Sleeper_08

The title says it all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HOm3r...1&feature=plcp

My three fastest laps were in my last session and are at the end of the video and include data

Argonaut

Dude...you have to give us more than the video. What are your impressions, how did you like the track, tell more about some of those other cars, how did they divide up the run groups, etc.

Nice job learning the track. 2:28 is pretty darn good. I've been there with some super quick, blow your doors off cars like that where I was doing nothing but staying out of the way. Really teaches you how to watch your mirrors...LOL. Any idea how fast the Robertson GT can lap? Somewhere in the 1:50 range would be my guess...yikes.

moochman4life

Man, I'm glad you finally got there! I can tell you were pumped by your previous thread talking about heading down and all your prep.

What I'm also happy about is now there is another vid of an 05-09 S197 out there...besides Brads (Argonauts) lol...haven't seen any in some time. I failed at my attempt.

Dude that's awesome stuff, but like Brad asked, what were your impressions? VIR left a lasting imprint on me, and I've been dying to get back.

Sleeper_08

Here is summary of my thoughts and feelings of the trip to VIR shown in the video above;

It is a long way from Toronto to VIR. I left my apartment at 5:30 Am and we got to our garage at the track at about 11:30 PM – 18 hours later. After unloading the cars from the trailer that is when I really appreciated the 2 minute trip from the garage up to our rooms. The rooms are plain but clean and include an internet connection.

The event was organized by David Murry and is different from most events. The track was open all day except for lunch and two brief bio breaks for the marshals. This meant you could run as much as you wanted over the two days. Passing was allowed on any straight without a point by and in any corner but only with a point by. I think the Porsche drivers defined a straight as any piece of track where you not turning for about 18 inches.

I have not been to VIR before but have about 25 track days over 3 years on 4 different tracks including Mosport. In preparation I watched Randy Pobst’s video quite a few times. My instructor, Gerry Low, also felt that trail braking was very important at VIR and so we worked on this at one of my local tracks the 2 weeks before we went. Because I am not able to heel and toe this meant that any downshifts had to wait until after the braking was finished.

My first session at VIR was both exhilarating and scary. It seemed that every car was on track and all of them were running much faster than I. As usual the videos do not give any real indication of how severe the elevation changes are and at VIR some of them are pretty severe. Thus there were cars in my first session that were passing me twice in one lap! The Porsche drivers weren’t taking hostages, especially of Mustang drivers, and at times it looked like they were parked in my trunk! This tends to affect your focus but gradually I was able to get faster and faster.

There were also quite a few offs and at one point an Acura SCCA car, that I was catching started blowing lots of blue smoke going into turn 1. My instructor told me to get as far to the outside as I could as quickly as I could and we didn’t hit him and he did not spew oil. Unfortunately my video was not running for that session.

With a 275/30/18 tire size I expected top end to be a problem and it was. On both of the straights it would wind up and hit the 6,250 rpm redline in fourth. I tried going to fifth but the data showed it actually slowed me down so I just left it in fourth and ran along just under the redline. This worked out around 132 MPH/215 KPH. In the climbing esses top speeds were in the 110 MPH/185 KPH range.

The combination of turn 10 and Oak Tree is quite similar to turns 4 and 5, Moss Corner, at Mosport except that at Mosport the elevation changes are more severe and the speeds are higher. As you can hear on the video my instructor was urging me to go faster through turn 10.

The trail braking worked well and on the data you can see it as a red area while turning. I was also using the curbs per Randy’s video and my car felt fine doing so. The David Murry instructors were teaching to stay off the curbs and to brake in a straight line. This is an example of how different instructors have different approaches.

My car can pull up to 1 G on a level corner and by the end of the second day I was generally running around .7/.8 G with excursions up to .9/.95 G in the slower corners. This meant there some margin, which was consistent with my #1 objective of being able to drive the car home.

By the end of the second day the number of cars on track had dropped significantly and for my final session I had a clear track for a lot of laps. This is when I did my best lap of 2:28.

The car ran like a charm and never skipped a beat. To give her a treat I used the 100 octane available at the track. Brake pad wear was minimal and the rotors still look like new. There were no signs of brake fade but driver fade was noticeable.

It is a great track and I had a great time but will probably not go back. There are other tracks closer to me such as Watkins Glen and Mid Ohio that it would also be nice to try.

Jeffk

VIR is fun. We went up last month for a charity event and had a blast!

Are your vids uploaded somewhere? I'd love to see them.

Thanks for sharing your experience with us.

Sleeper_08

Do a search for frederickmith on You Tube to find my videos.

Jeffk

Duh! I was on the forum on my phone and didn't see the first post. Sorry about that. Looks like you had a blast. Can see the progression of your confidence in the video.

hwm3

Great video and review.