sure...and I will leave it that as usual you can't back up what you say about me...

for example...show me my nanny gizmo post...which ignited your rant....you made a mistake and won't admit it.

BTW...have you ever tracked a car...I'm interested since you might, I said might, seem to think that HP is all there is to running on a track.

I don't have the talent to outrun a 991 with a decent driver in my 997. But I will try like hell to when given a chance. Thats the fun part. Honing skills and getting the most out of my car I have. At a DE thats all you can ask.

 

I know what you are saying, but I think in this case it was safer to move me. In the beginner group, I was coming up on everyone way too fast, and I had to do a lot of passing, which is probably the most dangerous part. In the advanced group, I only lapped one person, and I got passed only once (after the guy caught me because I had to slow down to pass the guy I caught). As you saw in the last video, I was really able to focus on the driving, and my lines got better and faster. I also learned a lot watching the line of the driver that passed me. He showed me that I was turning in a little too early, and that was something I had to watch from behind, and I never would have picked up regardless of how much my instructor would have tried to describe it verbally (maybe I will post that part of the video too). Maybe I'm wrong, but with the level of drivers and cars present on Saturday, I think that moving me up was a good thing.

 

Thanks for the post and videos - what a great day of fun. Can't wait to track my 991S.

 

One point to keep in mind in advancing thru run groups is that it's not really an issue on how fast one drives. It has more to do with track awareness when stuff is happening around you quickly.

 

^^^What he said^^^

Safer? Maybe for that event, but down the road, not so much. Part of being an advanced driver is dealing with traffic. If your eyes are far ahead where they should be, it's not dangerous coming up on slower cars, because you see them early. Especially on a flat track like that one. I've been there, but on much more difficult tracks to see ahead of you. Advanced drivers have to do the same thing you were doing in the beginner group. There are plenty of slow cars in advanced groups too. And at some point there will be cars faster than you as well, maybe lots of them.

I do agree that working on your lines will be far better in a faster group, but it's not only your lines that you need practice with. It's the other scenarios, what to do with a car on your tail that doesn't want to wait for a point by, or when a car spins right in front of you and judging which way it will exit the track so you can avoid it, or correcting sudden oversteer, trail braking or threshold braking or open passing where you have to give a point by in the corner, taking turns OFF line. All of these things should be second nature to you (you shouldn't still be focusing much mental attention on apexes) so that when the unexpected happens (a car dumps fluid right in front of you), your mind isn't consumed with the basics. And certainly not with an instructor still giving almost turn by turn instructions.

Until you can do several sessions without an instructor having anything at all to say and making your apexes with ease lap after lap after lap, you should not be in the advanced group, just my opinion. Has nothing to do with your skill level, but more so your experience. And this is not for just you, it's for the guys out there with you that assume that you know this when you get out there.

That last set should have taken place in the intermediate group. Not putting you at the head of the fast group, that makes no sense to me whatsoever.

 

Exactly. I can see from the video that OP has the typical tunnel vision we all had to overcome. You can see it in how he can't seem to link up the long sweeping corners where the clipping point is blind upon corner entry. And like you mentioned, Advanced drivers can see that they are coming up on slower cars well in advance and adjust accordingly, planning what corner/straight they will overtake them.

I hate organizations that allow people to move up quickly because you get guys that don't have nearly enough experience get in trouble because they haven't seen enough things at slower speeds (sliding, spinning, etc, both themselves and others on the track), so when it happens to them at the faster sessions, they end up in serious trouble.

OP, I guarantee that you are not doing yourself any favors by moving up quickly. Take my advice and practice getting the line right first at a slower pace before gradually moving up in speed.

 

Miller is a ***** to learn. Since it's devoid of landmarks and no trees, it's hard for your brain to remember what turn is what, right?

 

Looks like you had fun!

 

Kind of. Since it was only the West track, I only had to learn 10 turns, but 5, 6, and 7 in particular are tricky. I looked at the map the night before, and thought I knew it, but my first session was a complete disaster. I couldn't remember where I was and those turns were killing me. Went into the classroom and they talked about how 5 opens up, so you can accelerate more than you think. 6 is a decreasing radius turn, and you have to stay wide forever before turning in for the apex. 7 is a triple apex, somewhat blind, and you have to ignore the middle apex. Once I heard and processes all that, I did much better.

As far as going to the advanced group, I know understand what you guys are talking about. Those were great posts. Hopefully, at least the tunnel vision part, wasn't as bad for me as for most, thanks to my mountain bike and road cycling experience, both of which also require that you look ahead.

 

<cue in real american hero intro>

 

+1.

My friend was an amazingly quick rider. He was progressing much faster than me given same amount of racetrack time. We ended up at about same lap times, I just got there slower. He is dead now and I miss him.

Experience is one thing you can’t get for nothing. (Oscar Wilde).

 

When racing, learning never ends. There is always another thing. As I said, you did great, car did a lot for you, but remember don't get coc*y. You cycling, mountain biking and such has nothing to do with it. Once you get faster (and your outing was quite comfortable at this stage) that's when things start to happen, always something...

As Mario Andretti said; “If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough”.

 

My view is that the faster you go, the more you need to be thinking about what could go wrong and be ready to deal with it. If you're not truly ready, slow down and just focus on technique. A healthy measure of fear should always be there - too many people have died in high-speed car crashes.

Also, studies have shown that in many fields (sports, music, etc.), about 10,000 hours of deliberate practice are needed to attain an expert level of skill (http://www.psy.fsu.edu/faculty/erics....exp.perf.html). I don't know how accurately that applies to performance driving and racing, but it's something to think about for people who expect or want to get good quickly.

 

Great advice guys! Thank you!