was back out at buttonwillow yesterday on an almost empty track. tried pedal dance first. brake pedal felt exactly how i expected it. it always did what i expected and never did things i didn't. if i went to far and locked up a tire i felt the abs clear as day. and until i took it up to that level, it didn't do weird shit by itself. tried going back to see if i would be able to notice with just the 5-sec traction button and blew pretty much every turn-in because the brakes would basically give up when i started to brake hard. inconsistently. went back in after 2 laps and turned pedal dance back on... back to consistent behavior... amazing. thanks so much for your advice.

now i can only blame my poor skills! :)

You gonna make it to the next 86CUP at Buttonwillow in Sept? :thumbsup:

definitely!

btw, put a video together with really terrible telemetry. a 2:17, so... not good. virtual best was 2:15. the data is 1hz and the video data is interpolated so its often misleading, but... [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_0Ip_QQV0E"]buttonwillow 2:17 with telemetry - YouTube[/ame]

i know i need to be wide open from bus stop all the way through riverside to phil, but just haven't got it through to myself that more gas will be more stable for the rear. those bumps at the end of riverside can be scary if you're too unsettled when you hit them. i also think i need to get on the gas earlier in turn 16. and i think i should brake later and less for the last turn. and turn 2 in that video is all kinds of fucked.


and some mishaps
[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jo17zm4tF6U"]buttonwillow fuckups compilation - YouTube[/ame]

Looks to me like you are either not correcting at all (first few spins) or overcorrecting (them fishtailings). Probably work on feeling the car and being able to hold slip angle before worrying too much about lap time? Car control will improve times for sure, dont get too hung up on the line and braking and gassing points, as those change depending on conditions and car setup. My $0.02, im not very experienced either but Im just sharing what has worked out for me so far.

here's my perspective of each spin... please let me know how wrong i am :)

- the first spin i really was just completely distracted by the insane porsche that suddenly zoomed up on my ass (they said he did a 1:41)... really completely overcooked the corner... tried correcting but not nearly enough... i chopped the throttle which sealed the deal... really.... really dumb spin.

- after that, overcorrecting for sure. coming out of phil hill, and started to slide right when i turned in, thought i caught it but then it suddenly got worse after i hit the inside curb, and i again, chopped the throttle and it bit hard and snapped me. dumb. need better throttle control.

- after that i fishtailed after phil hill. i screwed up my turn-in and tried to correct the line last minute instead of just hitting the inside curb harder and the whole car got out of balance and then after trying to correct for the oversteer after the car yawed while it was unweighted over the crest, i overcorrected the steering and it bit and snapped, and then after that i'm not entirely sure what happened... i'm sure the throttle was all over the place because i was bouncing around. definitely terrible steering usage after the first snap in the fishtail.

- last session of the day going over the crest after turn 2 i tried to correct for the oversteer, but i let off the gas too much (im thinking right there in that gear i probably should have just kept it wot during that slide) and again snapped it... then it went down hill from there... i kept chopping the throttle after each fishtail just perpetuating the fishtail... at least the fishtail was getting smaller before i ran off.


most of the time i was able to correct for oversteer just fine... but those clips were me really blowing it. there was basically nobody else on track so i felt pretty comfortable going with larger steps on things... which i think helped get things better quicker...


what do you think? any recommendations on developing better feel for controlling the oversteer? just seat time?

@alex.s Have you considered getting coaching?

There's an open test day this Friday, and the GT4 I had booked for the day cancelled yesterday so I have an opening.

I really don't understand why inexperienced drivers are turning the nannies off. 2 Instructors from Skip Barber school have both told me to leave them on, and I do. The only time I turn them off is on AutoX course, and I did a skid pad the other day.

When I have instructor in car I will leave them on for first session of day, to learn the line on the track and then turn them off IF the instructor approves.

With no coach in the car I wouldn't even think about turning them off, I am far to inexperienced.

You need to take CSG Mike up on his offer of coaching, a good instructor in the car actually makes track days way more fun since you don't get in over your head as you have done

Best mod I've made was signing up a coach, and by far the most cost effective. I'm not fast yet but starting to see that I could be. Can't recommend taking this offer enough. :thumbup:

Also maybe not entirely slow now, either...

Thanks for you input. Right now I'm not trying to execute a perfectly clean tidy fast lap. I'm trying to learn how to control the car in extreme situations.

I think you cant learn to control the car when you aren't controlling the car... Ie. Letting the nannies save it for you.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

Pretty much what Alex said, you wont learn much (if any) regarding car control with the nannies on. You can learn about the race line but thats about it, and that line is bound to change depending on if you trail brake or not (and you should), and since trail braking is not possible with nannies on, you might as well not be doing much aside from getting used to the speed.

Well unfortunately in the Northeast we don't have run out areas like the ones in video. You do what Alex did at Palmer, or Watkins, Limerock, Thompson the list continues and you will have totaled your car into a tire wall or rock wall if its Palmer.
Maybe the 2017 cars are different, but nannies still allow you to learn the limits of the car and allows trail braking. I have only had it kick in a few times and each time I was happy it was there.

Both hpde instructors I've had encouraged me to turn it off as soon as I felt comfortable, and felt that the sooner the better.

The trend of leaving it on is for people, like others mentioned, who are really new to track days, we're talking about people who are 10s off the pace and still learning the very basics of awareness and manners and point bys and car control.

People start hpde with extremely different levels of skills, OP there has prior track time in motorcycles for instance. But I agree, a coach sitting shotgun will do wonders, I likely would have struggled to break the two minute mark around Laguna Seca without one, instead I was there on day one and consistent 1:55s +/- on my two return trips.

Funny, I also instructed for Skippy before they filed for Bankruptcy, and I advocate nannies off.

You are correct though; there's a time and place for when the nannies should be off, and being solo as a novice is not that time and place.

The more time you spend with the nannies on, the more you have to un-learn and re-learn when you transition to nannies off.

Remember, the Skippy cars are all no-nannies!

The nannies are more forgiving, but you still cannot approach the limit of the car with the nannies active.

You're correct in that driving the car home at the end of the day, intact, is always a win.