Lessons learned in Nashville at GTMotoring.com

Aug

Lessons learned in Nashville

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Coming into the second Eastern Division round of the Redline Time Attack series, a great amount of anticipation surrounded the outcome of Round 4 at the Nashville Superspeedway. Round 3 in Joliet at Autobahn saw me lose by a second in the Street FWD class, and from the moment I finished my final lap, there was a nagging frustration in the back of my mind of knowing that I could have run faster.

All in all however, 2^nd place was still an encouraging result given the circumstances. I had the privilege of being a groomsman in Greg’s wedding the evening before. While one would suspect my late arrival at 10:30am on Sunday was the result of being over-served (only partly true), much of it was due instead to a faulty nav unit which invited us to explore beautiful downtown Joliet. If that weren’t enough, a weak/defectitve pin in the rear brake calipers of our tow vehicle decided to engage the e-brake at 70mph, causing the truck’s rear brakes to catch on fire.

At this point I must express my gratitude to the Redline organizers who were gracious enough to allow me to get on the track, albeit for a mere 2 laps of practice. I discovered I was nearly 8 seconds of the pace from the front runner in my class; a well-built, well-driven Dodge SRT-4 with twice as much power as my RSX. Not having a clue what I was up against, but feeling that it was a bit of a David vs. Goliath battle, I decided to see how close I could push towards a 1^st place finish. After all, I was still the reigning champion for my class. How hard could it be?

Running 8 laps on a track I really hadn’t seen in 2 years with a car I hadn’t even driven in almost 10 months was a big test for me. Could I run balls-out lap-after-lap and hopefully get it right? By the time I had run through my 6 competition laps, I had knocked off nearly 9 seconds from my first lap, with my fastest lap naturally occurring on the last one. My friends and family were in awe as Todd (Redline’s announcer) rattled off my rapidly improving lap times with every pass. It made me feel like an absolute rockstar and even I was pretty impressed.

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It wasn’t enough. Doug Wind and his SRT had run deep into the 1:39s.

I wasn’t upset finishing second, but I was irked that I hadn’t been better prepared. Finishing about 1.1 seconds behind with a 1:40.49 was acceptable, but I needed redemption. I vowed not to let the SRT rain on my parade again.

The GT Motoring/Challenge/Seen It! Crew ventured back out to Autobahn a few weeks later with plans shake down Greg’s new S2000 which only saw 6 laps and for me to obtain a piece of mind. Redemption came quickly in the form of running a few mid 1:38s. Granted, most of my laps were around the 1:40 range, but this fueled a misnomer that would eventually take me out of the running for 1^st place in Nashville.

By midday at Autobahn, I was feeling comfortable with the South Course, knowing my lap times would have been sufficient to win. With an egotistical charge of confidence I was now braking later and later, throwing the car through corners and the braking zones, getting back on the throttle earlier and earlier and forcing the sticky Bridgestone RE-11s to scream for mercy at every possible moment. In my mind, I was driving like a man possessed. However, had I only bothered to pay attention to my lap times I would have realized that with all the extra effort, I was actually scrubbing off time rather than improving it.

Round 4 took us to Nashville Superspeedway; a track I felt very comfortable with and was confident about despite my lack of power for the long straightaway. I knew full well that my closest competitor had double (or more) the power of my car, but I was convinced that all I needed to do was throw the car around the tight infield portion of the roval and all would be fine.

In 2008 I had run a 1:11.9 at Nashville. For 2009 it was determined that 1:10s would be a simple task despite the fact that the RSX was essentially unchanged. All that was needed was for me to simply drive faster and more aggressive. Corners that I had breathed off the throttle last year were to now be taken with a flat foot fueled with something to prove. I kept telling myself that it was necessary to push like mad through the infield and that my efforts would far outweigh the time lost on the straight to higher horsepowered competitors.

For much of 2008, I was still trying to find the limit of the RSX’s capabilities. The last time around in Nashville, I felt as though I had left a lot on the table. So naturally the underlying instinct was to drive harder, brake later, accelerate sooner and throw the car around as much as possible until it was necessary to dial back a few notches. Unfortunately, I maintained that mindset going into Nashville and the infield track tore me, my ego and my lap times to shreds because of it.

All of Saturday and most of Sunday saw me running in the low 1:12s at best. Of course, I became frustrated and discouraged. The car was understeering more than ever, forward traction was nonexistent and I was constantly finding the tires far greasier than I ever had in the past. How could this be? The Bridgestone RE-11s were reported to be a step up from the RE-01Rs and I was completely perplexed. While there was a change in that my preferred Cobalt XR pad compound wasn’t available, there was no weight transfer under my late braking, the car just seemed sluggish and all the while I pushed even harder.

