Novice driving mistakes
08-06-2011, 11:07 PM
#1
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Novice driving mistakes
Feel free to move this to the racing section, or other section if you feel that it would fit better somewhere else, I just thought that it was relevant to cars in general, so I am posting here.
I am currently considering writing a few things about cars/racing/driving for a friend's blog, and thought that I would gauge opinions of my writing style. I have been told that I occasionally come off a bit boring, condescending, and arrogant when I try to write things like this. If it is not terrible, I may try other topics.
An Idea of my writing style, and thoughts that I express.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zA4HClBMfw
Rookie driving mistakes:
Show me one hundred videos of drivers who lack in performance driving experience crash, and I will show you 99 videos where an accident is caused not by too much speed, or poor road conditions, but by poor decisions, and poor actions by the driver.
Watch the video of the WRX crash again. Now try to explain what happens at 0:19. The obvious answer is that the driver loses control of the vehicle resulting in a crash. The more blunt answer is that the driver made one of the dumbest, and most common mistakes that a novice driver can make. Watch again, and put it on full screen if you have not already. As the driver turns into the corner he is carrying a too much speed for public roads, but still within the limits of what the car is capable of. It turns in fine, is carrying speed through the corner fine, the front is not pushing wide, and the rear is not stepping out. At 0:19, the driver of the WRX sees the motorcycle in the oncoming lane. This makes the driver nervous, causing him to hit the brakes. Watch closely, and you will see his brake lights come on BEFORE he loses control. This action upsets the balance of the car causing the rear to come out. At this point, like most newer drivers who have watched too many racing movies, he tries for the save with a bit of opposite lock, and like most newer drivers, over corrects and slingshots himself into the outside of the corner, and ultimately the wall.
Now let's take a more scientific, and closer look at why each of the mistakes the driver made had such a large, and ultimately bitter result.
The first mistake was driving on a public road beyond his own ability. That in itself is a rather obvious mistake, and one that is easy enough to see.
The second mistake was jumping to the brakes mid corner while perilously close to the limit of adhesion. Doing this is a more extreme version of lift-off. Lift-off is an action where you do just that, lift-off the throttle mid corner. Depending on situation, and car setup, it can be a very advantageous method used to help get the car to turn in how you want at a higher speed than you could otherwise, but that is for a later discussion. For a novice driver, any form of lift-off is not a great idea. What happens is as you lift off the throttle, the car decelerates, causing the car to lean forwards. This leaning action transfers more of the car's weight to the front wheels. This weight transfer is what causes the spin. As there is less weight pressing the wheels into the ground, there is less grip. At the same time there is much more grip in the front. Since there is now more grip in the front, and less in the rear, the front of the car now turns more sharply towards the inside of the corner, and the rear of the vehicle starts to slide towards the outside. This rotating motion causes the car to spin. Every bit of this chain reaction is made even worse if the brakes are applied, since there will be even more weight transfer.
This is where the third mistake takes place. As a knee-jerk reaction to the car beginning to spin, the driver will attempt to "counter-steer" the vehicle, by steering towards the outside of the corner. Since the front of the vehicle still has much more grip from the decelerating weight transfer, the front of the vehicle darts towards the outside of the corner too quickly for the driver to react causing the crash. This is the over correction that many people tend to do, as they have not acquired the very delicate "feel" for what a vehicle is doing, that can only be attained through experience.
So what should you do then? Well to be honest, if you haven't "been there and done that" before, then you will almost certainly end up exacerbating the situation by trying to correct. Assuming that you are driving a manual transmission car, I would highly recommend that should you ever find yourself in a spin, follow the "Both feet in, don't try to be a hero." advice that most driving instructors will give a novice driver at their first track day. Which by the way, if you are the type of driver who likes to drive fast in the canyons, you should have already gotten this advice from a driving instructor at the lapping days/performance driving school that you have already gone to.
There will be times when driving at the limit of grip, (which really should b done at the track), that you do want to load up the front of the car either entering a corner, or mid corner. This type of technic is a little bit more advanced, and if you don't already have a few track days under your belt, you have other things to spend your time learning first to improve your driving. However, if you are feeling a bit adventuresome, which face it, if you are a performance riving enthusiast, you probably are, these are a few techics that can be very advantageous to know. One is called "Lift-off", and the other is "Trail-braking."
