lito
forum member
Want to get good at heel and toe? do it every single time with every car you have.
Gotta disagree with you on several points. Surprise, right?
Heel/toe is NOT something that I (or any other instructor I know) teach in entry-level pedagogy. Point of fact, I've never had a student come from a different discipline (drag racing, motocross, karting, etc.) that had even a glimmer of the concept of heel/toe. It was always a "new" skill to learn once the driver had the basics down, and was ready for a fresh challenge. I also advocate learning it on the street (highway, really), NOT on a race track. Simple reason: on the street you should never be anywhere remotely close to "the limit," and as such, a botched heel/toe downshift will just jerk you around inside the car.
This is not always possible. Want an example? Turns 1, 2, and 3 at Sonoma Raceway. Those are what amount to a continuous series of turns, right out of the main straight, with turns 1 and 2 being the first and second parts of a high-speed sweeper with a decreasing radius. No straight-line braking to be had there -- you end up having to gently get on the brakes while still in the left-hander that is turn 2 in preparation for turn 3. If you're going to negotiate it properly, you have to downshift while turning. Fortunately, there's a small window during which you can do it. Because I'm not going for ultimate lap times or anything, I usually do it while coasting up the hill on entry to turn 2, but it is while under some cornering load. However, it is not while also under braking! I do my braking right before that point, just a little (and gently!) to keep the car's velocity in check.Next point: Never, never, never shift in a corner. Shift BEFORE the corner! I don't care how fast you are with the stick and clutch (even 60mS for a DSG), the instant you disconnect the engine from the rear wheels, you have altered the dynamic set of the car. A "clutch kick" is how drifters get the car sideways. Why would you want to take a chance on doing that if you don't have to? ALWAYS enter the corner under power (unless you're intentionally trail-braking for a specific reason).
Truer words were never spoken! It's why my modifications to my car have been so minimal when compared with others here. I'm still working on the driver mod! But I did replace my springs and rear sway bar with Boss 302 components because I wanted a balance and responsiveness change. The work on the driver mod up until that point made it possible for me to see what I wanted to change and how to go about it.Bottom line: train the driver first.
while coasting up the hill on entry
There's your problem....no coasting!!!!
Oh, and we did see a BEAUTIFUL Audi R8 V10 out there as well. Blew the motor SKY HIGH in The Carousel... "big bada boom" (bonus points for identifying the movie reference, it's an easy one!) and a huge smoke show, but surprisingly no oil down on the track at all. Must have let go internally, and chuffed half the pistons out of the exhaust. Still not sure how that happened, but...
There's always Lemons Racing...Terry, you're dead right! I have seen the light, and here's a peek at what the future holds
... compares blip shift to computer driven cars ...
I think it's time for all of us "hopeless romantics" to hang it up, and find a new hobby, one where we actually participate.
Well I'm all for learning skills and developing drivers, but where in the HPDE ladder / solo / instructor scheme of things do you teach rev match heel toe techniques? In HPDE1? In HPDE2? HPDE3?In all seriousness, I want to be on record as advocating driver education and skill development. Learn the skills, and master them as best you can. THEN go the hardware/software route to create a safety net, which will allow you to USE THE SKILLS YOU HAVE with confidence right up to the limit.
Hey, and I dig the concept of CMC. V8s, RWD, cheap tires, low cost. Lots of tight racing. But 260 whp in a 3200 pound car isn't exactly a gut wrenching tour de force iron man drive.Want to race for real? CMC: No ABS, no TC, and it's tight, close, hard racing from the standing start all the way to the checker.
Well... the fast AI guys tend to use ABS. And again, 9.5 or 9:1 power to weight isn't exactly "Ayrton Senna driving Monaco in the rain" levels of driving difficulty. But of all of the NASA classes, American Iron does look like the most fun. If there wasn't just so much contact I'd be out there with them. Seriously. Every time I drive an AI car it just feels right.AI: No TC, ABS is optional, but penalized. Also close, hard racing.
Well... its easy to say that from the cheap seats where we all sit. I suspect its a good bit more difficult than we all think. I have friends that have driven modern F1 cars. OK, one friend, who is more of an acquaintance. We went to dinner a number of times, and it was fun listening to his stories (he was one of the modern era Stigs on Top Gear). This guy was a real master in any pro car he has driven... and he said F1 cars were much harder than it looked.F1? It's a joke these days.
