26 Reply by autoxmike (edited by autoxmike 2014-04-08 11:13 AM)

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

doctordel wrote:

Tire contact: locked up, IMO. Also, IMHO, driving on the far inside-where you are basically ignoring the racing line in order to occupy the space in the turn where a car following the racing line would otherwise be-in order to gain a position is not considered a clean pass if they have to either brake to avoid contact or change their line through the turn once they've entered it. I'm not saying that dive-bombing can't be done at all, but it takes a deft hand, the right car, and the right traffic conditions to pull it off successfully, repeatedly. The Hong Norrth hotshoes are uniquely skilled at the dive bomb inasmuch as they don't disrupt the other cars lines after they have taken a set. There are other exceptions to the 'avoid the dive bomb' rule of thumb but Mike et al are pretty darn good at it out east here.

Just ran across this thread.  Here is my approach to passing under braking:

1) DON"T USE IT ALL: AWLAYS leave some braking & turning ability on the table.  This lets you back out from the pass if need be.

2) BE THE OTHER DRIVER(S): Put yourself in the position of the driver(s) that you are passing.  You must leave them a reasonable "out" if they decide to LET you complete the pass. If the passee does not have an "out" then do not attempt the pass.

3) ASK FOR THE CORNER:  If you can't completely overtake them before their turn in, "ask" for the turn by poking your nose in while leaving yourself the ability to back out (see #1 above - Leave some braking & turning ability  on the table)

4) LOOK FOR THE ANSWER: Watch for a change in the attitude of the car being passed that indicates that other driver has given you the corner. This is almost always  subtle but very clear. 

5) BE DECISIVE: Once you get the answer (or not), be decisive. If the answer is no, back out of the pass. If the answer is yes - then take it and get it over with.

A properly executed "Dive Bomb" is anything but that. It is a well controlled, orchestrated maneuver where there is communciation between all drivers involved, and where the driver(s) being passed have priority and are actually in complete control of the situation.  To do this you must be very cognizant of the entire situation around you paying particularly close attention to the car(s) being passed, and you also must know the capabiliies of your car and know where you are on that capability curve at all times. One strength that IMHO our Hong Norrth drivers have is that we are all pretty accomplished autocrossers where you need to know where you are on the car's performance/capability curve at all times. That and we all have a buttload of seat time in our car. We discuss subjects like this all the time so that we all learn from each other. We also have a team culture where we encourage everyone to call each other out  when we see one of us driving in a sub-optimal way. We are pretty tough on each other but that is the most essential part of learning and getting better as drivers.

Mike
Hong Norrth
#39 TRON Gray/Orange MX-3, aka "Sumbich"

27 Reply by chaase (edited by chaase 2014-04-08 11:31 AM)

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

OttoMotif wrote:

Thanks for the input everyone. I agree it was driver error due to lockup - I was just looking for an excuse when I watched the video and saw no sterring input that would have caused it.  I guess I need to speak with our brake maintenance mechanic.

I didn't see anything to indicate contact. We run a Saturn too and the braking gets a little tricky once you are running faster and faster. The most disconcerting issue is the tendency for the rear to wander under heavy braking. At the end of a long straight, when you are really moving the ass end can get light and things can get hairy if you are not paying attention. It is especially bad if you are pointed down hill.

I had a incident at Loudon that I had no idea why the car lost it. The Schumacher Taxi guys were behind me and got some video and it looked like one of the rear brakes locked up on me. That is all I could see in the video. i wasn't even going that fast since I was in traffic with other cars.

As you get faster and faster with the Saturn, the rear becomes an issue. We are debating add some weight or even a wing to try to keep the rear planted more. We've already changed up the rear brake pad compound and it helped some but it can still get interesting.

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  • From: Wheaton IL
  • Registered: 2009-05-01
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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

Oh god my eyes!  This should be required reading for anybody to drive a car. Anywhere. Ever.  http://www.amazon.com/Going-Faster-Mast … ing+faster

You are only entitled to the space you occupy.

29 Reply by BoB

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

Trevor57 wrote:

Oh god my eyes!  This should be required reading for anybody to drive a car. Anywhere. Ever.  http://www.amazon.com/Going-Faster-Mast … ing+faster

You definitely need to read it before listening to what the internet says you should do to your suspension to make it fast.  Real easy to turn a twitchy under heavy braking into a lift oversteer problem.

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  • Registered: 2013-01-16
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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

You should have given yourself a black flag at 2:21 and went in.

idk your experience, but go do some track days with an instructor to learn racing lines. Other drivers will be more predictable to you once you know what they will "most likely" be doing around you. You are better off backing off and taking the line then you are jamming a corner 3 wide(like the tire wall part)

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

I agree with the discussion about aggressive driving. I will point out that compared with the car density on the track at NJMP last week, this was an open track day!

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

Raydoc wrote:

I agree with the discussion about aggressive driving. I will point out that compared with the car density on the track at NJMP last week, this was an open track day!

NJMP, 2.25 miles, 140 cars.
Sonoma, 2.37 miles, 170 cars.

Open track day?  Hardly..

bs

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

I thought NJMP had 160 cars registered?

NJMP-74'/car@160 cars
NJMP-85'/car@140 cars
Sonoma-74'/car

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

I watched you video. I don't think that I had a quarter of a lap with that few cars on it. You had sections of the video where you couldn't see the next car in the front window! You want to see stacked cars? Look at one of the old Stafford races.

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Re: Who pushed me into the tire stack?

Raydoc wrote:

I watched you video. I don't think that I had a quarter of a lap with that few cars on it. You had sections of the video where you couldn't see the next car in the front window! You want to see stacked cars? Look at one of the old Stafford races.

I was at all of the Stafford races.  Also a couple of NJ races, and all of the Sonoma races in the past year.  The last Stafford race was the most dense, I think 120 cars on a half mile course (.6 with the infield turns)?

As for Sonoma vs NJ, I think you need to factor in cars at the start, cars at any point during the race, and cars at the finish.  I honestly don't think the density is much different between the two.

Looking back at the two most recent races, I *think* there were 160 cars registered for NJ, and 140 at the start.  There were 170 cars registered for Sonoma (HQ limited it to 170, as prior races had 185 cars registered!), and I think I heard there were 153 or something close to that at the start.

So, 85' per car at NJ, 82' per car at Sonoma.  It's just noise, but unless most of those 140 cars stayed on the track most of the time at NJ, then Sonoma was marginally denser.  I heard there was a lot of attrition early.  Regardless, trust me, Sonoma was anything but an open track day.  Other than the first 10 minutes of the race, I do think that most people were pretty well behaved at Sonoma this time around, so it didn't seem like there were a ton of full course yellows during the times I was out there.

I think the number works out to something like 26' per car at the last Stafford race, so anybody who ever whines about too many cars on the track just needs to be reminded of that.  A friend of mine did the math before that race, and I think he figured that if every registered car made the start of that race, then the track wouldn't have been physically long enough to line them all up nose to tail.

bs