I will be the juniormost instructor this weekend at a combination HPDE/road race school on the outskirts of Montreal. I've coached a few people before in Solo 1, but never instructed yet. Is there anything really basic that I should know or keep in mind that I might not think of on my own? I know many of you have instructed for years. My racing buddy who is alot more experienced (at racing and instructing) than me won't be there to give me tips because he'll be instructing at the ITR Expo. Thanks all.

 

too bad the archive search isn't working - cause you could find a ton of good info in there.
my best tips for you (from a student)
- get a communicator
- talk to the student
- praise the student when/if he/she does something right
- take your student for a ride in your car during your on-track session - maybe point out how you do some of the things you noticed the student had the most difficulty with.
- get a communicator - PLEASE.

 

Be positive!!!!! be excited. smile. grin. laugh. clap.

A very significant part of your job is to make sure the student has fun. (the most significant part is to make sure the student doesn't kill anyone, you included.)

I HATE COMMUNICATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Please do not breathe in my damn ear, thank you.

 

hmm... I never noticed the instructors' breathing in my ear. Maybe the had the gain set too high - or maybe you were scaring the crap out of them...

 

i am talking about students' heavy breathing in my ear......

In all seriousness....i (and my students, i ask) have no problems with me not having a communicator....I know how loud i have to talk, and i also use hand signals. The times i have used the comm, it just didn't work as well for my or my students.....the weekend just wasn't as productive.

But hey, I'm weird.

 

I think it actually depends on the instructor... I have had 4 instructors with no comms, and 3 instructors with comms. While 2 of the 4 comm-less instructors worked well with me (and we had a productive day), I really hated having to scream to be heard (and my car ain't that loud). It was just one less thing to worry about with the communicators, and it made a lot of difference to me, as far as comfort level went.
But hey, I'm weird.

 

archive searching is back up!!!

There is a bunch of good threads a while back about instructing....

https://honda-tech.com/zero...cting remember to select archived topics.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by .RJ &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">archive searching is back up!!!
</TD></TR></TABLE>
HooRayyy!! Bout time.

 

Yup, know i can tell all the stunnas to stuff it and search when they ask about brake pads, spring rates, harnesses and alignment settings and then ban then when they keep whining about why their thread got locked and i took points away from making threatening statements.

 

I found this one, which seems quite insightful...

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=60827

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SJR &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">too bad the archive search isn't working - cause you could find a ton of good info in there.
my best tips for you (from a student)
- get a communicator
- talk to the student
- praise the student when/if he/she does something right
- take your student for a ride in your car during your on-track session - maybe point out how you do some of the things you noticed the student had the most difficulty with.
- get a communicator - PLEASE.</TD></TR></TABLE>

What he said along with constant communication. And when the student starts to learn the line, start pushing 'em a little harder.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by .RJ &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Yup, know i can tell all the stunnas to stuff it and search when they ask about brake pads, spring rates, harnesses and alignment settings and then ban then when they keep whining about why their thread got locked and i took points away from making threatening statements.</TD></TR></TABLE>

Any way to get the search character limit reduced from 3 to 2? There are a lot of 3-letter terms out there... I had to abandon my "ATS LSD" search yesterday...