing broke or has needed replacing, so I’ll happily write down the other costs as zero.

[nickfrog]

xjay1337 said:

The main thing that wears tyres I've found is excessive slip IE pushing through understeer etc.

The two main things that wear road tyres on track is overheating them above their (low) optimum temp range (which indeed can lead to too much slip which compounds the issue, pun intended) and how soft a road carcass is which leads to outer wear at the front, although neither are often an issue on a first track day. The huge majority of people on track days who want a step up and longer stints use semis for more thermal stability (typically a 8-10 lap plateau), hence my recommendation when I read about the PS3 which was a touring tyre that was even less "sporty" than a PS2.
Semis both offer a stiffer carcass and a more resilient compound at higher temps for longer and switching changes the experience significantly and also removes the need for too much camber, which is not always desirable for road use.