shwah
10-29-2006, 04:21 PM
Well I joined the 2 wheeling VW club today!
Had a good, but frustrating weekend at Blackhawk. The car worked well, I improved my personal best by over a second, but I spun in something on the 2nd lap and lost touch with the battle for 2nd/3rd. I did get a lot of open track to work on smooth, settled, fast driving.
Made a mistake going into 6 which is a med/slow right hander. Near the top of 4th approaching, brake hard, grab 3, turn-in, throttle through. Broke a hair late, cranked the wheel early for turn-in and stomped on the gas to try to salvage some exit speed. Nailed the curb just right (or is that wrong :o ) and popped up on 2 left wheels. Seems like it was about a 40 deg angle, but I can't tell now (video camera was mistakenly OFF! :bash_1_: ). The weird thing is how everything slowed down and I was able to go through a pretty extensive thought progression - and never got worried, scared, or spooked afterwards.
1. hey here we go up onto two wheels, hope we don't go over.
2. don't lift, or it might upset the balance
3. hey stop turning right
4. wow the exit curb is approaching, and the dirt will probably send me the rest of the way over
5. how about steering slightly left?
She dropped down on all fours shockingly smoothly, I proceeded to the right hand kink following and lamented that my shift point from 3 to 4 whas 40ft further down track than I like.
So yeah - nailed the curb - got up on two - bicycled from T6 to the exit curb (right by the entrance road) - set it down and continued on. I doubt I lost more than a few .1s of time, and am still amazed at how little this bothered me. I don't know whether this is good or bad yet, but at least now I know to stay a bit off that curb :P
It was a great ITB race too - a shame that I took myself out of the running by not catching that spin. I think a new lap record may have been set by the Fiero with a 1:25.9. The silver Golf had a new best at 1:26.9 and my 1:27.08 was my new best. I really wanted to race with the black and silver Golf today and can't wait until next year! :D
Had a good, but frustrating weekend at Blackhawk. The car worked well, I improved my personal best by over a second, but I spun in something on the 2nd lap and lost touch with the battle for 2nd/3rd. I did get a lot of open track to work on smooth, settled, fast driving.
Made a mistake going into 6 which is a med/slow right hander. Near the top of 4th approaching, brake hard, grab 3, turn-in, throttle through. Broke a hair late, cranked the wheel early for turn-in and stomped on the gas to try to salvage some exit speed. Nailed the curb just right (or is that wrong :o ) and popped up on 2 left wheels. Seems like it was about a 40 deg angle, but I can't tell now (video camera was mistakenly OFF! :bash_1_: ). The weird thing is how everything slowed down and I was able to go through a pretty extensive thought progression - and never got worried, scared, or spooked afterwards.
1. hey here we go up onto two wheels, hope we don't go over.
2. don't lift, or it might upset the balance
3. hey stop turning right
4. wow the exit curb is approaching, and the dirt will probably send me the rest of the way over
5. how about steering slightly left?
She dropped down on all fours shockingly smoothly, I proceeded to the right hand kink following and lamented that my shift point from 3 to 4 whas 40ft further down track than I like.
So yeah - nailed the curb - got up on two - bicycled from T6 to the exit curb (right by the entrance road) - set it down and continued on. I doubt I lost more than a few .1s of time, and am still amazed at how little this bothered me. I don't know whether this is good or bad yet, but at least now I know to stay a bit off that curb :P
It was a great ITB race too - a shame that I took myself out of the running by not catching that spin. I think a new lap record may have been set by the Fiero with a 1:25.9. The silver Golf had a new best at 1:26.9 and my 1:27.08 was my new best. I really wanted to race with the black and silver Golf today and can't wait until next year! :D