Complete newbie questions
Discussion
The way I had it explained to me was like this:
Your car has a finite amount of grip, at any time you want to use as much of it as possible, but where you distribute that grip between acceleration, braking and cornering will change as you go round the circuit.
So in a straight line you need to have your foot on the floor, only changing at the red line ( a bit dependent on your car and the torque curve of course.) Here you are using all your grip for acceleration and you are likely to be well within the grip level unless you have a seriously powerful car.
When you come to corner you need to allocate progressively more grip to the cornering and so the cornering speed will need to be slower than the straight line speed. At the very last moment you need to brake hard to achieve this, as hard as you can without locking the wheels. As you begin to corner you then need to allocate grip to the cornering so you need to come off the brakes. This 'releases' some of that grip for lateral traction. The reason you do this gently is to avoid upsetting the weight balance of the car, as if you come off too suddenly you will lose front end grip, which is the opposite of what you want of course. The more you add steering angle the less brake force you need to be applying and this in combination with the fact that the car is still slowing should keep you on the circuit.
Now the car is also going to continue slowing down through drag as you come off the brakes, but the aim is to reach the apex of the corner at a speed where 100% of your grip keeps the car from spinning or understeering depending on the setup. Then as you start to wind off steering angle you gradually come back on the power aiming to be on full throttle at least by the time your wheel is straight (and possibly sooner for lower powered cars.)
The only other issue changing gear. You change down in the braking zone before you begin to turn to avoid upsetting the car. The aim is to enter the corner in the correct gear so that the speed as you start to wind off lock and apply throttle puts your engine squarely in its power band. As the car will slow down a bit more after your last gear change this means you need to enter the corner slightly higher in the power band.
There's also of course the issue of the racing line vs the geometric line around of corner which can be very different. ie sometimes its better to go slower round a corner in order to be able to get on the power early before a long straight as that will have a bigger effect on the average speed for the whole complex.
That's what I was told anyway and it seems to make sense. Obviously there's a lot of nuance to do with individual cars, grip levels, downforce, engine mapping etc, but as a basic set of principles it doesn't seem bad.
Hope this is of help. Trackdays are brilliant fun aren't they what ever car you are in!
Your car has a finite amount of grip, at any time you want to use as much of it as possible, but where you distribute that grip between acceleration, braking and cornering will change as you go round the circuit.
So in a straight line you need to have your foot on the floor, only changing at the red line ( a bit dependent on your car and the torque curve of course.) Here you are using all your grip for acceleration and you are likely to be well within the grip level unless you have a seriously powerful car.
When you come to corner you need to allocate progressively more grip to the cornering and so the cornering speed will need to be slower than the straight line speed. At the very last moment you need to brake hard to achieve this, as hard as you can without locking the wheels. As you begin to corner you then need to allocate grip to the cornering so you need to come off the brakes. This 'releases' some of that grip for lateral traction. The reason you do this gently is to avoid upsetting the weight balance of the car, as if you come off too suddenly you will lose front end grip, which is the opposite of what you want of course. The more you add steering angle the less brake force you need to be applying and this in combination with the fact that the car is still slowing should keep you on the circuit.
Now the car is also going to continue slowing down through drag as you come off the brakes, but the aim is to reach the apex of the corner at a speed where 100% of your grip keeps the car from spinning or understeering depending on the setup. Then as you start to wind off steering angle you gradually come back on the power aiming to be on full throttle at least by the time your wheel is straight (and possibly sooner for lower powered cars.)
The only other issue changing gear. You change down in the braking zone before you begin to turn to avoid upsetting the car. The aim is to enter the corner in the correct gear so that the speed as you start to wind off lock and apply throttle puts your engine squarely in its power band. As the car will slow down a bit more after your last gear change this means you need to enter the corner slightly higher in the power band.
There's also of course the issue of the racing line vs the geometric line around of corner which can be very different. ie sometimes its better to go slower round a corner in order to be able to get on the power early before a long straight as that will have a bigger effect on the average speed for the whole complex.
