How do you become good at performance driving? Is it considered worthwhile to attend performance driving schools?
As it stands, I have no experience tracking or hooning. I'm interested in being up to amateur racing/tracking in a few years, or maybe trying to backup drive a lemons team.
Pic unrelated
go karts and baikus
Do people in their 20s actually do carting?
Many of my friends did and often won, but that was in their early teens.
You don't become good at it. You have to be born with the ability and the money. If you have to go to a school to learn it you don't have it. Most of the worlds best drivers started out in go karts when they were 7.
Don't care if I "have it" or not, as I'm not trying to be competitive or make money.
Just want to be able to track without embarrassing myself and myself throw a shitbox into an amateur league just to get track time.
Paul Newman started in his 40s and won 4 road racing championships and co-drove to 2nd place at Le Mans.
I'm pretty sure he was telling the guy to go to school while also insulting him
yeah it's fun grab a couple of friends with
he's not talking about becoming an F1 champion but honing his skills as a driver, retard
Do you do simracing
Start by doing some autocross (i.e. cone fagging). It's cheap and there's lots of events all over the place. There's usually SCCA guys who will hang out and give pointers to newbies. When you register they'll put you in the novice/orientation group.
Once you git gud at that you can decide if you want to take a basic weekend performance course, do a track-pro ride along, move up to rally cross, etc.
Karting was suggested and is a great method, but my issue with karting is that they are very precision vehicles. You will learn how to be gentle with them for sure, but no car you drive on the street or track will react anywhere near the same.
Solo/PDX events are the 2nd best option. As long as your car can pass inspection, you will be allowed to participate. And inspection is basically, "Are your tires on? Is your battery tied down? Do you have a seat belt? Ok, you're allowed on." Where I live, though, Solo events are claimed to be the cheapest but are actually twice as expensive as a track day when you calculate actual seat time. Seat time is what you want.
The best way to get to know your car and learn to drive well is on an actual race track where there are no speed limits, you have the ability to row through the gears at high rpm, and most track days require instructors to sit with you for the first year or two. So they will give you direct one-on-one input Not only is this the most effective in my opinion, but it is the cheapest because you can still have a shit car, take it to the track, and pay ~$300 for about 80 minutes of full track time. Memberships and participation often reduce that price tag. I know $300 seems pricey, but you need to look at it like this:
PDX/solos cost $25 a day, $90 yearly membership, and you will have approximately 3 minutes of actual drive time once everything is said and done, or 6 minutes if you go the 2nd half of the day for an additional $15 (these are prices near me). There are about 16 events a year, so the cost is as follows: $5.63 per event for yearly membership + $25 for first 3 minute run + $15 for 2nd 3 minute run = $45.63 for 6 minutes of seat time. Or, $7.61 per minute of seat time.
Track days near me are $300 a day. No additional fees or membership fees. You get 4 20 minute sessions. $300 / 80 minutes = $3.75 per minute of seat time. AND, you get instructor input.
you have to put a lot of time and practice into it. best way to sink tons of time into driving hard is on the street. id suggest going to your local toe gay late at night and drive hard
Spoken like someone that not only isn't good at driving, but also someone that doesn't know what they're talking about.
Just sign up for a track day near you and go out and have fun. If they have instructors available, ask them to ride with you (they might even ask if they can drive your car to show you, or let you ride in their car).
Karts aren't really as cheap as you think. A heavily loved lower end cart will cost about $500 and a top end new one upwards of $4500.
So basically just buying a used kart is already more expensive than a year of autocross in your shitbox.
I like yer style...
Reading this thread has me wondering.
What kind of experience or certification does one generally need to have to be accepted as a back-up driver at amateur events?
For that matter, is it possible to become a rally co-driver without much driving ability?
Driving shitboxes at speed
I'm still not good so maybe try something else
Autox and trackdays. A lot of times you can have an instructor go with you, and the experienced guys there will always give you advice if you ask
yeah but car maintenance is way more than kart. gotta factor that in
>go kart
>fm set up
>Miata is always the answer.
But you already own the car and are already doing maintenance on it. Amateur Autocross isn't all that stressful on a car and won't add to your regular maintenance schedule. Unless your car is not in proper working order, in which case you shouldn't be spending your money on frivolity like autocross and karts anyway.