Finally got out to Sears Point with Gisele. I hadn't been in years, so I thought it would be wise to have an expert show me the finer points of driving a Porsche on such a challenging (and scary!) race track. Robb Todd of BR Racing in Los Gatos was there to support a few of his customers and I was lucky to have him agree to join me for a session.

Here's Robb showing how it's done!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqSG2bi3epU

Once we swap seats, you can see right away that I've got lots to learn. LOL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cq9nqgi1uB0

Once I got up the courage to put the hammer down out of the esses and all the way down to the hairpin at T11, it was like magic. A feeling of sheer euphoria!

Can't thank Robb and his crew enough for all their support, enthusiasm and hospitality. A great day! I'm looking forward to doing Buttonwillow next weekend with the PCA's Golden Gate Region. Come join us for another threesome!

 

Looking good! Nice save on T2 exit.

 

Yeah, looking very good! Infineon is still my favorite track and your video reminds me why. It's like a roller coaster with very little time to take pause.

Oh, and I wish it were as easy as Robb makes it look. He just gets into someone else's car and lays down a collection of exciting laps. Very cool.

 

Awesome video...very fun. What type of cam set up did you have and where did you mount?

Also, only because I have never heard your coach say it, but try to look up the track (especially entry and mid corner) as far as you can. This mindset/visualization will reduce the sensation of speed and the corresponding fear; and will allow you to also identify your relationship to the apex and radius of the corner much faster. The more aware of that you are, the more likely you are to be able to use all of the track available and you will open up and begin seeing where to get on the throttle sooner and begin squaring the corner off with rear end drift. All of this will help you get your lap times down and help smooth your entry and exit drive out of the corners.

I realize this was an unsolicited comment and please realize I am not being anyway critical of your driving, thought your gear box work was very good. Just trying to share an old racers perspective. My bike coach used to say, look past, go fast....meaning don't focus on where you are in the corner itself, but where you are in relation to road beyond the corner you are in... hope that helps.

 

PS, nice profile pic

 

TurboDogue,

My cam set-up is a GoPro HD. It's connected to my roll hoop via an I/O Port camera mount.

Appreciate the feedback on my driving. I actually instruct myself, so I'm very familiar with this advice, since I believe it's probably the single best thing for a novice to learn. You stated it very well. Obviously, I've somehow regressed in this area.

 

Oh, one other thing to add, in regards to moving your head so your eyes are looking far ahead... the HANS set-up in my car really limits my head movement. I've got the carbon bucket GT2 seats. I've talked to a few owners who have actually shimmed the front seat rail mounting so that the seat tips rearward a bit, freeing up some room between the HANS and the seatback. I'm going to look into doing this on my seat.

 

This is so spot on for my driving. I need to work on this at every event, in fact. I have to tell myself to keep my eyes up and to look down track to help my brain process all that's happening. It's the weakest part of my technique yet, the most enjoyable when I get it right. Really good stuff.

 

I really enjoyed both watching Robb and you. I think that you did a fantastic job and even though you werent pushing it quite as hard as Robb you had a very consistent line and some great pace. I think the save at the beginning of the 2nd video says it all, you have it under control. Nice job

One question, where did you get the porsche visor decal????????

 

I had it custom made. I created an Adobe Illustrator file of the artwork and sent it to a graphics guy. It came out sweet!

 

any chance you can email me the file? thanks in advance, PM sent