Well, as of yesterday, I managed to lower my handicap below 100 for the
first time. Now, with all the talk of negative handicaps, I know this is
not that impressive, but it's a milestone for me. I've managed to take
off about 140 seconds during January (so far ;) ), so that's something.
If I can maintain this pace, I'll be breathing down Mr. Huttu's neck in
no time. :-)
Anyway, a lot of the discussion here seems to center on how to get your
handicap down from the 30-50 range into negative territory. I thought
I'd post a few things that I've learned and noticed in my quest for that
sub-100 number, in the hope that it might help some other beginners like
myself (I got GPL around November of 2000). So, without further ado, in
no particular order, with the disclaimer that I'm still not particularly
good myself, so take this advice for what it's worth, etc. etc., here
are my thoughts.
o Just getting around the 'Ring without crashing or spinning can take
30 or 40 seconds off your time when you're just starting out there.
o Learn to trail brake. No other technique has helped me more.
o Don't spend all your time trying to get to 1:29 at Monza.
Learning the other tracks is fun too, and the skills you develop
doing it will help your times elsewhere as well.
o Tracks like Spa and Monza are harder than they appear. Yes, they're
mostly straight, so it's relatively easy to get around them in a
more or less quick way. But because they're mostly straight, the
importance of the corners that they do have is greatly magnified.
If you're not *perfect* through Malmdy, Masta, and Lesmo #2,
your lap time will suffer greatly compared to someone who is.
You'll be losing considerably more time than it actually takes
to negotiate the corner in question, because your relative speed
will be down all through the following straight.
o You'll be faster at Monaco once you can negotiate all the hairpins
without using reverse...
o Zandvoort is a good track for learning two important techniques:
trail braking and the four wheel drift. I get around much of
Zandvoort by turning in early for the corner while lifting or
braking ever so slightly. The cars then just slides right around
the corner without losing much speed. Two thirds of the track
is taken this way. And I find that I'm faster at other tracks
after having driven Zandy for a while.
I really mean that last bit too. I had been lapping Zandvoort,
and set a new PB there. Then I went to Kyalami, and quickly and
effortlessly reset my PB there too (not hard-- it wasn't very good
to begin with). So the next afternoon, I went back to Kyalami,
feeling I had quite a bit more potential to lower my time.
To my chagrin and dismay, I couldn't even get back within a
second of my effortlessly set fast time from the previous day,
even after doing *75* laps. Frustrated, I parked GPL completely
for a couple days. When I came back to it, I did some other
things, found my way back to Zandy, and resumed my form. A new
PB at Kyalami followed almost effortlessly afterwards.
I think the reason for this may be that because Kyalami has so
many straight parts, it becomes less obvious that you need to
drift and trail brake the car in the corners that it does have.
But after driving twisty Zandvoort for a while, this gets worked
into your psyche, and you continue it elsewhere, to the betterment
of your lap times. That's my theory anyway.
o While learning Rouen, I had trouble taking Grsil flat, even though
it didn't look like it should be any harder than Monza's Ascari,
which I had been taking flat for some time. Eventually I
discovered that the difference was in the setup. I was running
at Monza with a setup that I downloaded from lightsout racing,
while at Rouen I was using the default. When I stiffened up the
roll bars, Grsil came under control. Now I imagine that a more
talented driver could have done it with the default setup, and
in fact, as I learned the line better I was able to do it with
less stiffness in the roll bars, but this definitely helped me
get going. The setup does matter, although obviously it's not
the only difference between a raw rookie struggling to stay on
the pavement and a world record holder. :)
o My best times at Monza have all come with other cars on the track.
Somehow chasing someone just inspires me to push that little
bit extra, I guess. I don't know if this means anything, but
it's just something I've noticed. I've never been under 1:30
in training mode.
o I only drive the Ferrari. I once tried the Lotus at Monza
thinking it might magically make me 3 seconds a lap faster.
It didn't. Looking at the world records, I'm so far off the
best Ferrari times that I don't think futzing with other cars
is the real route to getting better. It might improve my times
a little some places, but it won't improve my skill, so what's
the point? Improving my skill is what I'm really after.
o Don't spin at La Source. It's easy enough not to, and oh how
frustrating after an otherwise good lap. You're not going to
turn a 3:30 into a 3:20 by getting on the gas a microsecond
earlier here, so don't bother.
o I don't particularly enjoy hairpins.
o Somehow I'm just really fast at Maggotts. When following an
AI car, I invariably zoom up his tailpipe here, even if we've been
very even the rest of the lap. I'm not sure what I'm doing so
differently here. But I suspect this may be part of the reason
why Silverstone is one of the two tracks where I've beaten the
Papy benchmark. Anyway, all I do is turn in early, lift, slide
around the corner, and get back on the gas also a little early.
A technique I learned from Zandvoort, of course.
o The lefthanders are faster than the rights at Silverstone (except
for Woodcote), but those slow rights are harder to get right, for
me anyway. I do them better after some Zandy practice. Just a
touch of trail brake helps a lot.
So anyway, that's it. Again, my handicap is only +91.52 at the moment,
so don't listen to me, do what Huttu says instead. :) I don't doubt
that some of the things I mentioned above are bad habits that I'll need
to unlearn to improve further, so be careful paying any attention to me.
But I was just feeling effusive and decided to share. Thanks for reading
this far. :)
Marc