Zoom Zoom Boy
09-17-2009, 03:10 PM
Thought a few of you might find this interesting. This really applies to any track, not just Mosport.
Mosport crash avoidance techniques…
There are times at Mosport where you know you’re going to crash and there’s nothing you can do about it but to take your hands off the wheel, cross them against your chest, close your eyes and imagine the tire wall is a big fluffy white pillow. Then there are times when you’re only slightly out of control and if you don’t panic, keep your head in the game and eyes up, you can use the little control you have to minimize damage to yourself and your car.
First tip:
Don’t fear the grass at Mosport – fear going onto the grass sideways.
If you see you’re going to go off the track, for god’s sake drive off straight. There’s no point trying to fight with the car or trying to keep it on the track. If you slide off sideways there’s a chance that you’re going to catch the rim in grass and flip the car. There’s also the chance that if you fear the grass, you’ll overcorrect and slingshot across the other side of the track and hit the inside wall.
Below is a video from my off in turn 2 last Sunday. You can read the digital display and can see my max speed hit is 104mph – or 167kph. The tire blew and I instantly lost traction and steering. The car was going straight so I just locked the brakes and waited. When I felt I had scrubbed enough speed I let go of the brakes to get my steering back and redirected the car away from the tires. One thing you can notice from the video is how much speed you can scrub on the grass with locked wheels. The digital display on the right measures actual speed from GPS tracking - not wheel speed.
Had I felt I wasn’t scrubbing enough speed (wet grass etc) I never would have let off the brakes and just driven straight into the tires. There’s a bigger crumple zone in front then on the side. If you’re expecting an impact, it’s hands off the wheel, because on impact the wheel will jerk and you can break your thumbs. Arms crossed on the chest because you don’t want and arm dangling out the window if you’re rolling and unconscious. Eyes closed for two reasons; first being flying glass, second being you don’t want your body to know the exact moment of impact so it can’t prepare for it. Not sure how the second one minimizes injuries, just know it does.
FYI The noise you hear on turn 2 is the front splitter scraping the ground. The twitch you see on turn 1 exit is wheel spin from turbo spool in 4th gear.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6cVdItY0MA
Second tip:
Eyes where you want to go. Don’t over-correct.
In the second video the backend steps out on me. Back story; turns out from my two offs and subsequent waiting on the grass for about 2 hours total to re-enter the pits, caused the turbo to heat-soak my head gasket, it baked, cracked, then excess oil vapour went through the valve cover, filled the catch can which then sent oil vapor through the breather and onto my rear tires. All I could feel was going down the hill and losing rear end traction.
The trick I find to catching a car that’s snap oversteering is always keep your eyes up, look where you think you can go safely, aim for that direction, don’t let off the gas, hold back steering wheel input by about 30% for your correction and try your best to drive out of it without a lot of correction. I’ve always subscribed to seat of your pants driving. Always listen to the tires and let them tell you what the limits are. I find memorizing visual markers mentally exhausting and unreliable – since IMO every lap is slightly different. Tires are always changing temperatures, engines always fluctuate in power, your lines are never truly the same, etc. If you come in a little hotter from one corner and are anchored to visual markers, you won’t adjust your speed for the next corner, and you’re going to find yourself in trouble pretty quick. The reason your keep your eyes up is because your arms will make a lot of the corrections all by themselves if you just look where you want to go. That leaves your brain free to focus on your tire traction and direction you need to go. I have years of track experience in very twitchy high-powered CRXs so the hold back steering input by 30% is just something I do - I have no reading or physical understanding of the geometry at play that I arrived at that number. For me, I’ve just always found the second tank slap to be far more dangerous and harder to control than the first. So I hold back steering input on the first slide, bring the car back in line gently and more often than not I avoid the second slap altogether.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPqlTEcIEzg
Anyway, this is only my experience and my advice. I do a lot of instruction, but very rarely go through crash avoidance techniques with students since there’s no real safe way to practice them. I hope this advice makes you safer on the track. Feel free to add your own safety tips and advice.
