There's one thing that I think rapidly improves lap times (once handling
is sorted out) and that's learning to hustle the car in the fast corners.
It's not something I learned in any class I ever took-Dick Barbour just
told me at a party "If you're going to really race you have to learn to
hustle the car in the faster turns. The fiddly stuff has very little time
difference unless you're blowing it completely, But fast turns at the
beginning or end of a straight are where you win races."
So what does that mean? Simply that you have to use up all the turn. If
you can position the car anyplace else in the turn but on the line and
still get through it, then you're not hustling the car. Seat time only
helps if something different is going on at the end of it. You've got to
really concentrate on perfecting turns and knowing where the edge is. Most
times you find it by going a little past it (oops, so that's how this turn
looks going backwards). I'm still edging up on quite a few turns at the
tracks I run frequently, but I've taken big chunks out of my lap time by
pushing myself harder in the sweepers. There's a turn at the end of the
straight at Pacific Raceway in Kent, WA that I used to brake hard and drop
to third for. Now I'm staying in fourth and just tapping the brake. I'm
pretty sure it can be done flat out with some margin for error. I'll get
there.
Of course Dan gurney said "It's better to come in slow and come out fast
than it is to come in fast and come out dead." But the sequence most books
recommend is first learning to manage entrance speed, then exit speed,
then mid turn speed. You can't jump from one to three and see any
improvement, but hustling the car happens in the middle of the turn.
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