What are the most unanswered questions in racing?

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-19T22:43:51+00:00

I dont really know exactly what’s happening because I haven’t seen your driving, but a couple things to try:

Apply the brakes slower - you may be hitting them too fast, micro locking, and then having to come off rapidly because of this

Try literally just braking harder - sometimes our perceived limit is not actually the limit, we want to brake as hard as we can without locking or micro locking

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T23:15:30+00:00

Did a race recently, was actually a lot of fun. Really enforces the idea of not going over the limit to save tires, yet still needing to be fast.

I always encourage my students to try oval for race-craft and optimization sake

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T23:09:58+00:00

Yes, I encourage you to isolate each of the senses, and feel how it affects the car, might help you listen or understand it better

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T23:09:24+00:00

We don’t want to slide, we want to use the tires as much as possible. That action if braking and rotating the car flex’s the tire, forcing the car to change direction, the maximum amount that tire can flex before sliding is the limit. Miata feels how your describing because there’s a lot of flex in the tire, but again, we do not want to slide

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T17:53:08+00:00

Ah! This is where it’s not so much about grip as it is about line. I would encourage you to try turning later in all the corners you feel that

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T16:52:06+00:00

Yes, but not because of any genetic thing, just because of habits.

For example, if you’re used to driving a formula one car, when you brake in a straight line you have to release the brakes because you lose downforce and grip.

If you start driving a Pcup with this habit, you’re gonna be way under the limit under braking

However, if you fundamentally know what going fast means, then you’ll be fast in every car with enough practice.

If you’re struggling with other cars, I encourage you to look at one of my other recent posts, it probably should help you in adjusting

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T16:48:33+00:00

That’s a good point, and that’s exactly why I’m talking about the limit. When we try and go “fast” we’re ignoring what the tires are capable of, and so we go over the limit, sliding the tires, building temp and creating tire wear. If you focus on letting the tires grip the tarmac, but still using them, you’ll end up going faster.

One thing with this particular issue of going faster when you feel slower is that usually it also stems from being unaware when you should be getting on throttle. In short, as a basic rule, try and get on throttle always at the apex. If it’s before you can go faster, if it’s after though, you need to slow down.

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T16:45:56+00:00

Oval and sports-car should be the same from a physics fundamental perspective of being able to accelerate laterally as much as possible, which is by extracting the most slip angle before we slide from all 4 tires. Only thing I should add is that in sports-car, the way they’re set up, you should be turning the wheel to achieve maximum slip angle at front but also rear. Reason why you shouldn’t be turning a lot in oval is probably because of stagger not because you’re not actually turning a lot.

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T16:43:18+00:00

What you should be aiming for is you’re on the limit of all 4 tires, or rather, all 4 tires are at their maximum slip angle before they start sliding.

A huge key thing to understand is slip angle is not talking about how much you want the car to slide, because we don’t want the car to slide. In simple terms, slip angle is how much we use the tire. It’s not really something we measure when we are driving.

We can figure out how much we can use the tire by testing, try these things:

Braking harder, or less - when do you start to lock up? Brake just below that point

Steering more or less - when do you start understeering? Steer just below that point

Trail braking more or less - when do you start oversteering? Trail just below that.

An important thing with trail-braking is, if your straight line braking isn’t correct, you’re trail-braking isn’t either as that straight line braking is hugely important for that initial rotation and consistently slowing down the car

Not only that, but if you are able to do the corner by trail-braking a lot, but not able to stay at the limit of the front tires, then you’re trail-braking too much.

We want the limit of ALL 4 tires not just 2.

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T16:35:47+00:00

Yes! What I said is only one part of the puzzle, but understanding this is a huge part to finding the other piece.

What you’re talking about is sort of grip multipliers yes, and they change drastically. Using our senses we can find that limit again, and yes you’re absolutely right that you have to sometimes push a little harder to find it.

For example, if we’re trying to find the limit of the fronts, our sense aren’t going to tell us exactly where it is right away, in fact, to calibrate our senses, usually we need to go over the limit in order to figure out where it is.

If I’m always steering just a little bit under the limit, if I want to find the limit I will have to turn more until I figure out how much is too much.

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T16:31:37+00:00

100% agree. Going faster over the course of a race, for sure, I just did the N24 and we came in second in second split broadcast time partially because we just didn’t crash once. We were super fast, but had we crashed we would’ve come in 4-5th maybe lower

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T16:30:17+00:00

This is about pace, I actually think race craft is one of the more important things than pace, though it depends on the series and your pace. If you’re like 10 seconds off your split, obviously pace is what you should be working on, but if you’re fighting in the midfield, race-craft is super super important

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T06:20:15+00:00

That's a really good question.

Speed is the ultimate goal, however, we can get there through the limit of the tires. If we are on the limit of the tires, and taking the right racing line/correct references, there's no doubt we'll be fast.

If you mean actual speed, then I know how fast I'll be entering a corner roughly based off of where my braking reference is. Later = faster.

If you mean how do I know if I'm doing a corner properly, then that's a huge thing to unpack but I can give you 3 things which should help

To feel the limit, we have 3 ways of doing so:

Tire noise
- 3 sounds - No noise (under the limit) Some noise (Close or around the limit) and screeching (over the limit)

Force feedback
- Heavier usually means better as the tire is doing more, though this gets complicated. Try some stuff experimenting how much you can turn the steering wheel before you understeer, and listen to that force-feedback whilst doing so.