Mosport crash avoidance techniques…
There are times at Mosport where you know you’re going to crash and there’s nothing you can do about it but to take your hands off the wheel, cross them against your chest, close your eyes and imagine the tire wall is a big fluffy white pillow. Then there are times when you’re only slightly out of control and if you don’t panic, keep your head in the game and eyes up, you can use the little control you have to minimize damage to yourself and your car.
First tip:
Don’t fear the grass at Mosport – fear going onto the grass sideways.
If you see you’re going to go off the track, for god’s sake drive off straight. There’s no point trying to fight with the car or trying to keep it on the track. If you slide off sideways there’s a chance that you’re going to catch the rim in grass and flip the car. There’s also the chance that if you fear the grass, you’ll overcorrect and slingshot across the other side of the track and hit the inside wall.
Below is a video from my off in turn 2 last Sunday. You can read the digital display and can see my max speed hit is 104mph – or 167kph. The tire blew and I instantly lost traction and steering. The car was going straight so I just locked the brakes and waited. When I felt I had scrubbed enough speed I let go of the brakes to get my steering back and redirected the car away from the tires. One thing you can notice from the video is how much speed you can scrub on the grass with locked wheels. The digital display on the right measures actual speed from GPS tracking - not wheel speed.
Had I felt I wasn’t scrubbing enough speed (wet grass etc) I never would have let off the brakes and just driven straight into the tires. There’s a bigger crumple zone in front then on the side. If you’re expecting an impact, it’s hands off the wheel, because on impact the wheel will jerk and you can break your thumbs. Arms crossed on the chest because you don’t want and arm dangling out the window if you’re rolling and unconscious. Eyes closed for two reasons; first being flying glass, second being you don’t want your body to know the exact moment of impact so it can’t prepare for it. Not sure how the second one minimizes injuries, just know it does.
FYI The noise you hear on turn 2 is the front splitter scraping the ground. The twitch you see on turn 1 exit is wheel spin from turbo spool in 4th gear.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6cVdItY0MA
Second tip:
Eyes where you want to go. Don’t over-correct.
In the second video the backend steps out on me. Back story; turns out from my two offs and subsequent waiting on the grass for about 2 hours total to re-enter the pits, caused the turbo to heat-soak my head gasket, it baked, cracked, then excess oil vapour went through the valve cover, filled the catch can which then sent oil vapor through the breather and onto my rear tires. All I could feel was going down the hill and losing rear end traction.
The trick I find to catching a car that’s snap oversteering is always keep your eyes up, look where you think you can go safely, aim for that direction, don’t let off the gas, hold back steering wheel input by about 30% for your correction and try your best to drive out of it without a lot of correction. I’ve always subscribed to seat of your pants driving. Always listen to the tires and let them tell you what the limits are. I find memorizing visual markers mentally exhausting and unreliable – since IMO every lap is slightly different. Tires are always changing temperatures, engines always fluctuate in power, your lines are never truly the same, etc. If you come in a little hotter from one corner and are anchored to visual markers, you won’t adjust your speed for the next corner, and you’re going to find yourself in trouble pretty quick. The reason your keep your eyes up is because your arms will make a lot of the corrections all by themselves if you just look where you want to go. That leaves your brain free to focus on your tire traction and direction you need to go. I have years of track experience in very twitchy high-powered CRXs so the hold back steering input by 30% is just something I do - I have no reading or physical understanding of the geometry at play that I arrived at that number. For me, I’ve just always found the second tank slap to be far more dangerous and harder to control than the first. So I hold back steering input on the first slide, bring the car back in line gently and more often than not I avoid the second slap altogether.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPqlTEcIEzg
Anyway, this is only my experience and my advice. I do a lot of instruction, but very rarely go through crash avoidance techniques with students since there’s no real safe way to practice them. I hope this advice makes you safer on the track. Feel free to add your own safety tips and advice.