Just a reflection, but the success of some of the latest GT Academy winners in real cars is, to my thinking a testament to the value of practice and coaching. These people that were very adept in driving in virtual environments proved that it was not a huge transition for them to do well in real cars...with coaching. Even though it was a bit cheesy at times, the show was a testement to how valuable lots of time behind the wheel with a good coach in the other seat is to speeding up your improvement as a driver/racer. It's convinced me. I'm going to be getting two days of much needed coaching at Sears Point with experienced racer Donna Gilio in a few weeks that I looking forward to.

Any other thoughts on the impact of coaching?

 

Some of these drivers and some that were canned in the first 2 rounds are actually really good. They had previous real car experience though.

The show was somewhat a political contest. One of the guys canned in the second round was a very succesfull ITA Integra driver and Spec Miata driver but that was never mentioned.

iRacing did a similar test on one of the fastest star mazda drivers but he actually had never driven a car and didnt have a drivers license. In his case he did very well and was only a second or so off the pace at Road Atlanta.


Yes having a good instructor/coach is very valuable. If you really want to get some coaching look into a Skip Barber 3-4 day weekend or Bondurant. If you cant afford that then do HPDEs and get as much seat time with quality instructors as you can.

 

Thanks for the advice..I have a NASA comp license and years of experience, but I'm seeking coaching to improve, undo bad habits, and gain new skill.

 

Ahh in that case Skip Barber would probably be the next step, unless you can get lessons from Matt Bell since hes in CA too.

 

I dont know about the show or program you are talking about, but, I have a driving coach. I cannot tell you how valuable his input is. He watches me from all parts of the track. We review and adjust. Everytime he is trackside, my lap times drop.

Get your self a coach. To me, it is as important as seat time.

 

Coaching and lots of tracktime go hand in hand.
Highly advise the coaching though.
A second set of experienced eyes,and knowledge help enormously.

 

I've got a great coach...very experienced, many wins and championships, and knows FWD Hondas very well, I'm good. No way I'm spending the $$ on Skip Barber. That's 1/3 of a season, right there.

 

Side note, did anyone see the episode where James May drives a Maserati( i think) with some famous driver/coach and cuts down an amazing amount of time off his lap. Pretty good little clip.

 

I have been doing track days for the last 6 years, I have been a driving instructor for the last 3 years and I also started racing this year. i am not the best out there and I still have people ride with me every time i get the chance. I am lucky enough to know people who where or are skip barber instructors and have been racing for a long time. It is always good to have someone help you get faster.

 

He has had Jackie Stewart and some big name rally driver that I've seen.

 

I have worked with Mike Skeen this past July and it was money well spent.... My only piece of advice is make sure your car is good to go.. Do not make a bunch of changes to the car. I made that mistake!!!!!

 

Anytime you make your way down to Socal, let me know. I offer coaching services as well.

Coaching is the single fastest way to decrease lap time, period!
Money so well spent...

 

I remember the first time I beat the guy around here who was "the guy to beat". He has 5 championships in 4 classes. He and I were watching the footage of my win with us racing nose to tail, side by side for all 30 minutes and he says, "Why didn't you give up? Most racers when racing that closely can't do it for 30 minutes." Most people won't believe that playing countless hours of Forza (with very talented online racers) made me a well rounded race car driver. It didn't make me faster in my own car necessarily but what it did is allowed me to have lots of practice racing cleanly, learning strategy, having confidence in commitment, minimizing mistakes and maximizing every rev and inch of track for that extra 2-3 Tenths, lap after lap after lap.

So in the race where I beat him for the first time, it was my first time racing that hard and that close in real life, however according the neural network in my brain, I've been doing it virtually for thousands of hours and that had real (positive) implications.

disclaimer: while I'm advocate in racing simulators for the purpose of building talent and practice hours I adhere to the belief that if you're not using properly then it's just wasted time playing video games. Perfect Practice makes Perfect in reality and the virtual world as well.

my $.02

 

Good point. I used to do hours of GT3 on PS2. The hardest part for me was not feeling lateral G-Forces. So I ended up driving much more agressive on the simulator. Enthusia was probably the one I learned the best from, because you would get penalized a little for one-tire off track. Made me pay more attention to lines and when would be a safe place to pass.