That's what I was told anyway and it seems to make sense. Obviously there's a lot of nuance to do with individual cars, grip levels, downforce, engine mapping etc, but as a basic set of principles it doesn't seem bad.
Hope this is of help. Trackdays are brilliant fun aren't they what ever car you are in!
A couple of laps for you to be in absolute awe of the savage acceleration, monumental cornering and stupendous braking of 1391kg of Focus estate!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0KhIBFORU8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0KhIBFORU8
Bobberoo said:
Well I must say I had a great time, although I don't think I'll do another one this year, I may well go back and do Abingdon next year!!!
The people were great, lots of great advice from obviously much more seasoned drivers than myself, the tuition was excellent and Antony (the tutor) came and checked later in the day to see how I was getting on!!
I didn't embarrass myself and neither did Rio my Focus, the levels of grip and the amount of speed I found I could carry were amazing for what is basically a family estate car!!!
It was nice to meet and chat to Steve Campbell with his lovely Caterham, and Byker28i dropped in and managed to grab some excellent pics too!!!
]
Thanks for the words of encouragement chaps, much appreciated!!!
Good to see you and great to hear you enjoyed the session. It was a good day with not many red flags and as far as I could tell everyone was nicely behaved. Weather was very kind .....though a bit hot for us later in the afternoon with open top cars ! We really enjoyed it as well. Did I see the marshall's bring something back from the track that had dropped off the car near the end of the day ??The people were great, lots of great advice from obviously much more seasoned drivers than myself, the tuition was excellent and Antony (the tutor) came and checked later in the day to see how I was getting on!!
I didn't embarrass myself and neither did Rio my Focus, the levels of grip and the amount of speed I found I could carry were amazing for what is basically a family estate car!!!
It was nice to meet and chat to Steve Campbell with his lovely Caterham, and Byker28i dropped in and managed to grab some excellent pics too!!!
]
Thanks for the words of encouragement chaps, much appreciated!!!
Anyway, you have now scratched the itch of track days.....hope your 2nd is as fun as the first ! See you on track somewhere !
Steve Campbell said:
Bobberoo said:
Well I must say I had a great time, although I don't think I'll do another one this year, I may well go back and do Abingdon next year!!!
The people were great, lots of great advice from obviously much more seasoned drivers than myself, the tuition was excellent and Antony (the tutor) came and checked later in the day to see how I was getting on!!
I didn't embarrass myself and neither did Rio my Focus, the levels of grip and the amount of speed I found I could carry were amazing for what is basically a family estate car!!!
It was nice to meet and chat to Steve Campbell with his lovely Caterham, and Byker28i dropped in and managed to grab some excellent pics too!!!
]
Thanks for the words of encouragement chaps, much appreciated!!!
Good to see you and great to hear you enjoyed the session. It was a good day with not many red flags and as far as I could tell everyone was nicely behaved. Weather was very kind .....though a bit hot for us later in the afternoon with open top cars ! We really enjoyed it as well. Did I see the marshall's bring something back from the track that had dropped off the car near the end of the day ??The people were great, lots of great advice from obviously much more seasoned drivers than myself, the tuition was excellent and Antony (the tutor) came and checked later in the day to see how I was getting on!!
I didn't embarrass myself and neither did Rio my Focus, the levels of grip and the amount of speed I found I could carry were amazing for what is basically a family estate car!!!
It was nice to meet and chat to Steve Campbell with his lovely Caterham, and Byker28i dropped in and managed to grab some excellent pics too!!!
]
Thanks for the words of encouragement chaps, much appreciated!!!
Anyway, you have now scratched the itch of track days.....hope your 2nd is as fun as the first ! See you on track somewhere !
I kept clipping the cone at the complex at the start of the straight heading back towards the pits, only the last time I clipped it it was more of a full on hit it, which flipped it up and it wiped out the passenger side mirror!!!
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