what is it with all these "hard parkers" ugh

[Kong Sheng Han]

If you took away all the stickers/decals on my car, you wouldn't really be able to tell that it's modified and tracked. Someone who knows cars could tell that I'm lowered, maybe tell that I have an aftermarket exhaust, but that's it. Everything else is pretty much internal.

I guess the big numbers, decals, and rubber marks are enough to prove to anyone in public that I track my car, or that I'm a poser-boy racer?

Originally Posted by elim11

What's your thought about those who have expensive suspensions, wheels etc and do go to the track but get lapped by guys in completely stock cars.

I know someone like this. Supercharged M3 with a bunch of other mods, but my buddy in an E92 328i kept passing him all day. Guy in M3 apparently wasn't willing to learn how to properly drive on a track and, I believe, didn't show up the second day.

[jphughan]

Originally Posted by Kong Sheng Han

I know someone like this. Supercharged M3 with a bunch of other mods, but my buddy in an E92 328i kept passing him all day. Guy in M3 apparently wasn't willing to learn how to properly drive on a track and, I believe, didn't show up the second day.

I had a student like that recently. I was assigned to him late, so we didn't get a chance to talk much before I was getting in the car on his way to grid up (this was at CotA), but he said he had raced a few times at TWS and was just in the lower run groups because he was new to this organizer. By the second corner of the warmup lap I knew that he must have a pretty broad interpretation of the term "racing". He was as green as any student I've ever seen -- not even close to a reasonable line, VERY slow around corners indicating no familiarity with that car at all (or performance cars in general really), not looking ahead or at corner workers, etc. So I worked with him as a total novice and we had an ok time, and at a discussion prior to a later session I learned that he had done 3 track days at TWS before he started "racing" because his dad, also a racer, said he was ready. But he walked around the pits with his flame-retardant suit halfway unzipped hanging off his back like the pros do!

He left after his 3rd of 5 sessions that day and didn't show up for the second day either.

And then I had a buddy of mine instructing a guy in a Gen 1 Viper at his first track day ever at CotA. For some bizarre reason he was put into the Yellow group where I happened to be lurking for a session. I was in a friend's 1985 M535i gray market import car that had 200 hp back when it was new (driving it gave me renewed sympathy for Miatas when they're trying to pass people!), though it did have race pads and RA-1s. This Viper guy had Hoosiers, though. I come up behind him, and even with the car I was driving, he made me 52 seconds slower on the entire lap I sat behind him -- because of course he didn't give me a point-by either.

[Kong Sheng Han]

Rofl. Thanks for sharing. Those stories are actually funny. What orgs do you instruct with? You should maybe instruct for me when I hit up COTA someday.

[nholmes]

Also a good read:

http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1266814

[G-Lo408]

Man all I've done is change my brakepads, brake fluid, put some stainless brake lines and tires. The E92 M3 has more than enough power to keep up. I also have cone marks on my bumper from auto-x events but totally agree, I also see a bunch of cars out there with all kinds of mods but they're afraid they'll break them so they take it easy. To each their own. I honestly think it's a waste of money if you ain't going to use the car or parts for what they're meant for.

[jphughan]

Originally Posted by Kong Sheng Han

Rofl. Thanks for sharing. Those stories are actually funny. What orgs do you instruct with? You should maybe instruct for me when I hit up COTA someday.

Just Edge Addicts right now. If other obligations hadn't come up on Trifecta weekend and in early July, I was going to get certified with BMW CCA and Driver's Edge, respectively, but they each only do one event at CotA per year, and with TWS looking like it really truly might close this time and a replacement track not immediately on the horizon, I'm not sure how much I'd be instructing with those groups anyway until such a replacement track opens. The next nearest tracks that either of those groups runs are MSR Cresson and Houston MSR, both about 3.5 hours each way for me, and I just don't see myself making that kind of a drive with any kind of regularity.

I'll be out at the Edge Addicts event in June though, and if you're in Austin, what's this about running CotA "someday"? What are you waiting for??

[jphughan]

This is a great article that used to be on Inside Line's blog but isn't anymore for some reason, but I found the text:

This semi-regular column is written (in his own blood) by an automotive sage and noted malcontent, known as The Mechanic. Mercilessly beaten as a child with rolled-up back issues of old car magazines, our free-spoken hero developed a unique "for your own good" take on cars and the auto industry, along with an unfortunate habit of setting himself ablaze. Later, after a distinguished career as an automotive journalist and magazine editor, he cast off the reins of his musty oppressors, carved out his superego with a plastic spork and became The Mechanic.

You should learn to drive.

Why? Because you probably can't. Chances are you think you can, and you tell your friends you can, but you can't. If this is true, you're a squid: a guy who owns a car he can't even come close to driving near its potential.

Let's be clear. Squids suck.

