The Drivers Edge weekend at MSR-Houston review or; I have a lot to learn

First off, this was the 2nd time ever on a road course and the first in about 7 years. Then I ran at a little track in PA (Was called Beaver Run, now Pittsburgh International Raceway). Then, I ran my 1988 GT that was stock power-wise, but had some simple suspension mods (Bilstein shocks, MM springs, caster/camber plates, 2 piston front brakes, rear disc conversion, etc).

On to this event.

My car is a 2016 PP GT with BMR performance springs, Continental DWS-06 tires (stock PP sizes) with MMD Zeven wheels (19x8.5 and 19x10 stagger), GT350 CAI and Lund 93 tune.

Day 1:

Classroom session: Intro to the track, what to expect, etc.

Run 1:
This was a "get to know the track" session. No helmet. For the first 2 laps, my instructor (who has a FBO 14 GT) drove my car to show me the line he uses and to give me an idea to take in the track. After 2 laps, we switched and I drove the car to try the line and get feedback at higher speed. Not bad.

Classroom session 2: Review of run 1.

Run 2:
This was done at "full speed" with helmet. The first thing I learned is I needed to be more patient with turn-in when it came to the turns. Plus, my timing with the shifts, braking, etc was a mess. I had no clue what I was doing. I was going through the corners slower than molasses and was not setting myself up for the straights at all.

Classroom session 2: More review, talk about car control, balance, oversteer, understeer, basic safety, etc.

Lunch: Parade laps in a torrential downpour.

Run 3:
The track was wet, but no lightning so we had corner workers. Had to learn a little more car control, difference in lines, etc.

Classroom 3: Review of driving in the rain, what did we learn, etc.

Run 4:
Lightning in the area, no corner workers, so we had parade lap, but I took the time to work on my line.

Review of Day 1: By the end of the day, I realized I really really don't know this car at all. I was overthinking a ton the whole day. I was trying to figure out what to do in the corner as I was in the corner instead of setting myself up prior to the corner. I was having a hard time hitting my shift points (mainly downshifting). I was too busy heel-toe down shifting and trying to do 10 things while trying to read a line and listen to an instructor in my ear was too much. I left the track feeling defeated. I was expecting to do so much better (my first ever event in the fox, I graduated to solo after 2 sessions). I was determined to do better on Day 2.

Day 2.

Classroom session to start the session:
Watched a clip of Jackie Stewart from when he was on Top Gear. He talked about car control, simplifying things, etc. Good information

Run 1:
This session was better today than any yesterday. We had a dry track so I could push it a bit. My first 2 laps were just "meh". Things clicked after that. I remembered to breathe going into the corners and I felt smooth. I actually hit a particularly tough part of the track perfectly a couple of times, but I was still turning in too soon and missing some shift points. I wasn't going full throttle in the corners and I wasn't looking ahead as much as I needed to. My instructor was happy with the way things went, so I felt better.

Classroom 2: Review of run and we started the session learning what we would be "graded" on for our next on-track session. Talked about things maybe we werent doing as well. I immediately realized I needed to pay more attention to the corner workers and vowed to call them out each time I saw them. I also knew I needed to ask my instructor what I needed completely (even though we discussed things after each run).

Run 2:
I was ready. I felt calm, I was breathing normally. I talked to Steve (instructor) and told him what I felt I needed to work on and how I was going to do it. We started out with a hot, sticky track. I picked up where I left off and hit some good corners, but was still turning in too quickly on one of the sweepers at the end of a straight. Every damn time. The good thing is I recognized it then the next time around, I told my instructor how I was going to enter the corner and what I was expecting. I called out every flag I saw and stopped heel-toeing and also waited longer in a few of the corners to downshift. By the end of the session, I was at the back of the pack mainly due to my work needed in the corners. I then asked Steve what he thought of the session and he just reinforced in me that I need to learn the car a lot more and the only way to do that is through repetition. He said I seem to feel comfortable in the car, but I have to learn when/where to shift to make sure I'm set-up in the corners for the next straight. Once I"m smoother, then I can push the speed a bit.

