My First Track Day

[hagakure]

Well,

Went to Thunderhill and tracked the car for the first time, and it was an AMAZING experience. It was a NASA event, and I had a patient, informative, and detailed instructor. I have to admit that I did much better than I expected first time out, and my instructor was very complementary concerning my car control skills, how quickly I learned the line, and my smoothness. He said that he would readily recommend me to run with the number three group my next time out on this track (1/2 is the beginning level for HPDE days with NASA). Needless to say, I was completely stoked!! I've been bitten by the bug, and there is no turning back.

The car performed flawlessly. I ran the stock suspension, with the exception of a WORKS rear bar and Toyo RA-1's, which were fantastic. I can see that the more I get into it; the car is going to require coilovers. There is a lot of body roll in tight transitions when weight transfer is in play, and the car understeers quite a bit in tight, low-speed corners. Power was more than adequate with the works TR-340 package. Only 3 cars in my entire group passed me all day. It is quite obvious that all-out power is definitely secondary to driving skill on the track. I passed porches, corvettes, etc, all day with ease, and on the other hand, one of the cars that I could not pass was a 92 MR2 Driven by an 18 year old who has a LOT of skill (long-time Karting background, etc). This was the normally aspirated car with 132 HP!! At any rate I am looking forward to burning up a lot of $$ and rubber in the next few years, and have as a goal getting my racing license by the end of three years. It was a great time, and if you are on the fence about getting out there with your car...get off the fence and do it! The most fun I've had in ages. I really do think that the years I spent criterium racing were very helpful in feeling the line, being comfortable in a bit of traffic, etc. Anyway, enough already, just pretty thrilled, and wanted to share the experience. There was only one other Evo out there, and he was in group 3. There were quite a few STI's though.

Peace all.


Percy Howard

[JanSolo]

Yes! Another addict. I hope to walk away with the same kind of positive experience on the 1st of October. Glad you had a good time!

[garrick70]

Hey Percy,

i live in the Sacramento area, and i am signed up to go to Thunderhill's driving school on the 21st of November. Do you know if this is a similar to the NASA school you participated in??

[brwnrice]

i'm glad you had fun out there. i myself is itching to go out in a real track just dont have the time right now though. hope to see you in one of the norcal tracks someday. :wink:

[hagakure]

Hey Percy,

i live in the Sacramento area, and i am signed up to go to Thunderhill's driving school on the 21st of November. Do you know if this is a similar to the NASA school you participated in??


Should be very similar. I am going to do another NASA two day event at T-hill on November 13-14 as well. Two full days of track time!!

Percy

[garrick70]

Hey Percy,

i live in the Sacramento area, and i am signed up to go to Thunderhill's driving school on the 21st of November. Do you know if this is a similar to the NASA school you participated in??


Should be very similar. I am going to do another NASA two day event at T-hill on November 13-14 as well. Two full days of track time!!

Percy

Is that still open? Maybe my neighbor (another Evo owner) and I could join you.

[hagakure]

Hey Percy,

i live in the Sacramento area, and i am signed up to go to Thunderhill's driving school on the 21st of November. Do you know if this is a similar to the NASA school you participated in??


Should be very similar. I am going to do another NASA two day event at T-hill on November 13-14 as well. Two full days of track time!!

Percy

Is that still open? Maybe my neighbor (another Evo owner) and I could
join you.



I believe that it is still open. Would love the company!!
Check on nasa's site which is at https://www.nasaproracing.com/nasa_event/show/?event_id=136

Percy

[e8]

Awesome!


Understeer eh? You should learn to lift throttle over steer and trail brake some. That should be your next task before coil overs. :thumbsup:

just my 2cents.

[vtluu]

I'll be running with NCRC (http://www.ncracing.org) at Reno-Fernley (http://www.ncracing.org/reno-fernley.html) on Oct 9-10, doing my first HPDE. Can't wait! :D

[GokuSSJ4]

glad you had the chance to track your car, theres nothing like it !
+ having RA's help alot . do you have the RA shaved ? and if not wait till theyre near shave, they will start to grip alot more. Big difference from tracking the car on regular tires and R-compound tires.

[methods4]

Hey Percy,

i live in the Sacramento area, and i am signed up to go to Thunderhill's driving school on the 21st of November. Do you know if this is a similar to the NASA school you participated in??

I've been to two or three of those schools at T-hill. Very informative and you'll have an instructor with you in every session. After each session they have a download meeting with everyone to see where people are having problems (slow down for T11!!!) and what to do. Maybe I'll sign up and run in the advanced group. Tempting. Right now I'm signed up for October 18th with www.gglotus.org at Buttonwillow. If you want more track time than you can handle, GGLC is the way to go. Last event I ran with them at T-hill, I got 7 sessions. And each session was 25 minutes. On top of that it was only like $150.

BTW, I'm in the Sacramento area also.