And we'll all be better off if the squids of the world would put their egos aside and fess up to their squidness. Then we can move on to my larger point, which is that said squids should take the time and make the effort and do what it takes to really learn how to drive.

Now I'm not talking about hogging the left lane or using your turn signal. I'm talking about real driving. Car control. Entry speed. Trail braking. Left-foot braking. Contact patch manipulation. Heel-and-toe downshifting. Proper line. I'm always amazed how many "car enthusiasts" are constantly talking about doing suspension and engine mods to their Insert Car Name Here when 99% of them can't drive it nearly as fast as it can go the way it left the factory. Trust me, their money and time is much better spent on driver training than it is on a cold-air intake and a fart can exhaust.

And please don't think I'm picking on the import Evo/WRX/Z crowd exclusively. This kind of ego-driven insanity is an across-the-car-world offense. From the Sultan of Money that just took delivery of his new Bugatti Veyron to the stockbrokers of New Porsh Beach to the endless list of Camaro and Mustang guys that have been poorly controlling their V8 beasts for 40 years. Hell, fact is, most performance car owners couldn't drive an Accord as fast as it can go, a point proven every week on Top Gear when they put a star in their reasonably priced car.

I'll give you another example of what I'm talking about. Once, in a previous life, I won a few races and set a few track records driving a Dodge Neon ACR in SCCA Showroom Stock C. About a year later, I attended (just to watch a friend drive) a Porsche Owners Club Squid Day at Willow Springs Raceway northeast of Los Angeles. Out of suspicion I pulled out my stopwatch. The majority were running lap times within a second of the times I was running in the Neon. And these guys were driving new 911 Turbos and were wearing $500 driving shoes, which are known to cause speed.

And they surely told all their friends how they spent the day driving their car fast at the racetrack. These people are delusional.

Basically, we're in the midst of a national epidemic of bad driving, and it's only fed by stability control systems, ABS and ever larger and stickier tires. These things make people feel fast. Especially slow people. Slow people I inevitably end up talking to. Then, of course, I have to hear about how they were ripping through the canyon and flying down the road, when I'm sure they were parking it in the corners like an old lady. As my dad, The Mechanic Sr., once told me, "The Mechanic," he said, "everyone is fast on the straightaways."

The worst offenders might be the auto journalists themselves. They are all fast. Just ask them. But the fact is, most couldn't turn a quick lap time if their life depended on it. I know. I know them. All of them. And I often have to drive cars on racetracks and mountain roads with them. Trust me when I tell you, maybe 50% of them can drive a car competently, 25% can drive a car well and only maybe 10% of American auto writers I would call skilled or fast.

I'm in that last group, of course.

Where do your skills fall? Be honest. Then go learn how to drive. -- The Mechanic, Inside Line Contributor

[Kong Sheng Han]

Originally Posted by jphughan

Just Edge Addicts right now. If other obligations hadn't come up on Trifecta weekend and in early July, I was going to get certified with BMW CCA and Driver's Edge, respectively, but they each only do one event at CotA per year, and with TWS looking like it really truly might close this time and a replacement track not immediately on the horizon, I'm not sure how much I'd be instructing with those groups anyway until such a replacement track opens. The next nearest tracks that either of those groups runs are MSR Cresson and Houston MSR, both about 3.5 hours each way for me, and I just don't see myself making that kind of a drive with any kind of regularity.

I'll be out at the Edge Addicts event in June though, and if you're in Austin, what's this about running CotA "someday"? What are you waiting for??

Gotcha. Sad to see that TWS may be closing for good. There isn't really any other track nearby that interests me as much as that old place. Did you know there are talks of another 6 month extension on trackjunkies? I think TWS and an intro to MSRH will be my only events this summer, maybe one at H2R if I think my car can handle the bumpiness.

"Someday" because I'm poor and can't justify dropping $400-500+ for one day at a track. I feel that my money is better spent paying $325 for a weekend through PDS and getting up to 16 24 min sessions at TWS. $800 for a weekend at COTA for a novice (Trifecta) is actually a great deal, but again, I can't justify the cost right now. Only a college student right now, so I have some time.

[jphughan]

Originally Posted by Kong Sheng Han

Gotcha. Sad to see that TWS may be closing for good. There isn't really any other track nearby that interests me as much as that old place. Did you know there are talks of another 6 month extension on trackjunkies? I think TWS and an intro to MSRH will be my only events this summer, maybe one at H2R if I think my car can handle the bumpiness.

"Someday" because I'm poor and can't justify dropping $400-500+ for one day at a track. I feel that my money is better spent paying $325 for a weekend through PDS and getting up to 16 24 min sessions at TWS. $800 for a weekend at COTA for a novice (Trifecta) is actually a great deal, but again, I can't justify the cost right now. Only a college student right now, so I have some time.