Overall:
I had a great time. I was a little deflated at the end of day 1, but only because I knew I could do better. I did do better on day 2. I'll still be in the first run group (Green) next time at this track (or any track with this group), but I welcome that wholeheartedly. I need all the help I can get.

I'm hooked like I knew I would be. I also realize the only mods I need to be buying are track days/weekends. I wasn't even close to reaching the potential of this car at all. I had some tire squeal during some good turns, but I need a shit ton more seat time.

There was a professional photo guy there so hopefully I get some good pics and when I do, I'll add them here.

I knew I"d enjoy it, but I def have a lot to learn.

Not familiar

I live in Houston and not familiar with this, where is this track?
Thanks

077tango said:

I live in Houston and not familiar with this, where is this track?
Thanks

Click to expand...

Just north of Angleton off 288

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Turning in too early is what people unwittingly let their street driving teach them. Dunno why that is, maybe it's fear of running out of pavement on the outside, or into fixed objects there. But turning in too early is more likely to put you in that situation, kind of a self-fulfilling error. Now that you have a better idea what your line through any corner (maybe sequence of corners) should look/feel like, you can still practice this in your street driving at street driving speed. Don't just drive constant-radius corners or right down the centerline of your lane - use most of your lane, but no more than that. Even if you're stuck following a slow minivan through an Interstate ramp, you don't have to follow the same line that its driver is likely using.

Don't worry if your advancement comes slower than you think it should, and don't ever let that bother you. It's mental clutter you don't need, and just by being out there you're still doing something that I'd guess fewer than one person in a thousand ever does.

Maybe get your downshifting done before you're in the corner, to the gear you need to be in coming out of it. A gear too high being better than a gear too low. This is also something that can be practiced in your street driving as long as you don't take too much advantage of the slower speed allowing you to practice using a gear that would be too low for a similar corner taken at track speed.


Norm

Nice report, sounds like a fun weekend. As a track noob myself it's cool to read these types of recaps. It's interesting to me how the majority of go fast parts focus on power but I can't recall ever reading a track day post where someone came back looking for more power lol. It's always seat time, tires, handling, brakes.

BTW if it makes you feel better I just bought my first Mustang last fall, a totally stock non-Brembo GT, and my first track day was this past May in the rain and fog on all season tires at Palmer. To say I sucked would be a vast understatement. I was getting blown off the course by econo-cars. Tires make a HUGE difference.

Thanks, do local members ever get together? I would enjoy seeing other mustangs and sharing ideas.

@ Strengthrehab

Sounds Like you had fun. Rick runs a great group at The Drivers Edge. I was really bummed I had to back out on MSRH because of work. I am on the waiting list for TWS and I am signed up for MSRH in November. If you signed up for any of those, stop by and say hi. Also, there's NASA Racing that has HPDE too. That will be at TWS Oct 15-16. Also, I believe the Driver's Edge will be at MSRC doing the 3.1 CCW that weekend.

Minimum brakes needed

Looking to sign up for the November class, I have stock brakes so inquiring as to minimum upgrades need to be able to run the course safely.

Thanks

Running stock is fine imho. As long as the fluid is fresh and the pads are good.

There is a wait list for green and blue groups (instructors are in-car). If uouve never run with the company, you'll be in one of those 2 groups.

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Waiting list

I saw that, figured I'd go ahead sign up and keep my fingers crossed.

Thanks

Ken, sounds like you had a pretty good time, and at the end of the day, that's what it's all about. If you aren't having fun, then why do it, right?

Your report sounds pretty typical of most guys when they first get on the track.

I agree with what Norm said. And I am by no means a track expert, but I do have several events under my belt. My advice would be to first - forget about heel-toeing at a track day. Practice that on the street, or even in a big mall parking lot. Trying to learn to heel/toe on the track while at the same time trying to learn turn in points, braking, points, apexes, etc is just too overwhelming for 99% of drivers.

I would also say to focus on looking ahead. To this day, that is still one of my biggest things that I have to consciously remind myself to do while in the car. It helps to "slow" everything down, rather then focusing on what is right in front of you.