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Following the first competition Time Attack session on Sunday, I had experienced enough torture. Convinced that the new pads were the scourge of my poor performance, I swapped back to my Cobalt pads, which were on their last legs. Greg’s S2000 had ripped out a wicked fast lap prior to the aging OEM differential blowing up, so with his day of driving finished I asked Greg to ride with me during the final practice session to see what was ailing my performance.

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In years past, there had been a few occasions where Greg had either ridden with me or driven behind me so that he could pick up cues on where to push further or where to alter a driving line slightly. I was always the faster driver/car. I wondered what it’d be like when I’d have to ask for driving advice, but when the time came, it wasn’t awkward in the slightest. Surprisingly, I didn’t find it the least bit ironic or humbling that I was now asking Greg for his assistance. I have always regarded him as a consistent and smooth driver who always drove very well. I had always assumed the difference between us was directly related to the fact that he had a higher regard for life than myself. In retrospect, I learned that he was the faster driver for most of the weekend NOT because he wasn’t as crazy as me, but more because he drove in a much more cool and composed manner.

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The Cobalts definitely did help set the car up better, as the stronger initial bite worked much better with the Bridgestones, allowing me to finally drive deeper and get on the throttle sooner the way I liked. However Greg quickly pointed out that my inputs were far too aggressive. I was over-driving the hell out of the RSX to the point where I was scrubbing off speed and inaccurately setting the car up for just about every corner.

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Greg’s advice wasn’t overly-technical (then again, my nickname isn’t Cole Trickle for nothing) knowing that the simpler the delivery, the better when it came to my level of comprehension. He merely suggested that I try being smoother, try to take as straight a line as possible through the corners and encouraged me to try braking a bit earlier into the first high speed corner off of the banked straight.

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His advice was priceless. It was almost embarrassing to witness how much it changed my driving. My instinct was to barrel into the first corner, slamming on the brakes as late and as hard as I could until the rear end had almost completely rotated around. By braking only slightly sooner and smoother, I was able to cut a tighter but faster line through the first hairpin, plus I hadn’t over-cooked the tires, providing me with the forward traction I was missing and even more lateral grip. The first turn made all the difference. The rest of the track seemed to slow down and the car seemed entirely more responsive. Despite the noticeable changes, it still came as a surprise that I had run well over a second faster than the rest of the weekend’s times.

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The problem was that it would have been nice if this revelation brought about a happy end to the story, but unfortunately it didn’t. I didn’t learn of my fast practice lap of 1:11.0 until after a mistake-ridden final Time Attack round where the fastest I could muster was only a 1:11.8. During the final Time Attack session, I once again lost my cool as I thought only of simply out-grinding the SRT-4 in the corners. I misshifted, put too much heat in the tires and went off-track on my fastest lap. While I didn’t completely throw out Greg’s advice, my own fighting spirit got the best of me and I lost sight of the task at hand.

The moral of the story? Be prepared mentally, run your own race and never, never, NEVER forget the fundamentals. I spent the entire weekend worried about fighting the infield to make up for being ridiculously outgunned on the straight when I should have been concerned about taking the weekend one lap at a time.

I must admit, I’ve even fallen victim to griping about the massive discrepancy in power compared to me and Doug’s SRT-4, but the truth is that he deserves all the credit for his wins. Driving a front-wheel-drive car with that much power is no easy task, and while it’s easy to say that he simply won the race in the straightaways, the fact of the matter is that his car requires very steady braking, precision throttle control and management of such power, which is no simple task. In noting that, I will be the first to say that he unquestionably deserves the wins and competing against him has been both a pleasure and a learning experience.

My mindset was all wrong from the time I had wrapped up Round 3 up until seeing my practice times only after the final Time Attack round had finished in Nashville. While I have no doubt that both races could have been won for two completely different reasons, the underlying lesson was that they weren’t. I didn’t drive my own race and instead psyched myself out worrying about my competition and completely overdrove the car.

Just when you think you’re starting to become a good driver, it takes lessons like these to give you the reality check that is sorely needed. I’m just thankful to have such helpful teammates to point out what should have otherwise been blatantly obvious.

A special thanks goes out to the rest of the GT Motoring/Challenge/Seen It! Crew including Nick Weir and my brother in-law, Craig Moore for keeping the car in top shape. Also a big thank you goes out to Bridgestone for allowing us to look like rock stars in their big display and for all their support. Also thanks to Enkei for their backing and to J’s Racing Japan for shipping out a much-needed tie rod just in time to allow me to even compete in the first place.

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Wish us luck this weekend in South Carolina as Greg looks to finish on top once again and I try to get my head on straight at Carolina Motorsports Park; a track that appears to be both technical and very high speed. It should prove to be another fun weekend and hopefully we’ll come away with even more fun stories to tell!

On a side note – All three top drivers in the Buddy Club Eastern Division Street RWD Class are running on CHALLENGE coilovers AND Bridgestone RE-11 tires! Congrats again to Greg in his 1^st place finish in Nashville and to David for 2^nd place!

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