Well this AIX video honestly looks like the least challenging: having half the power to weight of the entire field seems like shooting ducks in a barrel. Who needs to worry about cornering speeds and braking zones when you have TWICE the power of everyone else. You can drive a car like that at 80% and still beat everyone, if you are the only car in a field of 9:1 or 12:1 power to weight ratio cars and you have 5:1.Then you get this:
No ABS, No TC, No auto-blip, just big meat, big power, and aero. Gotta drive that one. Two vids, polar opposites. Which looks like more fun, Terry?
with those that do. I'll give ABS a pass on the strength of its ability to prevent flatspotting expensive tires, but that's about it.old, dead technology: Flathead engines. Carbs. Drum brakes. ABS-less braking systems. Pre-WW2 shock technology. "Points" ignition systems. Leaf sprung solid axles. Torque Arms.
This is what concerns me - I'm envisioning people claiming respectable lap times (if only to themselves) when it wasn't their skill with the available mechanical bits that got them there. I'd much rather shave a couple of tenths off my personal best (on any track) knowing that it was all because I got better, than knock off a couple of whole seconds because some electronic device could do any of it better.The "autoblip" boxes are becoming much more commonplace at HPDEs and I've worked with many HPDE students and customers that HPDE that have these boxes installed. They are pretty simple, and they work. We've installed a few for folks. They don't cause bad things to happen, they LESSEN the chances of bad things happening. So why are they bad?
But these BlipShift boxes are a boon for those folks. I feel that any driver aid that makes a driver SMOOTHER and less jarring on inputs like brake and clutch is a good thing. I've only ever had one HPDE1 student that could already heel-toe in 20 years of instructing, and its damn sure is NOT something we try to teach new HPDE students. Most of the time we have students ..... brake... then downshift at the slowest part of the turn (after braking, before the apex).... or just use one gear for the whole course. HPDE1 is about learning flags/safety, Situational Awareness, passing and being passed. We work on driving lines and braking points, sure, after the above bits are mastered
Not my cup of tea but to each his own. Buddy of mine loves his auto-blipper. I just don't want anything that detracts from the driving experience and I'm getting a hell of a lot better at it so I'm kind of proud of that. Its almost subconscious now most of the time and done right its truly a beautiful thing. I still struggle sometimes with relating street pedal heights and mild RPMs vs hot brakes and aggressive RPMs on track. Part of the learning curve...
I think Porsche is doing right by not putting DSG trans on some of their "driver" models e.g. GT4. But I do marvel at how fast the DSGs bang gears. Wow! I don't have that kind of money to spend so its not like I have to choose.
I agree that too many driver aids kills the enjoyment to the skilled and experienced drivers, and removes more and more of the driver from the equation. Something like the Nissan GTR is the epitome of this. Tons of driver nannies, lots of tech, more power than they admit to, but somewhat boring to drive (to me), makes anyone look fast - even automotive journalists! Doesn't mean these cars aren't fast.
I won't either! There is a place and time to learn heel-toe, and it's NOT on a race track, with the car performing at 100% (or as close as the student can get it to that point).But really the blip shift box is such a minor thing, and I think folks are blowing it out of proportion. I have seen countless noobs trying to learn to rev match downshift on track, and SPIN constantly. This is a skill that has a pretty high level of risk when you get it wrong, and its actually one of the toughest to master. I won't let my HPDE students "practice" this with me in the car, no thank you.
Again, agreed 100%, as I said in post 59 and post 60 of this thread... I know they're hard to find, I mean they are both SOOO old, a whole page ago... ;-)Well I'm all for learning skills and developing drivers, but where in the HPDE ladder / solo / instructor scheme of things do you teach rev match heel toe techniques? In HPDE1? In HPDE2? HPDE3?
I think its safer to actually learn to rev match on the street, in low to no traffic conditions.
Exactly. Post 59 again.Or at an autocross, in a parking lot. That's where I learned, and didn't make an ass of myself on track trying to be an F1 driver in HPDE1. "Practicing" heel toe on a race track will most assuredly lead to spins and off track excursions. Once you have this muscle memory down, though, of course the track it is the right place to use it. Again - I'm not saying people shouldn't learn this skill, but that its more difficult for some to learn than others, and in these cases... a little computer help isn't terrible.