And the biggest thing is to have fun. Check your ego at the gate. There will be guys in "slower" cars that are faster than you (watch out for spec Miatas and e30 BMWs). But if you keep it up, you will soon get to the point where you will be passing guys in Corvettes and Porsches. But don't it all that distract you. As the kids say, "you do you," and don't worry about anyone else out there.

I think I'll add "shifting late in a corner" to the list of habits that people teach themselves in their street driving. You go into a corner in a residential neighborhood or a tight turn a gear or two too high because you're driving easy, and then you find that there isn't as much "oomph" coming out of it as you'd like even for that mild driving. So you downshift in reaction rather than in anticipation.


Norm

Norm Peterson said:

I think I'll add "shifting late in a corner" to the list of habits that people teach themselves in their street driving. You go into a corner or a turn a gear or two too high because you're driving easy, and then you find that there isn't as much "oomph" coming out of it as you'd like even for that mild driving. So you downshift in reaction rather than in anticipation.


Norm

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I did that more than a few times. I also shifted too much in tight areas and didnt let my speed carry. I wasn't familiar with hiw the car would react so i was being too cautious.

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TGR96 said:

Ken, sounds like you had a pretty good time, and at the end of the day, that's what it's all about. If you aren't having fun, then why do it, right?

Your report sounds pretty typical of most guys when they first get on the track.

I agree with what Norm said. And I am by no means a track expert, but I do have several events under my belt. My advice would be to first - forget about heel-toeing at a track day. Practice that on the street, or even in a big mall parking lot. Trying to learn to heel/toe on the track while at the same time trying to learn turn in points, braking, points, apexes, etc is just too overwhelming for 99% of drivers.

I would also say to focus on looking ahead. To this day, that is still one of my biggest things that I have to consciously remind myself to do while in the car. It helps to "slow" everything down, rather then focusing on what is right in front of you.

And the biggest thing is to have fun. Check your ego at the gate. There will be guys in "slower" cars that are faster than you (watch out for spec Miatas and e30 BMWs). But if you keep it up, you will soon get to the point where you will be passing guys in Corvettes and Porsches. But don't it all that distract you. As the kids say, "you do you," and don't worry about anyone else out there.

Click to expand...

Looking ahead is something i have to improve for sure. It's funny...when i started autocrossing and did my first track day back in 2008/2009, I progressed well. I learned car control, lines, looking ahead quickly. I learned on the autocross course and it translated well to the track. I felt more comfortable and got moved from group 1 to group 2 in NASA HPDE in one session.

Notsomuch this time.

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A few years ago I started making heel toeing part of my daily commute and in a couple weeks time it was as natural as pushing in the clutch. Then you can start rev matching at different rpm depending on circumstances and the power you want or need off a corner. You don't always have to rev match to 5000 rpm of course. My personal test is if I am going to dinner with my wife and she doesn't notice anything, I'm doing pretty good.

Perishable skills... Focus on nailing the basics in everyday life, though. Learn to heel-toe on the street (I've posted a "lesson plan" many times before), and make it habit. When you get in the car to run to the grocery store, or whatever, make sure you're in proper seating position in the car (feet flat on the floor under the pedals without locking knees, drape wrist over the wheel without pulling your shoulder off the seat, adjust mirrors so that left-center-right form a panorama, not 3 views of the same thing, etc.), practice proper hand positioning (9:00 and 3:00, leave them there unless shifting), and look through the car ahead in traffic (eyes up and down the track). Do all that stuff on a habitual level, and you'll take half to two-thirds of your mental workload away from your next track day.

Practice looking ahead and analyzing lines wherever you can. Offramps are great for this. Run the outside edge, run the inside edge, run a late-apex line, run an early-apex line, and start to get a feel for how they differ, and how the alter the position of the car on exit, and where you can get back on the gas. Practice throttle-steering: Center entry line to a cloverleaf, which is constant-radius. Hold the wheel steady, and add gas to push outside. Keep the wheel steady and breathe off the gas to pull inside. With a bit of practice, you'll find that you can actually weave around on the cloverleaf without turning the wheel at all.

