[plbrand]

Great points from Gerardo, truly a student of driving race cars. After 40 years of doing this, allow me to offer my perspective. Prior to joining SBR in '84 - 25 years ago - I had been racing karts and cars for a decade. Even had some success - a kart championship in '76 and winning the run-offs in 1980. After listening to Mike Rand present the tech line talk at a 3-day I was auditing, I clearly remember myself saying "Jeez, I wish I'd known that before".

For some, driving race cars is a 'natural'. I couldn't have told you where I braked, turned or apexed for a corner, I just braked when it seemed right and turned when it felt right, etc. After immersing myself in Skippy world, I recognized the benefit of structuring my driving with consistent, repetative actions. I spent more than a decade co-driving other guy's cars, and learned how to adapt to different cars, good or bad. After racing several rather bad cars, I realized I could alter my inputs to some degree to work around a car issue. This was the first time I was able to separate my actions from the car's actions. Wonderful enlightenment - you can't make a race car do anything, all you can do is ask it to do its best.

From the years and years of doing this - including much MX5 testing these days - it's clear to me that driving a race car is basically a craft, not unlike operating a piece of heavy equipment or a machine tool. Watch somebody really good 'work' a skid-steer or back-hoe and you'll see the same type of ballet we see in world class race drivers - an economy of input and a conservation of energy.

How does one learn this? In a word...experieince. Seat time is the key. The more you do this the better you get - period. The only shortcut is perhaps more natural aptitude than others. But clearly, driving a race can be a learned activity. No absolute natural aptitude is necessary as witnessed by the relative success of guys and gals who've worked hard enough and had enough seat time to become successful...at least until reaching a level of racing beyond what their aptitude and experience can produce.

Reminds me of a guy who won the midwest series many years ago. He'd come to Road America on Monday, lap all week and finally get down to a competitive time. He'd do well and win periodically, but when he came back to RA 6 weeks later, he was 2+ seconds off the pace again. Had to run Mon-Fri to get back to speed. Failed miserably when he went to the pro series, just didn't have enough apptitude to add to seat time to be successful at that level.

Another way to say it is this; speed comes from repetition and execution, not how hard you try. We all learn at different rates, so success will come from seat time, either today, tomorrow or next year. The best 'balance' between effort and risk is to focus on one single improvement in each session, and measure that improvement in tenth's. For some, competitiveness will come quickly, others will take longer - perhaps years.l

If it's not enjoyable to work slowly at the craft and accept very small successes, you're in the wrong sport. Ultimately, the reward is simply the absolute pleasure of operating the machine as efficiently as possible and being rewarded with not only the successful laptime, but the incredibly tactile rewards of operating the machine at optimum slip angles - the very edge of its performance envelope.

What I can confirm from MX5 testing at Sebring last week is that I get as much pure joy and pleasure from driving race cars today as I did racing karts in the early 70's. I'm truly blessed to be able to still do this, and as long as the 'ride' is still fun and I can still be comfortable, competitive and valuable in testing, I'll keep belting in!

Relax, work at the craft, let success happen, and enjoy the entire ride.

PB