[garrick70]

I believe that it is still open. Would love the company!!
Check on nasa's site which is at https://www.nasaproracing.com/nasa_event/show/?event_id=136

Percy

Which HPDE group are you in on the 13th?? I will try to sign up for the same group. Cannot make it on the 14th. It would be my first time tracking the car.

[garrick70]

Hey Percy,

i live in the Sacramento area, and i am signed up to go to Thunderhill's driving school on the 21st of November. Do you know if this is a similar to the NASA school you participated in??

I've been to two or three of those schools at T-hill. Very informative and you'll have an instructor with you in every session. After each session they have a download meeting with everyone to see where people are having problems (slow down for T11!!!) and what to do. Maybe I'll sign up and run in the advanced group. Tempting. Right now I'm signed up for October 18th with www.gglotus.org at Buttonwillow. If you want more track time than you can handle, GGLC is the way to go. Last event I ran with them at T-hill, I got 7 sessions. And each session was 25 minutes. On top of that it was only like $150.

BTW, I'm in the Sacramento area also.

This sounds great too. This is the reason I bought the car, so I might as well jump in. I cannot make the Oct. 18th event (strict monday through friday work schedule). However, it would be great if more Sacramento Evo guys could group up for these events. A little friendly competition among 916 neighbors!! :D

[robi]

Welcome to the high speed crak-pipe! ;-).

[SouthernCrane]

Maybe I'll sign up for the 13th too, in the n00b group though :)

[vtluu]

I've heard bad things about NASA's safety record, from several friends who do track events quite regularly (one of whom instructs with TM and NCRC). So I would be reluctant to run with them.

[garrick70]

I believe that it is still open. Would love the company!!
Check on nasa's site which is at https://www.nasaproracing.com/nasa_event/show/?event_id=136

Percy

O.K. I am know a member of NASA, and all signed up for the Nov. 13th HPDE group 1 (newb). I look forward to my first day on a track with the Evo! :D :shock:

[garrick70]

I'll be running with NCRC (http://www.ncracing.org) at Reno-Fernley (http://www.ncracing.org/reno-fernley.html) on Oct 9-10, doing my first HPDE. Can't wait! :D

Hey Tam,

I just joined the NCRC as well as NASA. I'm going to give both groups a go. Looking forward to lots events in the next year!!

[vtluu]

You might also want to join TrackMasters (http://www.trackmasters-racing.com) which is HPDE-only (no time trialing) and similar to NCRC. For a limited time (the site says "until June" but I joined last week) they're waiving the $20 membership fee.

[garrick70]

You might also want to join TrackMasters (http://www.trackmasters-racing.com) which is HPDE-only (no time trialing) and similar to NCRC. For a limited time (the site says "until June" but I joined last week) they're waiving the $20 membership fee.

Done!!

[SouthernCrane]

I've heard bad things about NASA's safety record, from several friends who do track events quite regularly (one of whom instructs with TM and NCRC). So I would be reluctant to run with them.

Like what? I would like to know before I join the track day. Please PM me if you don't feel like posting the response.

[vtluu]

I don't recall having heard about any specific incidents, but I'll ask around for any stories. I suppose it could just be blown a bit out of proportion so it would be good to have at least some anecdotal evidence to back it up.

My only experiences with NASA have been autocrosses. The first one I went to, they had a late crossover on course which created a very real possibility of one car T-boning the one ahead of it, and there were a couple of close calls. The next one (which I didn't go to), they ran an autocross at the Altamont Speedway oval; one car ended up smashing into the concrete wall. The car was totalled but luckily the driver was unhurt. Now, NASA HPDE are run by (presumably) different folks so this may not be indicative of safety at NASA HPDEs. But the bad safety rep that I mention is specifically about NASA track events, not autocross.

[hagakure]

I've heard bad things about NASA's safety record, from several friends who do track events quite regularly (one of whom instructs with TM and NCRC). So I would be reluctant to run with them.


The Event I did was run impeccably. I have no other history with them than this, but I was motre than satisfired, and felt very secure.

Percy Howard

[SouthernCrane]

Anyone going to do the TrackMasters event at Infineon on November 14?

[hagakure]

You should check out thunderhill that Nov. 13 and 14...two days, ton of track time. That is with NASA by the way. I am going to Butonwillow with Nasa ont he 9th of this month as well. Any norcal people want to head down, let me know.


Percy Howard

www.percyhoward.com

[midtown]

my friend and i will be there on the 14th, group3, hope to see some fellow Evos out there, mine is stock, friend's Evo is close to 400hp

[midtown]

I've heard bad things about NASA's safety record, from several friends who do track events quite regularly (one of whom instructs with TM and NCRC). So I would be reluctant to run with them.

i've heard that too before i joined, it's been 3 years,i have no problems with the organization, the numbers of ontrack "incidents" are no different than other groups, lately there's a big shakedown occuring with NASA, alot of the "old school" instructors were let go, i guess they want some new blood in there, anyhow, don't be afraid to join NASA, i would say the only downside is the long wait between run groups