Get in tune with all that, and suddenly your turn-in points on track and wheel feed-rates will become simple and obvious, and you'll know how to correct for any minor errors you may make without thinking about it.

Given the above, you'll have a LOT of mental capacity left over for watching flags, other traffic, strategizing passes, etc.

Oh, a note on passing: When you catch up to somebody, get right up on them leading into the corner to let them know you're there and want by. Not highway following distance, get within a car-length ("knock on the door"), then drop back a little bit on braking. Focus on nailing the PERFECT late-apex line, where you can really drop the hammer on exit (try for 2/3 to WOT at apex!!), and anticipate getting that point-by at track-out. If you get it, you'll already have a full head of steam coming out of corner-exit, and the pass will happen in the blink of an eye. If you DON'T get the point, it's really easy to back off the gas at exit or even brake if necessary. The alternative is to stick right on their bumper, wait for the point, see it, recognize it for what it is, pull off-line, drop the hammer, then make the pass. The decision loop between seeing the point and acting on it is usually around a half-second or so, and you won't get the pass done for another two to three seconds, and it'll be MUCH later on the straight. Not only is anticipating the pass faster, but it's also safer, as the two cars are side-by-side for a considerably shorter period of time, and you have all the time in the world to get back online for the next braking zone.

Bottom line is to make all the mechanics of driving (wheel and pedal inputs, seating position, eye placement, gear selection) as close to automatic as possible, and free your mind for the important stuff, like strategy and analysis.

Sometimes when I get a novice student that is experiencing a bit of "sensory overload", I will get them to leave it in one gear for the whole session (on many tracks 3rd will work in a Mustang at a reasonable pace) to allow them to concentrate on trying to get better at doing the other stuff right. Once you're more comfortable with entry speeds and lines, then go back to rowing the gears.


cheers
Ed

I hee-toe constantly on the street. I think the big thing was trying to shift too often. I probably could have run the course in 3-4th and 5th in some spots but routinely was 2-6th. Adds shift points, slows me down, added clutter.

Rev matching is tough. I get it right on the street abiut 80 percent of the time but i do need to speed up the downshifts.

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My instructor was directed to this post on M6g (I cross-post whore'd it) and left me this note via PM. He drives a track prepped 2014 and lives about 30 min south of the track.

Ken,

Someone told me to go to this forum to read your post about your weekend experience at MSRH, so I did. Well written piece. Excellent summary and perspectives. I was surprised you remembered so much. It is typical that a lot of the detail gets lost in the adrenaline and commotion. Your comment about the sensory overload was particularly insightful. I guarantee you that the overload goes away with track time. You will learn to assimilate it all at once.

It is typical that the first day is a bit of a downer. As I mentioned, some of my first days were awful, but the second day was great. You came back well and that demonstrates the maturity needed to be able to do well at this game.

Though you did not take up my offer to ride with me, I recommend you get rides with others as that can be an excellent learning tool, not to mention fun. If you'd like to run with me again, you can request me as your instructor. On the flip side, if you do not want to run with me again, all you have to do is let me or Rick know. It is important that you are comfortable with your instructor and not all instructors are born equal in talent.

Take care,

Steve Sands

That's pretty cool.

Strengthrehab said:

I hee-toe constantly on the street. I think the big thing was trying to shift too often. I probably could have run the course in 3-4th and 5th in some spots but routinely was 2-6th. Adds shift points, slows me down, added clutter.

Rev matching is tough. I get it right on the street abiut 80 percent of the time but i do need to speed up the downshifts.

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Click to expand...

If fifth is 1:1 on your car, and with a 7000RPM rev limit, I can't for the life of me see the need for 6th gear, unless you are SERIOUSLY hauling the mail, and then only on the big end of very few straights in this country...

