Going From Straight Line to AX.

Great to see you're climbing the ladder quickly. Taking an analytical approach, as you are doing, will speed up the learning curve significantly. I'm on my 6th autocross, and the main thing I have to learn is patience.

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It helps a lot if you take GoPro video and watch it later, if you aren't doing that already. You may see things that you missed while at the event.

Not such a bad driver after all then?

Keep the posts coming, great reading.

Oldjonesey

Boaisy said:

It helps a lot if you take GoPro video and watch it later, if you aren't doing that already. You may see things that you missed while at the event.

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I have been, didn't run it this past event because my dumb a** forgot my SD cards.

I think (think is the key word there) that I will keep everything how it is for the remainder of the season and just focus on seat time. However, I will have to do pads and rotors before too much longer as my EBC rotors and HP+ pads don't have a lot of life left. I think I may be able to get 3 events out of them.

I am really happy with the current setup on the car and I think it can be a lot faster if I could just figure out how to be a better driver.

For anyone who cares, here are some pictures that the club photographers grabbed of my going around track.

If they ever do an Auto-X "school" during an event, definitely attend one of those. I participated in one, even though I had been doing Auto-X for years (4+ years in an 04 Impala, about 2 in my Mustang), and it gave enough time for someone else to analyze and point out areas that I needed work on. Jumped 2-3 seconds in time between days from things that I learned in the "school." Wasn't major flaws, it is just little things here and there that added up to a large improvement after a while.

QuickShift281 said:

I am really happy with the current setup on the car and I think it can be a lot faster if I could just figure out how to be a better driver.

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More seat time. Nice to see early improvement.

There's probably a few bad habits picked up in street driving to get past. Turning in too early, trying to stay on the lane's centerline instead of using more of the lane width to 'open up' the turn radius a bit, maybe riding the brakes gently and too deep into the corner (past the apex in some cases) are things I see people doing all the time. But the unlearning of such things can be practiced to some extent in your street driving, just at slower speeds and lower g's. Try to get a feel for stringing closely spaced turns together as opposed to looking at them as individual isolated corners.


Norm

Norm Peterson said:

More seat time. Nice to see early improvement.

There's probably a few bad habits picked up in street driving to get past. Turning in too early, trying to stay on the lane's centerline instead of using more of the lane width to 'open up' the turn radius a bit, maybe riding the brakes gently and too deep into the corner (past the apex in some cases) are things I see people doing all the time. But the unlearning of such things can be practiced to some extent in your street driving, just at slower speeds and lower g's. Try to get a feel for stringing closely spaced turns together as opposed to looking at them as individual isolated corners.


Norm

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You are entirely right about the bad causal driving habits.

I have been attending the "rookie parade laps" and doing as many course walks with a good friend who is a Ohio State Patrol driving instructor, and a very good driver in general.

Constantly learning, and have been enjoying every ounce of it. I feel as though the car can do way better than the driver, but the driver SHOULD come around with time.


Thanks to everyone for the tips, this has been a big change of pace. If anyone has pad and rotor combo suggestions, feel free to throw them out. I have been looking into Hawk HP 5.0's, or a EBC pad and rotor setup.

Carbotech pads and Centric/Stoptech rotors (blanks are fine, no need for slotted/drilled stuff). Motul 600 or ATE Super Blue brake fluid as well. I think I had XP10 pads which weren't bad for a DD/Track option. They will squeal a little during DD, but nothing too noticeable.

Also might want to look into getting stainless steel brake lines too. - https://vorshlag-store.com/collecti...ducts/vorshlag-s197-ss-braided-brake-line-kit

Can get most of that stuff from Rock Auto for pretty cheap with their coupons.

Another update with event #3 in the books!

Went into event #3 with what was supposed to be good weather, however, it ended up raining about 15 minutes before the drivers meeting and into for the first run in the first heat. Go figure, I was in the first heat and had a cold wet track for my first 2 or 3 runs.

We ran the "short course" again with a couple minor changes, it was close enough to compare your times to event #2 to judge how you were doing. My times were much more consistent that events 1 and 2, and I took another second off my previous best running a 68.740. I am not setting the world on fire, however, with that lap time I did manage to beat a couple of c5 corvettes and S550s so I am pretty happy.

Again, I am feeling more and more confident. I have been trying to work on one thing at a time. This event I tried to concentrate on breaking my bad driving habits that are developed from normal everyday driving as suggested by Norm.

A good friend who is a experience driver said I am looking much improved (although he could just be trying not to hurt my feelings) and gave my some more pointers. Also, I actually remembered my gopro and have been looking at it to try and sort where I can cut more time off.

I am really happy with how flat the car is cornering and how under control the coils and BMR bars have the car feeling. I don't want to start playing with adjustment too much, however, I feel like I may need to loosen the front end up a little bit and get a little bit of weight transfer into the front. Thoughts?

Ultimately, I am having a blast doing this and look forward to every event more and more. Again, any tips you all have are more than welcome.

QuickShift281 said:

I am getting much much more confident in the car.

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The key in auto-x is seat time!

Yes to seat time. Seat time in the wet, maybe better still.


Norm

Another Update;

Ran event 4 last weekend (6/25), we ran the "Long Course" which is just over a mile in length. A little different setup compared to the first week we ran, however, it was close. Landed 3rd in class with a 86.809 best run, put me 70th overall in the day out of 131 drivers. I would have came in second with my final run if I wouldn't have destroyed a colony of cones in the last slalom (would have been a 85.909).

I am getting a lot more confident in the car. I also have started paying close attention to tire pressures, attempting to keep them consistent run to run. I softened up the rear shocks a couple of clicks to try and find some rear grip and it seemed to work.

