Learning To Drive Faster

So you've been racing or autocrossing for a while and now you're ready to take it to the next level. Let's talk about some tools and ideas for improving yourself:

Read Books About The Sport

There are some great books out there on the subject of being a faster driver. The book, Going Faster! Mastering The Art Of Race Driving by Carl Lopez and Danny Sullivan is an Excellent place to start but by no means the only one you should read. Read those books, read them again, and put what you learn to good use.

Go To Racing Schools

There are a number of great schools designed to teach you to be a better driver. For autocross I've attended the Evolution Performance Driving School and was a great experience. They hold events all over the country and they have different programs for the various skill levels of drivers. For road racers therer are schools at pretty much every track as well as places like Bondurant Racing School in Arizona.

Get A Camera And Record Your Runs

If you record your runs and review them back to back you may see places where you are strong and places where you are weak. Of course, the go to camera is the GoPro and their GoPro Hero4 Silver seems to be the latest one for recording racing. Even better than just recording your runs, have a better driver co-drive in your car and compare recordings side by side. This way you will easily see where you can improve, and you will know what to do to improve.

Ride Along With Pros

Every group has those drivers that are pulling amazing times. They are usually nationals attendees and some clubs even have some champions in their ranks. See if you can ride along with them multiple times during an event so you can learn from what they do. Heck, off to buy them lunch for their troubles and pick their brains while you eat.

Have A Better Driver Co-Drive Your Car

This is a nice cheap way to learn to go faster. Have someone that is a better driver then you share your car for an event and watch what they do. Ride along on their runs and have them ride with you and critique. Just be sure to listen to what they say!

Get A Data Logger

Lately there have been a number of apps geared toward our sport come out and from what I've seen they can be a great tool. These programs are capable of recording exactly where you are on course and your speed. They show you, down to the inch, how far off the apex of a turn you were as well as corner entry, corner exit, and straight away speeds. Most work with iOS or Android so they really don't require much in the way of equipment, save for a much improved GPS antenna and OBD plug in. I'm planning on giving Solostorm a try since it seems to be the go to app for autocrossing.

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