Why does track driving make simple instructions so hard to follow?

Story by Terry Thomas, photos as credited

Those of us who attend driver education events often hear the same mantra over and over. Instructors, those brave souls who jump into the right seat to help us become better drivers, must spend entire days repeating it through clenched teeth: “Look ahead! Be smooth!”

Sounds simple, right? And while we can all …

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God cramit, I've been doing it backwards for years!

I don't know if it's the exposure, the image compression, or my monitor, but that Firehawk is showing up in a perfectly stunning shade of magenta.

Trackmouse wrote: God cramit, I've been doing it backwards for years!

Look smooth, be ahead?

I can't say being ahead in a race is bad.....

Duke wrote: I don't know if it's the exposure, the image compression, or my monitor, but that Firehawk is showing up in a perfectly *stunning* shade of magenta.

Mine too. Maybe it's got blue tinted clear?

In reply to snailmont5oh :

2 coats of oversaturation.

holmesbr wrote: In reply to snailmont5oh : 2 coats of oversaturation.

I was thinking it's simply a clear blue sky being reflected off the red paint...

KyAllroad wrote:

Trackmouse wrote: God cramit, I've been doing it backwards for years!

Look smooth, be ahead? I can't say being ahead in a race is bad.....

Ha, if only!

Back in about 1988 I went to Spenard's racing school. One thing they did was assess the driving position the driver wanted to use. They told me I was sitting way too far back, forcing the big muscles in the upper arms, shoulders and back to do the work. They had me move much closer to the wheel so that my arms were significantly bent at the elbows. Now I am using the finer muscles. What a difference that made, instant improvement in smoothness and lap times. That change in seating position made more difference than anything else.

WildScotsRacing said:

holmesbr wrote: In reply to snailmont5oh : 2 coats of oversaturation.

I was thinking it's simply a clear blue sky being reflected off the red paint...

It's a little that, but I suspect some people have either crappy monitors or they are seriously in need of calibration. Or both. 

Students are allowed to drive too fast.  There are many new terms to learn and apply. (track left, throttle etc).  The line: which essentially is "where to be on the track, when should you be there and what direction should your car be oriented". That is 100 data points to remember.  Then there is driving which essentially is: "what to do when I am on the correct place on the track at the correct time".  IE: what gear, brake start, turn in etc.  Thats another 200 data points to remember.  Summary:  students are driving too fast.  

Sterling Moss said place your wrist across the top of the wheel without lifting your shoulder from the seat back. There are two schools of thought on this, seems the prevelant one is "What do old people know about NOW!" The other is "Wow! That guy won a lot of races in many different kinds of cars and I want to be like him!"

"You pay yer Quarter and you takes your chances!"

Bluebayou22 said:

Students are allowed to drive too fast.  There are many new terms to learn and apply. (track left, throttle etc).  The line: which essentially is "where to be on the track, when should you be there and what direction should your car be oriented". That is 100 data points to remember.  Then there is driving which essentially is: "what to do when I am on the correct place on the track at the correct time".  IE: what gear, brake start, turn in etc.  Thats another 200 data points to remember.  Summary:  students are driving too fast.  

Good instructors reduce the number of points from 200 to a manageable numbering (depending on the student). This weekend, there were some students being told to stick to 4th for the full session to remove shifting and focus on driving. There were also various stages of how closely the students were allowed to get to the limit, slowing down inputs and freeing up bandwidth. 

Mistakes happen, for sure, but I've been happy with the instruction I've received and witnessed (for the most part). I've witnessed some students do some strange things, and I have no idea what was exchanged between them and their instructors that lead to those mistakes (or then followed them). 

In reply to Bluebayou22 :

Completely agree. Many DE students seem to want to do all their sessions at the highest possible speed their personality and soft skills will allow for, instead of lowering the pace, getting comfortable, and improving the hard skills that naturally command higher speeds.

i was an in-car instructor for 15 years and classroom instructor for 5 in the BMW Club HPDE program.  2 teachers and I volunteered to develop a formal curriculum for the school.  we came up with about 20 Skills and 4 levels for each....which Instructors could use to more objectively guide and score the students.  It also gave the students a goal or vision of our expectations for each level.

Instructors would typically work on only ONE skill in each session with the lower groups...maybe even the whole weekend (typically for double clutch/heel-toe/left-foot braking).  A Group students would then be ready to hear about whatever had room for improvement at any given moment.

We expected most students to need 10 weekends to "graduate", if they were doing at least 3 weekends a year;  use it or lose it applies if there are long gaps between school weekends.

=====

and....as for testosterone....I demonstrated some testicle clamps each day, noting that our instructors would use them if they needed to reduce the flow of testosterone at any time.  interestingly, I never had a female student that I thought would benefit from them.

I think there should be a distinction between "hard to follow" and "hard to execute."

AhBNormal said:

Sterling Moss said place your wrist across the top of the wheel without lifting your shoulder from the seat back. There are two schools of thought on this, seems the prevelant one is "What do old people know about NOW!" The other is "Wow! That guy won a lot of races in many different kinds of cars and I want to be like him!"

"You pay yer Quarter and you takes your chances!"

I was always told, and feel most comfortable with, elbows at 90 degrees when holding the wheel naturally.

As it turns out, this leads to an outstretched arm on top of the wheel resting on the wrist.

Ride a bicycle straight. to keep it on the fog line you have to look far ahead. Good transfere from car racing to bike racing, I found myself shifting gears on the bike way more than my competors did. Get the feeling of the rear wheel stepping out in the rain.

Nothing helped to understand "slow down to go faster" than the first time driving on a wet track.  I slowed down and got smooth, somehow didn't give up much time but gained a lot when applied to a dry track.