Mental/Physical Preparation Before A Run Stuart R. submitted a comment that he claps his hands together before each run to increase his tactile sensitivity. I replied that this was great and that I also have a routine I do before each run. It just takes a few seconds once you learn it. Feel free to throw in some hand clapping! This may seem a little silly. That’s OK. It’s just what I do based upon what I’ve learned in the various athletic-type competitions, namely wrestling and internal and external martial arts throughout my life, as applied to autocross driving competition. I suggest you try ..read more

Key Driving Skills I think there are several basic driving skills that the novice should begin developing during the first year of autocross. Develop a steering method that maximizes feel and control while limiting hand repositioning Learn to put weight on the front tires prior to turning Learn to add throttle in coordination with opening the steering wheel Learn to trail-brake Learn basic line theory Developing a steering method We wish to develop a method that maximizes feel and control and limits hand repositioning to the a minimum. In the end (and also in the middle, as well as in the be ..read more

Frequently when we see great performers doing what they do, it strikes us that they’ve practiced for so long, and done it so many times, they can just do it automatically, But in fact, what they have achieved is the ability to avoid doing it automatically. When we learn to do anything new-how to drive, for example-we go through three stages. The first stage demands a lot of attention as we try out the controls, learn the rules of driving, and so on. In the second stage we begin to coordinate our knowledge, linking movements together and more fluidly combining our actions with our knowledge of ..read more

A friend of mine went to a Test & Tune event recently and used the opportunity to experiment with his shock absorber settings. He’d been running them full stiff in competition. He decided to start the day full soft and work his way stiffer. At full soft the car became very loose with dramatic oversteer on corner entry. The oversteer/understeer balance gradually changed as he stiffened the shocks. He was working all four corners together, simultaneously making the “same” change to each shock. He asked me this question: “How does [adjusting] damping change a car balance like this?” Here’s my ..read more

One of the novice passengers I took last weekend (I was a novice coach) remarked on how much grip the car had. He said, “Wow, you’ve got good tires!” I answered “Yes, I have good tires.” What I might have told him, if it had been a more appropriate time and place, is that the grip a car produces and that you feel from the passenger seat is the result of a host of factors, not just the tire itself. So, I started thinking about it and came up with the following ‘grip ingredients’ list. The first five are well-known. The last one is not given enough attention, I don’t think. Tire type. Yes, you ..read more

The year did not start well. First thing I did was to put Silver Ghost into a ditch at a wet Test & Tune. That was in February and caused me to miss the Red Hills tour. I had done the single-course Pro at The Firm in January, though with quite poor results and not yet on Penske shocks. I disliked the course immensely. The design used the edge of the pavement, effectively, as a wall of cones which it directed you straight toward. Except that the penalty for “hitting” a cone in the wall was an off-course spin in the dirt. The percentage of DNF runs was incredibly high. I’d never seen multipl ..read more

I trailered Silver Ghost down to Moultrie, GA, for Axis vs. Allies,, the final National Tour event of 2022. No co-driver. B-Street ran first group in the cool, dry morning of Day One. A Misty Day One Morning at Spence Field, near Moultrie, GA With first runs complete I found myself with a scratch time leading the overwhelming favorites DiSimo and Ruggles, co-driving an M2, by over 2 seconds. Had I turned into Verstappen since the last event? Nope. The M2 had split the turbo charge pipe. Second time I’ve seen that happen at a Tour event. With their M2 out of the competition, I invited Ruggles t ..read more

I’ve followed Super-Stock and then A-Street closely over the years. While I’ve never owned an A-Street car, I have co-driven in the class on occasion. A-Street and it’s predecessor Super-Stock have been two of our premier classes with interesting cars, compelling marque competition and they always draw top driving talent. Charles Krampert, 2021 A-Street National Champion, in his C6Z06 (Photo by Chris Morey) A-Street class has been dominated in recent years by the sixth-generation Corvette Z06 model (C6Z06), so much that people newer to the sport may think this is the way it’s always been. Prom ..read more

In the span of two seasons I scored co-drives in several Boxsters and Caymans at local autocross events. I was in between nationally competitive cars, the last being a 1989 944 in E-Street, and wanted to find out if a mid-engined Porsche might be my next autocross tool. In the end, as many of you already know, I bought a 6th generation Corvette after it was moved down from A-Street to B-Street. The five cars, in the order I drove them, were a 2008 Cayman, a 2005 Boxster, a 2008 Cayman S, a 2011 Cayman and a 2019 Cayman GTS. The relevant specs are: -2008 (987.1) Cayman, 2.7ltr, manual trans, st ..read more

Nats was a wake-up call. My driving discipline broke down. In CAM-S Grid at the Charlotte Tour. The car to the right is backwards in his spot for a reason. We all jockeyed for position prior to the start of the runs in order to get sun on the tires in the cool conditions. By discipline I mean the ability to calmly and constantly test for and drive at the limit, given whatever the particular conditions are, even if the limit is getting lower as the run proceeds, and not succumb to the desire to sacrifice position for speed. That means never overdrive and aways let correct position produce more ..read more