Lift-off is when you are going through a corner, and you either feel the front end pushing a little wide, or you just want to turn a little more quickly than you are. It is very simple, you just lift-off the throttle. Depending on car setup, road conditions, road camber, engine size, and a large number of other factors, this will have varying effects as to how the car reacts. For instance, in my Miata with my track setup, I can lift off the throttle mid corner, and the car simply turns in a little more. The extra front grip, and the reduced rear grip causes the car to rotate slightly resulting in that better turning performance. It is very easy in my car since it has perfect 50/50 weight distribution, and the engine is small and relatively light. The vehicle distribution weight is important since is keeps the car fairly balanced as it decelerates. In a car like a Lotus Elise, this action is much more difficult since the rear of the vehicle weighs more than the front, so as the vehicle decelerates, the rear has more momentum, and tries to keep going. This often results in a spin. Engine size also has an effect since what is causing the decelerating is the lift in throttle slowing down the engine, which in turn slows down the vehicle. With a heavy engine, the decelerating motion can be more significant, causing more weight transfer, and more rotation. In the end, the only way to know how your car will react is to do it. And I guarantee you, that the first time you do this, you will want to be on a race track, or other safe environment where there are not trees or walls to hit. The effects of lift-off can be even more exciting in a FWD car. Most FWD cars have most of the weight in the front, this means that there is already an imbalance compared to cars closer to 50/50 weight. What really makes lift-off more exaggerated in a FWD is that now the decelerating action is placed on the front wheels. This means that not only is the car slowing, and there is very little grip in the rear, but also, there is nothing slowing down the rear of the vehicle, so much like a car with more rear weight bias, the rear of the car wants to continue going, while the front is trying to stop. This causes very quick oversteer, which many even moderately experienced drivers find hard to control.
Trail-braking is a bit more technical, and more difficult to do. The idea behind this is to enter a corner faster than you would otherwise be able to. As you enter your braking zone coming up to a corner, you carry a little extra speed. You then release the brakes most of the way as you turn in. Ordinarily the front end of the car would now push wide, as you are asking to front tires to do too much work, and they are unable to turn the vehicle as sharply as you are asking them to at this speed. The tricky part here is to find the perfect amount of braking force needed to transfer just enough weight to the front wheels that you get enough extra grip in the front to get the car to turn, without leaving yourself too little grip in the rear causing you to over-rotate, and spin. (Be ready with quick hands, and those good counter-steering skills that you should have long before trying this.) You can also do a form of trail-braking mid corner called Left-foot-braking. This is advantageous in that you can transfer weight to the front mid corner like you would with lift-off, but now you can do it without lifting off the throttle. This becomes a very large advantage especially in turbo cars, as this means that you turbo does not un-spool. But honestly, I am not practiced enough with left foot braking to be giving any type of lecture about it.
So what is a situation in where a Novice driver should have tried one of these technics, but didn't?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3D6HXocBFlY
At around 0:14 the white Evo enters a decreasing radius corner too quickly. As he increases his steering angle around 0:19, you can see that he continues to push wide. He is asking the front tires to do too much. He is going too fast for the tires to get the vehicle turned. In the following seconds, he continues to turn, and if you watch the angle of the left front wheel, you can see how much the wheel is turned, and how the car is not following that angle since there is not enough front grip. As he continues to push wide, he eventually ends up in the dirt, resulting in a spin. Had the driver either lifted throttle, or used the brakes to transfer more weight, and in turn more grip to the front wheels, he could have gotten the car turned enough to make the corner. That said, with an obvious lack in experience in this type of situation, he likely would have transferred too much weight, and did exactly what the WRX in the first video did.
There are many mistakes that newer performance drivers make, and most of their crashes are caused by simple ones that involve improper weight transfer, causing either the front or the rear of the vehicle to lose traction.
Wow, that was a lot longer than I thought that it would be, and it's late, so I am not reading back through it to see if any of it makes sense...
I am currently considering writing a few things about cars/racing/driving for a friend's blog, and thought that I would gauge opinions of my writing style. I have been told that I occasionally come off a bit boring, condescending, and arrogant when I try to write things like this. If it is not terrible, I may try other topics.
An Idea of my writing style, and thoughts that I express.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zA4HClBMfw
Rookie driving mistakes:
Show me one hundred videos of drivers who lack in performance driving experience crash, and I will show you 99 videos where an accident is caused not by too much speed, or poor road conditions, but by poor decisions, and poor actions by the driver.
