For most beginners, on track instructors only focus on how to get a good exit, and explain it in a way that makes the entry not correlated at all. This is completely wrong, if you are struggling not only with your line on entry but also with your entry speed this will significantly impact your corner exit.
So How Can We Tell If We Are Over Slowing On The Race Track?
As drivers, we should constantly be checking in our driving and finding ways to improve. But if you don't know what to look for this can turn into a challenging task, so today we will give you the number one thing you should be looking for.
First of all the best way for us to review our driving is by watching an onboard video of us driving, so if for some reason you don't have a camera such as your smartphone or a go-pro filming from inside the cockpit now, we highly recommend you get one. This will become one of the most important tools for your driver education, which is going to be more useful than any mod you may ever put on your car!
Once we have our video working and we start to review it, the number one thing we want to look and listen for is our initial throttle spot. The most common mistake we see at Blayze is a lack of entry speed causing the driver to start to apply throttle way before they ever get to the apex. This causes two issues for the driver:
- That initial throttle takes weight off the front end of the car, which means we take grip away from the front end. That early throttle not only means we did overslow but it also doesn't allow the driver to ever roll enough speed as they take grip away from themselves.
* The other side effect of going to throttle early is we are inducing understeer. This means the driver may go to throttle earlier than the driver who roles better speed, but it takes that first driver much longer to be able to get to full throttle. They also can't open their hands as they start to apply throttle and that additional steering wheel input is scrubbing speed on exit. The driver who roles more speed can start to unwind the wheel as they apply throttle and get to full throttle much earlier.
So when you back to review your video look at every corner entry and pause the video as soon as you hear yourself going to throttle. Take a look at where in the corner you are, as you apply that initial throttle. If you are a long way away from the apex on entry you know you have over slowed.
A great way to practice rolling more speed is when you are on track don't allow yourself to pick up the throttle before you get to the apex. Initially, this will make you slower, but we are killing a bad habit. We go to throttle early because your body is telling you that you are too slow, and we think too slow = need more throttle. But instead what we want to do here is start trailing off heavy brake pressure earlier, and holding the brakes at a lighter pressure for a longer time (intro to trail braking). This will allow you to roll more speed and not over slow the correct way. Start working on that and we guarantee you will find a lot of lap time on any track you go to!