Now, my only real experience I have is autocross right now. But I will say, the hours of simulators has helped me find lines better. Also, even working the races as a corner worker helps. Then you get to see what line works, where the entrance, apex, and exit points in turns are.

A couple people that I race with posted a league for iRacing. Is it worth the $100/yr? I'd consider it more if I was able to pay for, lets say, 4 months during the off season, and then have everything stored, so I can go back next off season.

 

iracing is more realistic compared to the others mentioned but still is retarded with their tire model.

I spent hundreds of laps on Sebring taking turns at the same speed I do in my civic and I would lose control half the time...unrealistic. God forbid you drop a tire in that game.

Im going to say simulators, real simulators with motion or iracing just because of the track mapping being almost exact are good training.

Having a coach is great but just because they are champions doesnt mean they are good at relaying that to a student.


If I were you I would take Jeremy up and go down to socal to work with him.

 

I don't really think simulators (GT, Forza, iRacing) helped me be faster in the car and since you're not actually in the car it's hard to simulate what your body experiences so I don't actually give them that much credit for helping one go fast.

If I ever go to Road Atlanta or the Norschliefe (sp?) I can say I'm glad I played Forza because at least I have the turns memorized BUT as far as it making me "fast" there... no so much.

I really only give credit to the games for helping me learn how to drive consistently fast, in traffic, closely while utilizing strategy. That's a part of racing that can take a pre-video game driver many many years to learn.

Here's a list of things of the "game" taught me that would take lots of time in the real world to perfect or "get right" without dire consequences:

1: Race starts
2: Planning a pass under braking after gaining from the draft down the straight. (which changes your braking point due to a change in entry speed.)
3: Defensive and offensive racing 1 other or 2 other cars, nose to tail
4: What to do when setting a 2 tires or 4 tires off (my game experience has gone a long way to saving my *** in real life).
5: Landmarks, shift points and other data used for tracking each section of each track.
6: Minimizing mistakes, when NOT to go for the pass and when give someone room who "has the line".

A lot of this stuff only get's learned during the actual competition... by learned I mean the synapses and neural pathways become well establish and become a 2nd nature and carry over seamlessly when doing this in real life.


To go back to the OP. I 100% support the benefits of coaching. That guy I talked about earlier, the one to beat, he's my coach. It's because of him I've been able to go as fast as do. I think he watches my videos more than I do (especially the ones where I finished in front of him!).

Every student needs a master right?

 

I meant simulator like this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDFqA3_ryxM

My brother in law has 2 of these and they do help.

 

Anytime you can more closely replicate the actual event the better. Now if he was wearing a helmet and turned the volume WAY up and they charged him $20k if he wrecked that would be even closer!

 

I think coaching is a funny thing. In the beginning it's of great benefit. Then, if it's worth your even continuing, you need to find your own seat of the pants and hook it up to the gestalt. Then, if you can manage that, some more coaching from a honest-to-gawd racer *** data specialist could pay off - but not as much as racing ***** out against someone on the same hundredth. Anywhere in there you could ask "What's the purpose?" And the answer better be "This is the nexus of life" in whatever terms you can put it into - a smile and a glint in your eyes will suffice.

Scott, who is speaking mostly from memory...I still remember what it was like to be really Alive..."I CANNOT Beleeeeeve I didn't just lose the car!"...

 

I've haven't been fortunate enough to have had a coach (unless you count my HPDE instructors in 1996 & 1997). I'd LOVE to have a coach to show me the areas where I need to be faster and where and how I can improve to lower lap times. It's just that I need a way to find how I can afford to pay for a coach!!

 

I noticed a number of you are from Sacramento-- I have thousands of laps at Thunderhill. I always respected my coaches coming up and love being in the position now. As has been mentioned, it is sometimes just a couple extra eyes and one more perspective that can help you go faster. It is such a complicated sport with so many mental avenues, it takes a VERY talented driver to explore all of them on their own while driving in anger!

I recently coached someone at Infineon (where I work at Jim Russell-- now SimRaceway) in a Porsche Cup Car. He was good, but was struggling a bit with the complexity of the track and the temperament of the Porsche. Over the course of just one day he dropped something like 7 (yes, seven) seconds from his time. He ended up being on the podium in both races that weekend. I can't take all the credit, he was a very perceptive person, and one that was able to grasp the instruction and put it to practice. Either way, on his own he would have been stuck. His idea of how to go quickly around the track didn't mesh with what it took to make it happen at Infineon. I was there to give him a little insight into the matter and together we gave him a coupe trophies.