Still sliding around in the seat quite a bit. The drivers seat is getting worn out at 96k on the clock. Thinking about ordering a bucket to try to hold me in better. Also, brakes pads and rotors are on their last leg and I hope to get a new set on the car before next event.

Will post photos from the event when I get a chance.

Yet another update; This one I am kind of proud of.

Event 5 in the books, and I finally feel like I made some good improvements. To keep it short, ended up 2nd in class out of 8. I was 1 second out of 1st, and was on a great lap until I spun off course going into the back section of the course. Finished 52nd in PAX out of 130 drivers.

To some, that may not be any good. Hell that may not be good to anyone. To me I see it as a big improvement. Until event 5 my best pax standing was 74th out of 110.

Congrats. Any improvement is a plus and it's you that has to be satisfied at the end of the day.....

I doubt anybody follows this, however, I will give yet another update for my own laughs.

Late season, one club race left coming at the end of October (long break between events). I currently sit 2nd out of approx. 12 in class that have attended a fair amount of events. I am far enough of that I can't make a fast break for 1st in one event. It was about a 5 horse race going into the last 5 events of the year, and after that myself and the points leader broke away with it.

I really haven't made any changes to the car aside from some brake changes. I went to a set of GLOC R8's up front and EBC Redstuffs in back. EBC rotors on all four corners. I would like to give GLOC a HUGE mention. I ordered my pads through Vorshlag, received brembo pads rather than the stock GT caliper pads. Got on the horn with GLOC and they took care of it in the best manner humanly possible and had the correct pads out to me in time to have them for a event that week.

Also, got the opportunity to get my first road course seat time at Nelson Ledges here in OH. TLDR, had a blast, and will be making a point to run more track days next season.

Don't think that nobody is paying attention. I'm in a similar boat, as I'm in my first full year of autoX.

Best of luck with the rest of your season.

As you are finding out, brakes take a beating when attending events like AutoX or HPDEs. And I've burned through my fair share of pads&rotors!

I've tried a number of different pads on track, and keep coming back to Hawk pads. HP Plus or Hawk Blue. The Blue pads are definitely "track ONLY", they will destroy rotors on the street.

I've had the best luck with Ford plain rotors or Centric plain rotors. I want to try cryo-treated rotors.

Juice said:

As you are finding out, brakes take a beating when attending events like AutoX or HPDEs. And I've burned through my fair share of pads&rotors!

I've tried a number of different pads on track, and keep coming back to Hawk pads. HP Plus or Hawk Blue. The Blue pads are definitely "track ONLY", they will destroy rotors on the street.

I've had the best luck with Ford plain rotors or Centric plain rotors. I want to try cryo-treated rotors.

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I stopped using Hawk's when people started reporting issues of the brake dust causing issues with painted wheels. If you don't keep up with cleaning the wheels, very often in the case of Hawk's, then the paint can start coming off the wheels. Not to mention, most vendors said Hawk's pads were practically a side step vs. factory Brembo's. I had Hawk's, initially, but i noticed that the paint on my factory wheels started coming off. About the time I had 2 sets of wheels, I had also switched to Centric/Stoptech rotors and Carbotech pads.

For Cryo-treated, I almost went this route, but found the general opinion was to not worry about it unless you spend a lot of time running HPDE's. Autocross may not see the temps that benefit from cryo-treated rotors. My track time was probably 80% Auto-X/20% HPDE.

Boaisy said:

I stopped using Hawk's when people started reporting issues of the brake dust causing issues with painted wheels. If you don't keep up with cleaning the wheels, very often in the case of Hawk's, then the paint can start coming off the wheels. Not to mention, most vendors said Hawk's pads were practically a side step vs. factory Brembo's. I had Hawk's, initially, but i noticed that the paint on my factory wheels started coming off. About the time I had 2 sets of wheels, I had also switched to Centric/Stoptech rotors and Carbotech pads.

For Cryo-treated, I almost went this route, but found the general opinion was to not worry about it unless you spend a lot of time running HPDE's. Autocross may not see the temps that benefit from cryo-treated rotors. My track time was probably 80% Auto-X/20% HPDE.

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Strange, I've not heard about this painted wheels issue with Hawk pads. My first brake upgrade was a set of Hawk pads when I started doing track days, and all I run is HPDEs. (I've never tried AutoX) and that was 15 or more years ago! Several sets of painted wheels on 2 different cars, and my wheels seem to be holding up great.

Now, I did drive with Hawk Blue pads ONCE (before I knew better lol) on the street, and in heavy rain and about 60 miles. My wheels got coated with metal shavings from the rotors combined with whatever chemicals/materials the pads created. This coating was literally an 1/32" thick and stuck to the inside of my wheels like glue. Huge PITA to clean off, but the painted faces of the wheels cleaned up fine. The insides took a lot of elbowgrease to clean.

Boaisy said:

I stopped using Hawk's when people started reporting issues of the brake dust causing issues with painted wheels. If you don't keep up with cleaning the wheels, very often in the case of Hawk's, then the paint can start coming off the wheels. Not to mention, most vendors said Hawk's pads were practically a side step vs. factory Brembo's. I had Hawk's, initially, but i noticed that the paint on my factory wheels started coming off. About the time I had 2 sets of wheels, I had also switched to Centric/Stoptech rotors and Carbotech pads.

For Cryo-treated, I almost went this route, but found the general opinion was to not worry about it unless you spend a lot of time running HPDE's. Autocross may not see the temps that benefit from cryo-treated rotors. My track time was probably 80% Auto-X/20% HPDE.

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I switched to the GLOC R8's after my Hawk HP+'s were out of life, one reason was it has began trashing the wheel finish. In Hawks defense, I wasn't always on top of cleaning my wheels and they are a cheap wheel so I can only assume the finish is cheap as well. However, I am far more happy with the performance of the GLOC pads.