Hey,

Ok I want to do some HPDE next year to learn my car better before wheel to wheel action. I have some questions and I did search but could not find the answers.

1. How much is a entry fee usually?
2. Its my first time, do I have to have a instructor, do I get waived off so to speak at the next event or what? How does the whole instructor thing work?
3. How much seat time per weekend?

Thats about it for now, if you have answers post them please! Thanks!

 

I'll buy lunch for whoever writes me an HPDE Primer

1. $300, sometimes more.
2. Yes, you have an instructor - so make sure that your car has equal restraints and a muffler. A real muffler.
3. Usually 6 x 20 minute sessions. Sometimes more.

 

So I have an instructor the first time or every time? Do the cars have to be quiet? Thanks for your help!

 

You'll have an instructor until you are signed off to run solo permanently. Usually takes a while and driving several tracks. You can still get signed off to run solo within your group if your instructor thinks there are things you can work on by yourself.

The cars dont have to be quiet, but your instructor will thank you for it

 

You'll usually have an instructor until they feel you are safe and competent on your own. If you go out without one and demonstrate that you aren't ready to be on your own, you will be given an instructor until you're ready to "solo." Don't think it's a punishment or a drag. Good instruction is a veyr beneficial part of your HPDE experience.
-Adam

 

Hey,

Ok cool thanks for the help!

Simon

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by .RJ &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
The cars dont have to be quiet, but your instructor will thank you for it </TD></TR></TABLE>

#1 question asked by my instructors after a session: "WHAT!!???"

 

Some HDPE's can be about $125, depends on who is in charge and how much instruction you get..


go once..get hooked like the rest of the track ****** on this board...

Its safer then herion..(but more expensive) and has better rewards

 

more expensive then heroin? if you only do one or two a month with different oganizations... even after pads and tires... year to year cost of a HPDE guy vs heroin addict... i would think HPDE is cheaper... and if its not... at least its a legal rush...

Instructors are your friends. you dont know how fast you can be till you listen to them and nail a n ice clean lap on the "party line." and i wouldnt thikn of it as wheel to wheel in any respect. you are learning with other people on track and when they want you to pass (if you are fast enough) they will point you by!

 

im doing one on the 17th and 18th @ roebling road with the PCA. its $210. should be well worth the money

 

You get what you pay for...

Compare not only track time but also

classroom time,
what is taught in the classroom,
is there a lesson plan or is it "seat of the pants" instruction,
who is the Chief Instructor,
what are his/ her qualifications,
are there different levels of instruction given (beginner, advanced),
is the instruction teaching you how to race (wrong answer) or how to drive fast,
what are the organization's safety concerns,
are you allowed to change instructors between sessions if there is no "connection",
are unsafe drivers discliplined or removed from the track,

just to think of a few

 

My first time out my friend instructed me(B20Bastard) and he did a great job, it's always nice to hear how your progressing from someone you not only respect as a driver but someone you can go throw back a few with after the day is over. Making the connection with the Instructor in my opinion is very important. Most of us are adults and we've all been to school and had teachers yell at us and treat us like we're stupid, and while in all honesty newbie drivers are not up to par on all that goes on on the track(myself included, I'm still learning), again having a friend kind of helps that factor and feeling of "inadequacy" to the rest of the packat a minimum.

 

I would like to put my .02 in.

The instructors are not there to reprimand you or to hold you back. It's quite the opposite. They push you to be better. They teach on a level that you are comfortable with.

If you start to feel that they are pushing too hard and you think that next time you take this turn you will go off, slow down, tell the instructor, pull into the hot pit (place where you go after you come off track and before you go into the paddock)
for a hot minute and take a deep breathe and go back out.

You will have an instructor every time you go out until you become group 3 or advanced group HPDE and then you you still might. The instructor can sign you off that weekend (after he is comfortable with your skills) to go solo for the rest of the weekend or just the last session of the weekend or not at all.

You need the same safety equipment that you have on the driver's side in the passenger's side.

i.e. Fixed bucket seat, harness ( properly mounted ), regular seat belt ( came with the car stock )

having a friend is nice to have instruct but IMO not the first or first few events that you go to. An instructor that you don't know that goes into your car will tell you everything that you are doing well or not so well. Friends will sometimes not tell you everything or go around the topic that you don't fully understand because you have never heard of it or experienced.

just my .02

 

I'm running solo in group 2, but I feel more comfortable now than with an instructor...I get all nervous. I feel i'm progressing quickly and learning all the right things, when my friend instructed me, i didn't know him all that well, plus he's just a sraight-forward-tell-it-like-it-is kind of guy anyway...luckily he taught me the heel-toe method BEFORE I went out on the track, helped IMMENSELY...everyone should learn it...just practice when coming to a stop at stop signs and stop lights

 

Well, they are somewhat there to hold you back and somewhat there to push you on. They have an ultimate responsibility to keep you safe, that should be their charter. I was discussing this w/ a friend last night and told him that where I felt a competition school is a great experience, I don't think an open Friday practice session is a good idea for a first or second time out at the track. I am a big proponenent of lead/follow or comp school environments where there is not an instructor in the car but in both of those scenarios, there is actually someone watching you, they just aren't in the car with you. An open practice day is not this at all. So, in my opinion, an instructor is there to push you along yes, but also there to reel you in to some degree whether they are in the car, in front of you in a car, in the corner buckets keeping a watchful eye on you. In all those scenarios, they have the information they need to relate back to the driver what not to continue doing. Having done a lot of in-car instruction and a few lead follows, I personally think its easier to give them feedback when not in the car w/ them. That's me however and I realize every situation is different. If the student has no designs on racing in the future, they most likely have two seats and a different mindset so the lead/follow, observation types of instruction aren't as redily applicable. If they are intent on racing in the future, IMO these lead/follow, observation scenarios work very well.

