I won't go down that path much and appreciate that you didn't either, but if I could have it my way, the worms wouldn't be able to find me anyway. I want to be buried, probably in my Mustang, at the inside of Turn 1 at MAM, with my own excavator, which can dig substantially further down than worms can.
Although come to think of it, that's a somewhat boring turn in the Mustang. It's the Subaru that's an absolute hoot there and, as it turns out, so's the Datsun Fairlady. Both of which I've learned really CAN take that turn without braking.
What makes it more of a "hoot" is that I usually prove this in the most adrenalin-packed way possible. By not knowing I'm gonna do it until I'm doing it.
When the brake pedal suddenly becomes an answering machine. "We're not taking calls right now, but feel free to jab the pedal rapidly and repeatedly while praying steam will become compressible enough to matter... Beep"
In nearly any situation where that happens in the Subaru, I've decided even before the second frantic try at the pedal that I'm gonna go ahead and try to take the turn rather than being smarter and driving off the track in a controlled straight line.
On a surface smooth enough to reduce the chance of a roll, sliding sideways is a perfectly good way to scrub off speed. Especially in a turn you're in the habit of drifting through anyway.
Have had that scenario happen with a student in the car. Had I checked later I might've found that his foot left a dent in my firewall when he quickly tried his own brake pedal on realizing mine hadn't done anything. I calmly said through the helmet mic "We're alright, so relax and enjoy what a rush this one's gonna be."
Okay, the season's only been over for a month and I'm jonesing so bad for the track I somehow segue from religion to road courses? Sure am glad my best track buds are gonna be down here for indoor karting in about a week.
Edit: Actually, I haven't had a chance to prove the Datsun can do T1 with no brakes but as I was learning the car, I was braking a lot later and less. Because the fastest I could get out of it on that straight was 102 mph. And despite going through the turn faster and faster, never did feel like I'd reached its limit there, even when I'd progressed to doing just a longish "confidence brake" there to scrub off some speed and load the weight onto the nose of the car for turning. |
