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Old 09-21-2007, 07:22 PM   #1
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Racing School

Took my brother to racing school for his birthday at Summit Point in WV, where we worked on our road racing skills in Factory Five Cobras. It was an absolute blast! The school is run by a company called Racing Adventures and I highly recommend it. It was 20 minutes of classroom each day and then 7 hours in the cars, with trackside instruction betrween each skill session. The second picture was taken today, when we were finished for the day and exhausted. I may be the one who gained weight, but my "little" brother is getting pretty gray.





I have some in car and pit view video that I'll post when I get to it.

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Old 09-21-2007, 08:20 PM   #2
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DAMN, that's an awesome gift! How much?

-David
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Old 09-21-2007, 08:43 PM   #3
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o sweet dude....thats an awesome gift. ur bro is very lucky.

7 hrs, thats sick, in those cars, even sicker.
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Old 09-21-2007, 08:49 PM   #4
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They have a bunch of different options starting at $499 for half a day, if you bring your own car. We did two full days, Levels I and II, and used their cars, of course. It was just over $2,000 each, for the cars, instruction, the use of firesuits and helmets, in car videos, 8x10s of us by our cars, t-shirts, hats, lunches for us and our wives, and a gift certificate for my brother, sent with a 1/18 scale model of the Cobra he'd be driving.

It was worth every penny. Just the video my Sister-in Law shot of me falling over while trying to get my fat ass into the driving suit was worth the price of admission. Man, we had fun, and we learned a lot too.

The cars are spec racers, built just for the track. I've been toying with the idea of building the street car version for myself for years. Well...let's just say I should never have let myself drive one. I'm thinking dark, dark green, almost black...
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Old 09-21-2007, 08:57 PM   #5
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That sounds like a great time for sure...

I just had my second go round in a Road Racing open wheel car last week at Pocono and I was able to bring along two of my brothers...
...needless to say anytime I see "racing school" as the title of a thread I get all fired up. There is just nothing like it!

Question for you...with only 20 minutes of class time did they spend much time discussing a good break set and or rev match downshifting?...or is there time spent reviewing at the track...hell 7 hours of seat time is awesome any time you can get it but the class time and instruction passed along really made the difference to me especially the first time around.

If you have another chance to get to the track again you gotta check out this school...and I have nothing to do with the school, they just blew me away both times out.


PS this is not a pic of my day as I haven't pulled mine off the camera yet...
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Old 09-21-2007, 09:14 PM   #6
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That's a smokin gift! Lucky little bro for sure. Who won? hehe
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Old 09-21-2007, 09:28 PM   #7
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At trackside, you discuss an exercise and then practice what you learned. Once you have it down, you come in, have your questions answered and move on to the next discussion and drill. If a student is having difficulty with any part of it, he is called in to the pits and it is discussed in greater detail. An instructor only rides with you if necessary. I think there was an excellent balance of instruction and driving experience.

The first day was all about balance and line. We worked on threshold braking, avoidance exercises, etc. There was no discussion of rev match downshifting. That's probably in a later level. Most helpful for me was a walk of the entire track, with the instructors, to discuss braking, turn-in, apexes, etc, while actually standing there looking through the turns. Before lunch we did 28 laps of Mother Goose to solidify the morning's lessons. Each lap got progressively faster until we were moving through at a pretty good clip. After lunch, was open session for the rest of the day, but no passing.

Day two was mainly about learning to pass. One exercise that was nerve-racking but helpful was lapping as fast as we could without using the brakes.

During a discussion of braking, turning and contact patches, one of the instructors recommended open wheel schools, like you've done, because you can really see how you are affecting the balance of the car, just by observing the front suspension. I think I may try it at some point.
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Old 09-22-2007, 06:31 AM   #8
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That is an awesome gift!
I would love to get behind the wheel of a Cobra!
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Old 09-22-2007, 07:56 AM   #9
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...with this course you are allowed to pass on the straight and drive as hard or as tame as you want....the other great thing is that once you have been given the last bit of instruction on track it is just you and the other students from the class out there. The instructors each take a position at a particular turn and after each session they provide car specific feedback about the line your taking, your break points, your up reving into the downshifts and anything they see in that particular turn...

..sounds like this track day would be a great lead into the school you attended.

When all is said and done the unfortunate reality is that not many people get to experience either of these types of schools because of the cost associated.

There would be alot more people into racing if they could get into the car just once!
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Old 09-22-2007, 08:03 AM   #10
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Looks like a blast...

but how about a PCA DE?
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Old 09-22-2007, 10:52 AM   #11
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I thought I'd never do a PCA DE because I didn't want to hammer my car or bury it in a wall, but after yesterday, I may start doing some.

Before my Brother and his wife left this morning to go home, we went to breakfast and discussed attending the more advanced courses, which are only held in Vegas and Calgary.

My Sister-in-Law said that she wants to take the Level I and II courses to catch up with us before we move on. My wife is very much still on the fence. The unfortunate thing is that had my Sister-in-Law expressed an interest on Thursday, we could've gotten her into our class, no problem. One of the guys scheduled to attend cancelled at the last minute and left a hole in the schedule.
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Old 09-22-2007, 11:08 AM   #12
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What an awesome weekend, congrats! I talked with the guys from Factory Five at the car show this year at Lowes Motor Speedway. Nice guys and cars, they sent me DVD and book on all the cars and packages they offer.

My Simpson helmet just came in yesterday, Getting ready for my first PCS DE the first weekend in October.
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Old 09-22-2007, 11:22 AM   #13
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That's a terrific price, $1000 for 7 HOURS of on-track driving in someone else's car. It's hard to beat that.

-David
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Old 09-24-2007, 12:10 PM   #14
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Hey Grizzly, do you have a link to this school? I'd like to check out their different options, sounds fun...
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Old 09-24-2007, 03:11 PM   #15
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Hey Grizzly, do you have a link to this school? I'd like to check out their different options, sounds fun...
Here you go, HIFI. It was a great time.

http://www.racingadventures.com/

I hope to post a couple of videos soon. My brother took the DVDs that we shot home to edit. The in-car video was shot by Racing Adventures at our request. It may take a little while to get those, as the instructors won't be back to home base for a couple of weeks.

I picked this school over most of the others because:

a) it's road racing and not an oval like the NASCAR schools

b) you drive a lot as opposed to just a few laps (most of the oval track schools offered 8 laps).

c) because the Cobras looked to be just too friggin' cool (and they were)!

And no, I have no affiliation with this school.

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