I had heard rumors about a 6-month extension, but nothing's final until it's final, especially with TWS. But what I know for sure is that Louis, the guy who runs the concession stand and has been since Day 1 when it first opened in 1969, was told to start selling off his kitchen equipment, and the current owners are currently pulling up all the underground copper that was run throughout the track for things like lights that used to be out there when it was used for pro racing. Those aren't great signs to me. I hope that it gets bought by someone who plans to just renovate the track surface and maybe add some paved runoff because that would seem to make a lot more sense than building a brand new track, but I'm not holding my breath.

I hear you on CotA's running costs; that place makes the perk of free instructor track time especially sweet. That's not why I do it, but it certainly doesn't hurt. But if you want to just catch a ride with me out there sometime, check the Edge Addicts calendar and PM me in advance.

[admranger]

For reference, when I started all this nonsense 21 years ago, the instructors were all concerned that the students in their E36M3's would kill them all.

As for the guys who spend big bux on race kit and then don't track the car, I say please continue. This stuff will all be sold at a discount when their lease runs out so more goodies for us!

[Kong Sheng Han]

Originally Posted by jphughan

I had heard rumors about a 6-month extension, but nothing's final until it's final, especially with TWS. But what I know for sure is that Louis, the guy who runs the concession stand and has been since Day 1 when it first opened in 1969, was told to start selling off his kitchen equipment, and the current owners are currently pulling up all the underground copper that was run throughout the track for things like lights that used to be out there when it was used for pro racing. Those aren't great signs to me. I hope that it gets bought by someone who plans to just renovate the track surface and maybe add some paved runoff because that would seem to make a lot more sense than building a brand new track, but I'm not holding my breath.

I hear you on CotA's running costs; that place makes the perk of free instructor track time especially sweet. That's not why I do it, but it certainly doesn't hurt. But if you want to just catch a ride with me out there sometime, check the Edge Addicts calendar and PM me in advance.

Aw damn, that's sad. I'm still hoping it pulls through. I need to set a sub-2:00 PR before it goes; maybe this upcoming Sunday.

Thanks for the offer. We've discussed me getting a ride at COTA a while back. I'll be volunteering at the Trifecta event, and ortho281 offered to give me a ride in his M3. Would also love to get a ride in your GT4 (assuming that's the car you track). I'm scheduled to donate bone marrow on June 24, so the June 25-26 Edge Addicts event probably won't work. But I'll get in touch with you for other events.

Edit: I've done 8 track days so far and am solo qualified with PDS, but since I've never been to COTA, I'll probably need an instructor. $645 with instructor. I'm thinking, if I feel that I have enough money to blow, I could maybe do the December 18 event.

[e46e92love]

Originally Posted by javarithms

1: hors d'euvre,
2: sul tavolo (on the table),
3: antipasti,
4: pasta, cleanser (not counted),
5: main course,
6: cheese,
7: dessert.

Full course.

Some would argue cheese IS desert.

Cheers,
e46e92

[Kong Sheng Han]

Cheesecake

[MMMCOOKIES55]

Originally Posted by elim11

What's your thought about those who have expensive suspensions, wheels etc and do go to the track but get lapped by guys in completely stock cars.

I agree with that as well. You should always start off stock then progress from there based on what you feel you need to improve on. Slapping a bunch of parts on your car THEN deciding to track it when you have never even seen the limit of your car stock is just a recipe for disaster. I didn't think the thread would turn into this... haha. I guess its just seeing cars with mods and people not utilizing those mods to their potential is just a waste. We have really track capable cars, we should enjoy them for what they are I know I do.

[MMMCOOKIES55]

cheesecake

[Patrón]

My opinion is, it's their car, who cares if they don't track. now if it's a gutted, caged car and it doesn't go on the track or race against other cars and time, then that is a little funny but common.

[aris21]

OP, why do you care? It bothers you that much that you have to post to a forum to share your hate? Just move on. Not worth your time.

[Longboarder]

This thread made me self conscious driving around with -3.0 camber up front with people potentially scoffing at me for "not tracking" so I decided to leave all my track day tire marks on.

[Raek]

I don't really have any track mods (I bought the car with the BBK on it, had it not had it...I wouldn't have bought it).

I don't plan on ever tracking the car. I barely drive it enough as it is.

My wife also has an absurd amount of money into shoes she never wears.

I apologize for feeding the economy for my own personal enjoyment.

[Kong Sheng Han]

Originally Posted by Longboarder

This thread made me self conscious driving around with -3.0 camber up front with people potentially scoffing at me for "not tracking" so I decided to leave all my track day tire marks on.

Battle scars. I was washing my car two days ago and noticed a big scratch on the side skirt, likely from that -3.0° launching rocks at the side of the car. That kinda made me mad.

Originally Posted by jphughan

I had heard rumors about a 6-month extension, but nothing's final until it's final, especially with TWS.

Received email from Levica today. It's final!