racing slicks and gravel

My first autocross (in my car, not the borrowed s2000) was exciting to say the least.

Two blown fuses cost me a run. The car goes like hell, transitioning from straight to turn is all kinds of crap my pants scary. Once it's turning, it has lots of grip.

What KILLED me was my braking. In the front I was running one of the free sets of hoosier slicks I got with the car, (eventually I'll put on the general 595's, but I have to do a little grinding to get them not to rub). The day was hot, and there was already lots of loose gravel on the parking lot. As the day got hotter, we were actually pulling lots of rocks out of the asphalt. When I stopped at the end of a run the hoosiers would be coated almost solid with loose gravel. Is this normal? Anytime I tried to brake the front would just start sliding. One time I had to observers say it looked like a little mini wave of rocks riding the front of my tires. I don't know if this is what caused my braking problems, or if this is just going to be how it is with a car that has almost no weight on the front tires. I knew it would have issues, and I need to work with the drums in the rear to get them better, but this was SO BAD I don't know how to diagnose it.

Crappy sites with old asphalt are always a problem with really sticky tires. I've come off course with the tires white from all the pick up. Standard clean up is pulling pebbles out of the air cleaner, top of the engine and every other flat spot under the car. It's especially fun when the rocks get pitched up into the front disks. It makes such a lovely screeching noise. Like fingers on a chalk board, just twice as loud.

If you have no weight on the front of the car, you are going to have to do most of your braking with the rears. If they aren't up to the challenge...well, that wouldn't be fun.

Brake sooner. It's hard to learn. Especially with a car that gets to the next corner before your brain does. Also, don't get off the line everyone else is driving, even if you think it's the wrong line. Sandy lots, you almost have to stay on the clean pavement and out of the marbles.

I've seen a lot of guys running A6's on hot days have a dedicated pair of gloves to clean off the tires after each run. Spraying them down with water to cool them a bit isn't uncommon either. But it's not just slicks - on hot days even Star Specs would pick up debris.

The best tool for getting rocks off the tires is a curry comb intended for horses:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000HHODD6/

As for gravel -- the site I usually run on is concrete that's in good shape, but locally we have a couple of sites that are badly degrading asphalt. I've been told that there's really no advantage to running super sticky slicks on those kinds of sites, and that street tires actually work better. I dunno, I avoid those sites. :)

On the concrete site the tires come off the run almost clean, then pick up a huge pile of rocks driving through the paddock (asphalt) and over to the trailer.

Typical for old asphalt lots. Our autocross this past weekend was on a rarely used lot at the Kentucky fair and expo center, and it was similar to what you described. My RS-3s were picking up rocks and the guys on HoHos were picking up shovel fulls. Consequently, street tire cars dominated the event.

Once you get to use those tires on a clean lot, be prepared to poop your pants.

http://sth2.com/rocksoff/