One apsect I realized after the fact was that as an in-car instructor, you spend a ton of time with a novice student keeping them from following the line of the car in front. With lead/follow, you are teaching them by showing them where to put the car with the easiest thing in the windshield to find - you. And its very easy to keep tabs on when they are early/late/awkward through the turns IMO.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by phat-S &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">They have an ultimate responsibility to keep you safe, that should be their charter. </TD></TR></TABLE>It is the instructors responsibility to instruct the student how to safely operate the vehicle, but the ultimate responsibility lies with the guy who has the wheel and pedals.
Driving on track is unpredictable and students dont always do what you tell them to (the first, or second, or third times)
If an instructor could gaurantee his/her own saftey in a students car through their own instruction, there would be a lot more instructors.

 

The guidelines we were given in the L1, L2 clinics was if they were not obeying your instructions that you were to sit them out. The common refrain I recall was that you, as the instructor are in control, if you are not, pull them in. If you take the burden of riding with a student even if its not yours, it is your responsibility to keep them safe. That is in the end your job. Now that doesn't prevent things from happening and it certainly doesn't make it inherrently safe but in the end, pretty much any incident with a student will include a discussion with his/her instructor.

In the end, it is probably what separates good instructors from the professional instructors that do this. They are probably pulling from a much bigger toolbag in knowing the behaviors, attitudes, body language of the student than you or I. In many ways, we run a lot of risk in pushing a student. I would think I am there to encourage, yes; push, probably not; reel in, absolutely.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by phat-S &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">The guidelines we were given in the L1, L2 clinics was if they were not obeying your instructions that you were to sit them out. The common refrain I recall was that you, as the instructor are in control, if you are not, pull them in. If you take the burden of riding with a student even if its not yours, it is your responsibility to keep them safe. </TD></TR></TABLE>
conceptually, I couldnt agree with you more. If a student repeatedly ignores my instructions, he/she is coming into the pits and will probably sit out the rest of the session. I take full responsibility in giving my student the tools and instruction to safely operate the vehicle.
But in real-time, out on the track, its the student making the decisions. Some students it takes a few repetitions of an instruction before they "Get it"
Do you bring them in after they miss it the first time? Of course not. You coach them before they make the mistakes, you do on-track exercises with them, make sure they understand the basics, prioritize the information you give them, etc etc but that still cant account for everything
Now luckily, 99.99% of the time, the little mistakes they make, or instructions they dont get or forget, dont result in a big off.
But it only takes once, that same little mistake, except at the wrong time and place on the track.
Even students that respond immediately to instruction can go from safe, consistent laps to a mistake that comes out of seemingly nowhere and puts the car off the track. There really isnt any way for an instructor to ensure that wont happen.

Ultimately, it is in the instant that an instructor can't control things. The instructor sets the stage for saftey, teaches saftey, demonstrates saftey (in a ridealong) but can't gaurantee it.

Overall I agree with what you are saying, (and I admit Im probably nitpicking a little bit) I just think that a swooping statement like that can lead to blaming instructors for all/most incidents, which really isnt fair.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> I would think I am there to encourage, yes; push, probably not; reel in, absolutely.</TD></TR></TABLE>
very well put

 

I think we are coming from the same page. I intended the word responsibility in regards to what your task is, not that for which you are held accountable (ok, well maybe at a BMWCCA school - I kid, I kid ). The beginnings of any track day, the focus in the instructor's meetings is around safety and what we are tasked with from my experience. Never will we hear something like "now I want all these students' times down 3 seconds by the end of the day" because what we really want to see is that they all leave in the same shape they arrived. Even in the comp schools, although the focus will be different, its still a matter of safety. Being told to make that pass next time or being told not to dally behind that guy are really in the end, instructions geared towards not being where you shouldn't and being in front of what could happen. Specifically to HPDE, in my opinion, the only way we fail our students is to lose site of this [safety], be it turning an HPDE into competition or ignoring their mistakes.

interesting discussion

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Solo2Cvc &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

#1 question asked by my instructors after a session: "WHAT!!???"
</TD></TR></TABLE>

or anybody following too close for any length of time, for that matter . I actually think that everyone should follow a car as loud as Beno's at least once in their HPDE career - that should cure them of trying to "drive-by-ear" - I couldn't hear my GS-R if I got within a 100 feet of that civic! Good practice for racing, I would think. And boy was I glad I had my ear plugs!

 

i thought one of the greatest features of the school i went through (Midwestern Council) was that not only were there instructors in the car with you, but at all corner stations. i consistantly heard instructors/corner workers talking to students saying things such as, "you're consistantly missing you're apex by 2ft," or "the other cars in you're class are braking 25ft later than you, try progressively reaching that braking point." the in-car instructor has so much to try and pay attention to, it's always nice to have help.

to directly answer the original questions:

1) it largely depends on how many days the event is. multi-days you should expect around $300. Midwestern Council offers a HPDE/school for about $175 for a single day. i think it is very well run, as i have attended 3 times.
2) it will depend on what org the event is run through. there are some groups i know of that only give you an instructor for 1 session then you're on you're own. stay away from these.
3) enough that you'll be dead tired at the end of the day and vastly overwhelmed.

 

One word for one of the most important things to do after each session...DOWNLOAD...at least that's what we call it out here...basically it's just a time for every student and instructor to voice concerns to the chief instructor about the session as well as discuss among each other.