There are lots of transmission calculators, and if you plug in your gear, trans ratios, tire size and 3500 and 7000 RPM points, you can get a solid idea of min and max speed in each gear. With a 3650 (or a T56), virtually all the tracks in the midwest can be run in 3rd and 4th (which is 1:1). 2nd is rare, and higher than 4th only on two tracks that I can think of... Road America and Mid-Ohio, both of which have some pretty high-speed straights. Like 140mph+ in a stock-ish power level car.

I think you're right in that you're shifting too often. NOT a slam, but constructive criticism to help confirm your suspicion. Also, one failing I see fairly regularly on the downshifts is people trying to get it done too soon in the braking zone. They tend to get the downshift in early, and it's MUCH harder to rev-match with a gear-engagement of 5000+RPM than it is to just wait a tick and do the match at 4000, or whatever. After all, the goal here is to be all done with the shifting and have the clutch out in the correct gear just prior to turn-in. If you find yourself finishing the rev-match, and still dropping more than 6-700rpm under braking, you're downshifting too early. The vast majority of corners only require changing down one gear. A small handful will require dropping two gears. Only a select few will require dropping down three or more.

The MT82 2/3/4/5 ratios are 2.43/1.69/1.32/1.00, and sixth is an unsusable 0.65:1 overdrive. my TR3650, by comparison has 2/3/4 ratios of 2.00/1.32/1.00, so our last two usable gears are identical, but you have a nice "intermediate gear" 3rd, where the 3650's 2nd might be a bit too aggressive by comparison.

Most corners have an entry speed between 45 and 65 mph, and I think we can all agree that we don't really want to up-shift until we hit track-out and aren't relying on the weight transfer from acceleration to plant the back end so much... Think about your "speed in gear" as you reach the track-out point at corner exit. With my TR-3650, 3rd (your fourth) is usable from 54mph up through 99mph, and 4th (your 5th) is good from 71mph up through 130mph. That's with a 6400rpm redline. If you extend the powerband up to 7000, though, that makes the max speeds 108 and 142mph. Assuming 3.73 gears, and 25.5" tires (275/35-18).
Given all that, how many corners do you see where your EXIT speed is below 54mph? Not many. That's how many corners you'd need to use 3rd gear for. So, let's assume, for now, that you're only going to be needing 4th and 5th (1.32:1 and 1:1), so at most, you'll have a single downshift into any given corner. If your entry into the braking zone is under 108, you should be in 4th gear, no downshift required, just brake, turn, go! If you speed into the braking zone is 125mph, for example, and the entry speed is 50mph, you know that you'll need to drop to 4th gear, but you also need to shed the speed to get DOWN to 50. You could downshift as soon as you hit 108mph (top of 4th), but why bang the motor into the limiter just to change gears? Wait. Wait some more. You could also change around 80mph, roughly 4000 rpm in 5th gear, which will bump you up to around 5100-5200 in 4th on the switch. That doesn't sound too bad, now does it? Give it a quick 1500rpm blip, drop down the gear, and finish your braking. The point here is that to have a nice, easy downshift where you're not spinning the motor into the stratosphere, and with not a huge blip required, you just need to wait a while. It takes time to drop your speed from 125 down to 50, and all you're doing in there is braking in a straight line. You also leave yourself some room for error (decelerating from 80 down to 50) in case you miss the gear, or bobble the blip, or whatever. Plenty of time to recover before turn-in.

For now, I would just plan on using 4th and 5th, and then see if there is a corner or two that you're just lugging too badly before thinking about dropping down to 3rd. I would also avoid 6th like the plague, if you can. Again, unless and until your road-speed is north of 140mph, and you still have a ways to go before the braking zone, you won't gain anything by shifting up into an overdrive gear. Essentially, unless you're hitting redline (rev limiter or self-imposed point to keep temps down, or whatever), don't shift up. With a single-gear downshift, leave it for the last 1/3 of the braking zone.

A note on your instructor's note: He sounds like a really good instructor, sensitive to your experiences, supportive and constructive. He's also very wise, identifying that the student/teacher pairing has to have chemistry to work properly. If you worked well with him, then I think requesting him again would be a great idea!