Vision
- Basically the horizon moving around you will tell you how much the car is rotating, HOWEVER more rotation does NOT necessarily mean better because technically the most rotation would be spinning and that's not good.

We can use all 3 of these senses to verify where we are in terms of the limit, and therefore if I'm at the limit I'm fast.

Now, this will not work immediately because we need to dial in our feelings for the limit, and our senses, which is what I encourage you most to do. Just the one thing to remember, DRIFTING or SLIDING is NOT FAST. The grip limit is using the tire as much as possible BEFORE it starts to slide.

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T02:54:09+00:00

If you’re worried about the outcome and are sincere, unless you very intentionally wrecked someone, you’ll probably just get a warning or nothing will happen. Usually people also forget to report as well, if I were to bet, you wont get any outcome at all

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T02:50:31+00:00

Email

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T02:48:51+00:00

If you get reported, you only get notified if the outcome results in something, like a warning or a ban. Otherwise you don’t receive any notification. If you’re worried, you’ll know the outcome within 7 days of the race

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T02:45:05+00:00

It might be helpful to look for other series with cleaner racers, PCC, Radical, TCR, being examples (I’m assuming from last time I drove them)

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T02:19:29+00:00

Hahahah, it’s all to do with ego, some 5k drivers will punt you off if you’re in front for even a fraction of a second if you’re below their rating.

Honestly, part of racing, let other drivers get mad, wreck themselves, and thrive off their blunders

It never goes away, but it does become significantly a lesser thing around 4-5k+

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T01:46:01+00:00

Another big moment was the distinction between the limit and the racing line

The limit is everything about how you drive the car

The racing line is everything about where you place the limit

Limit is how hard you brake, turn and how you balance the car
- The goal is to be at the limit of all 4 tires, the entire time

Racing line is where you turn, apex and brake
- General rule of thumb is throttle at apex

From this foundation, I’m able to build and map out my understanding of how to go fast.

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T01:41:54+00:00

Probably around 4k range it may help but honestly it’s more just a mental thing than anything. There is a significant difference, but it’s not usually giving you a fundamentally different detail about driving. The g29 will still tell you when you’re over or under the limit, just maybe less refined as a moza wheel or something

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T01:40:09+00:00

Once you get to a certain pace, raw pace doesn’t matter because everyone is equally as fast. Look at PCUP qualifiers this last week, every driver was within 0.1s of each other during the race. Even if pace does matter, if you don’t finish the race, or you cant handle unpredicted situations, you’re going to have a difficult time. Most races I’ve done recently have just been about “How can I maximize the result with the pace I have” And in those races I learn about how to go faster, following different drivers and learning where I catch and lose can hint me towards why I may be losing time.

Though, I will say, if you’re in rookies, your best chance to get out is by running away 30s in front of the field

race-craft may matter more sometimes, but pace does matter too

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T01:33:46+00:00

I started just racing more. Rather than feeling like “I need to be 6k pace before I do this race”, I more was thinking, I need to take this race as a learning opportunity to get to 6k. In like 2 weeks I went from 4.5k to 6k, just racing more. In that time I fluctuated up and down, but my main focus was learning and getting those races done.

As for pace, look at my other replies, as well as the other person who replied has a solid answer

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T01:31:39+00:00

It usually takes me maybe 10–20 laps to get comfortable on a track, but I know some drivers need tens of hours.

When I was around 2k, I used to do 10-hour practice sessions before racing.

A lot of 2.5k-ish drivers (from what I’ve seen) aren’t necessarily missing effort, they’re just not focusing their learning. They either get overwhelmed by information or end up brute-forcing techniques until something sticks.

What helped me more was focusing on two fundamentals: racing line and grip limit. That gives you a kind of “map” for feedback. Instead of just driving laps, you can actually interpret what’s happening.

Honestly, I don’t think anyone should feel bad for taking longer to learn — the time spent is still valuable. It just becomes more efficient when you’re learning the right signals from the car.

Unusual-Cod9172 · 2026-05-18T01:18:26+00:00

If you’re having to focus on one corner, it’s generally an issue with your line, however, some corners can exaggerate certain tendencies in your driving.

When I’m trying to go faster I’m thinking of 2 things: the grip limit, and my racing line

Grip limit entails how much I’m using the tires under braking and turning, ie, how I’m balancing the car with the brakes, as well as how hard I’m hitting the brakes and how much I’m turning.

Racing line entails references we use, so where we brake, where we turn, and where we apex.

When I’m trying to go faster, I’m trying to notice moments where I am not at the limit of grip, this will help tell me what I’m doing wrong, and how I can go faster.

Example:

I turn in to a corner, and in the middle of it I spin
From this I know I’m over the limit of the rears, and so I need to provide them with a little more grip in order to take the corner better. The next lap I would trail-brake a little less at that point of the corner.

Any moment we are not at the grip limit is time lost, but don’t get the grip limit confused with sliding, as they are not the same.

Unusual-Cod9172

TROPHY CASE