Data is also an incredible tool in modern motorsport, but it often also takes a couple or more people to look it over. It is the same reason why certain artists make "ugly" work, they don't see anything wrong with their pieces. Even at Ford Motorsport and a Chevrolet-backed team I still have two or three engineers and/or drivers looking over my data with me to spot places I can improve upon. The data systems are not cheap, but they are coming down in price. If your choice is between a hot new suspension setup or brake kit or set of pistons and even a "budget" data acquisition system, go for the data.

PM me if there's any interest in NorCal coaching.

 

This is the biggest inhibitor to getting good coaching.... Cost!
Not that one would inspect a coach to offer discounted coaching after all you are paying for his/her time and knowledge, but the cost of coaching and the cost of track time gets expensive quick!
Especially when your on a budget.

 

Yes, it is complicated and mentally challenging. And one of the first challenges is to NOT "drive in anger". No matter how much coaching a driver gets, when you're racing it's up to YOU to find within yourself and thru your machine what's needed to get to where you want to go. If you're driving cars of similar potential and the other guy is pulling away what are you gonna do? Pull in and talk to your coach? Or do you have live video telemetry and communication - "What do I do Coach?" No. You defog the windshield of your mind with determination and you find what you need. Or you don't. And then you've got a whole nuther thing to think about.

One day at Seattle where I had hundreds of laps, while I was constipating away 20hp, I was a closer match to Greg Fordahl in his ITS 944, presumably with even more laps. As I remember it I had just a bit on him down the straight, and he could get inside me into Big Indy, and then he'd pull out a gap in 5a and 5b - where you might expect the dynamically wonderful 944 to outperform the lowly Civic beknighted to Integra Type R. I could see all of that and I went to work on it. I didn't think there was more on entry to Big Indy, but there was and I found it. I didn't think the car would stick thru 5a-5b if I went any faster, but it did, and I motored away. I mightn't have found any of that if I hadn't been faced with the choices racing presents.

And it's more fun than watching video, analyzing data, and talking about yourself, or it should be. If your choice is between a hot new suspension setup or brake kit or set of pistons and even a "budget" data acquisition system - sure buy the data system. But recognize that that's a bit of a false choice. You could also choose to drive more. You already know you can go faster. You can find that speed the old fashioned way.

Scott, who found his speed...but hasn't seen it much lately...caught a glimpse a while back at the kart track, and at that thanks mostly to the guy who was kicking my ***...

 

Driving at the ultimate limit is driving over the limit just a tiny bit the whole time with enough left in the bag to reel it back in when it gets out of control. That's what I usually try to do and it works ou great except when you don't uleave enough on the table to reel it back in.
There really is nothing else like driving at the mmlimit for hours on end experiencing that thrill and holding the car at the edge of out of control. It's absolutly fun and addicting!
I

 

Quality coaching is well worth the investment no matter how good you THINK you are. Whether a beginner, a seasoned and successful Club Racer, or a talented pro driver - there's value to be had. Think F1, Indy, and other top drivers are receiving coaching? Ha! They might not be referred to as "coaches" but believe me, it's there in one form or another.

People also need to recognize how best someone else could potentially help them. I enjoyed having someone ride in the car with me (both driving and in the passenger seat). Other situations it may involve having the coach spot from various places around the track; or review data after every session.

About cost: It's really not that bad considering the value. I think a way to make it more affordable is finding a coach who lives near the track you want coaching at which eliminates (or at least significantly decreases) their travel expenses.

I've seen several top notch pro drivers who provide quality coaching range from $500 - $1,000 depending on what you're looking for and the individual providing the coaching. (I was looking into coaching at Road Atlanta and the cost for Randy Pobst was $1,000 for the day, and review of various items the night before over dinner.)

Funny side story, at least to me. I was getting in-car coaching at Lime Rock where I was already pretty quick. During the day my coach had me try some different techniques to build up speed on and off line. At one point I asked him if he was sure I could make it down the hill at the speeds he was telling me to go (with him riding shotgun). His comment was yes, and if I don't then crash, he was going to beat the living crap out of me. LOL