It is when you're three-wide for half the track, nose-to-tail for the rest, and on the last lap there were four lead-swaps. Oh, and no contact at all... Right now, CMC is the most exciting racing to watch in our region. And again, very little contact. And 260HP in a 3050lb car that LOVES to change ends at the drop of a hat meets the criterion for "gut wrenching" to me! I had my reasons for moving on from CMC, but the racing and people were not factors.Hey, and I dig the concept of CMC. V8s, RWD, cheap tires, low cost. Lots of tight racing. But 260 whp in a 3200 pound car isn't exactly a gut wrenching tour de force iron man drive.
Think how much faster it would be with Auto-blip, ABS, TC, KERS and regenerative braking!! Sorry, couldn't resist. Remember, racing isn't necessarily about lap time, it's more about position. Running out front by a 6-second margin is not any more fun than a TT session, or a solid track-day session in the advanced group. Battling for 5th place with four other cars, for 40 minutes? Now THAT is fun!!And knocking on CMC and Spec Miata lap times is a ironic, considering how slow one of my TT cars is right now (BMW, above)... getting passed by Spec Miatas at TWS two weeks ago, ugh. But we've got a lot of things left to work on and big changes in store. Now my 25 year old C4 is a good bit faster than CMC, and AI most times, and driving it on 25 year old shocks and reman brake master cylinders that tend to last one day max it is "a challenge to drive".
Again with the contact? Are your Texas boys unable to complete a lap without crashing??? ;-) Yes, we have contact in GL/MW region as well, but it's fairly uncommon, outside of the typical "racing incident" where you might wind up with a door donut. Focus on the 50/50 rule and less on show-car shine, and you'll do a minimum of bodywork through the season. Also, buy the American Iron Bodywork Kit and keep it in your trailer. It's a 2x4 and a 10lb sledge. Comes in handy once in a while! AI is an interesting series, where you have so many paths to "the number" that work. Boss302S? Cha-ching, change tires, done. Or go the other route. We have an 80s era Firechicken that's so lightweight and cut up that he runs a bone-stock gen-1 350SBC and hits the 9:1 ratio with a restrictor. And yes, he's fast. And his tires last forever. Regional champion, and did well at Nationals as well... Has a race budget annually that is a fraction of your tire budget for the year. Seriously. Lots of sweat equity in that car!Well... the fast AI guys tend to use ABS. And again, 9.5 or 9:1 power to weight isn't exactly "Ayrton Senna driving Monaco in the rain" levels of driving difficulty. But of all of the NASA classes, American Iron does look like the most fun. If there wasn't just so much contact I'd be out there with them. Seriously. Every time I drive an AI car it just feels right.
The drivers in F1 (with a few exceptions) ALL operate on a level that you and I cannot even conceive of. Unfortunately, they're in a series that is so rules-laden that it has become comical. And don't even get me started on Bernie's antics! When was the last time we saw a seriously decent battle to the finish, with more than two cars involved and fuel wasn't an issue? Oh, and here's a different version of the F1 wheel from Kimi's car:Having to keep track of the in-car adjustments that the 2016 season cars have seems like a monumental challenge: differential modes, engine maps, front wing adjustments, KERS charging/discharging/metering, DRS use, fuel consumption levels, and more. Not to mention high speed aero capabilities that literally make your head swim.
But I still make fun of Maldonado as much as the next guy...
Ah, I'm not a hater, to be honest. It's just that the bulk of the people reading this thread are firmly in the "educational" portion of the HPDE ladder. If a racer sucks at heel-toe, then this is a killer piece to help them manage their race. If a TT driver is looking for that last 0.001 in lap time, the Auto-blip will let them keep steadier brake pressure, and they can find that time. If an HPDE driver has been trying for a few months and just can't get the heel-toe thing together, even after coaching, then yes, this takes that workload off his shoulders. For somebody that has never set a wheel on a race track before? No. Learn the technique to the best of your ability (post 60 in this thread), then revisit the concept later if you still need to.Last I will chime in about blip-shift devices. I think its much ado about nothing, but some seem to think its a mortal sin. Hey whatever floats your boat guys. Don't let the haters keep you from trying these little devices. They are simple and they work.
Cheers...