Watch the video of the WRX crash again. Now try to explain what happens at 0:19. The obvious answer is that the driver loses control of the vehicle resulting in a crash. The more blunt answer is that the driver made one of the dumbest, and most common mistakes that a novice driver can make. Watch again, and put it on full screen if you have not already. As the driver turns into the corner he is carrying a too much speed for public roads, but still within the limits of what the car is capable of. It turns in fine, is carrying speed through the corner fine, the front is not pushing wide, and the rear is not stepping out. At 0:19, the driver of the WRX sees the motorcycle in the oncoming lane. This makes the driver nervous, causing him to hit the brakes. Watch closely, and you will see his brake lights come on BEFORE he loses control. This action upsets the balance of the car causing the rear to come out. At this point, like most newer drivers who have watched too many racing movies, he tries for the save with a bit of opposite lock, and like most newer drivers, over corrects and slingshots himself into the outside of the corner, and ultimately the wall.
Now let's take a more scientific, and closer look at why each of the mistakes the driver made had such a large, and ultimately bitter result.
The first mistake was driving on a public road beyond his own ability. That in itself is a rather obvious mistake, and one that is easy enough to see.
The second mistake was jumping to the brakes mid corner while perilously close to the limit of adhesion. Doing this is a more extreme version of lift-off. Lift-off is an action where you do just that, lift-off the throttle mid corner. Depending on situation, and car setup, it can be a very advantageous method used to help get the car to turn in how you want at a higher speed than you could otherwise, but that is for a later discussion. For a novice driver, any form of lift-off is not a great idea. What happens is as you lift off the throttle, the car decelerates, causing the car to lean forwards. This leaning action transfers more of the car's weight to the front wheels. This weight transfer is what causes the spin. As there is less weight pressing the wheels into the ground, there is less grip. At the same time there is much more grip in the front. Since there is now more grip in the front, and less in the rear, the front of the car now turns more sharply towards the inside of the corner, and the rear of the vehicle starts to slide towards the outside. This rotating motion causes the car to spin. Every bit of this chain reaction is made even worse if the brakes are applied, since there will be even more weight transfer.
This is where the third mistake takes place. As a knee-jerk reaction to the car beginning to spin, the driver will attempt to "counter-steer" the vehicle, by steering towards the outside of the corner. Since the front of the vehicle still has much more grip from the decelerating weight transfer, the front of the vehicle darts towards the outside of the corner too quickly for the driver to react causing the crash. This is the over correction that many people tend to do, as they have not acquired the very delicate "feel" for what a vehicle is doing, that can only be attained through experience.
So what should you do then? Well to be honest, if you haven't "been there and done that" before, then you will almost certainly end up exacerbating the situation by trying to correct. Assuming that you are driving a manual transmission car, I would highly recommend that should you ever find yourself in a spin, follow the "Both feet in, don't try to be a hero." advice that most driving instructors will give a novice driver at their first track day. Which by the way, if you are the type of driver who likes to drive fast in the canyons, you should have already gotten this advice from a driving instructor at the lapping days/performance driving school that you have already gone to.
There will be times when driving at the limit of grip, (which really should b done at the track), that you do want to load up the front of the car either entering a corner, or mid corner. This type of technic is a little bit more advanced, and if you don't already have a few track days under your belt, you have other things to spend your time learning first to improve your driving. However, if you are feeling a bit adventuresome, which face it, if you are a performance riving enthusiast, you probably are, these are a few techics that can be very advantageous to know. One is called "Lift-off", and the other is "Trail-braking."
Lift-off is when you are going through a corner, and you either feel the front end pushing a little wide, or you just want to turn a little more quickly than you are. It is very simple, you just lift-off the throttle. Depending on car setup, road conditions, road camber, engine size, and a large number of other factors, this will have varying effects as to how the car reacts. For instance, in my Miata with my track setup, I can lift off the throttle mid corner, and the car simply turns in a little more. The extra front grip, and the reduced rear grip causes the car to rotate slightly resulting in that better turning performance. It is very easy in my car since it has perfect 50/50 weight distribution, and the engine is small and relatively light. The vehicle distribution weight is important since is keeps the car fairly balanced as it decelerates. In a car like a Lotus Elise, this action is much more difficult since the rear of the vehicle weighs more than the front, so as the vehicle decelerates, the rear has more momentum, and tries to keep going. This often results in a spin. Engine size also has an effect since what is causing the decelerating is the lift in throttle slowing down the engine, which in turn slows down the vehicle. With a heavy engine, the decelerating motion can be more significant, causing more weight transfer, and more rotation. In the end, the only way to know how your car will react is to do it. And I guarantee you, that the first time you do this, you will want to be on a race track, or other safe environment where there are not trees or walls to hit. The effects of lift-off can be even more exciting in a FWD car. Most FWD cars have most of the weight in the front, this means that there is already an imbalance compared to cars closer to 50/50 weight. What really makes lift-off more exaggerated in a FWD is that now the decelerating action is placed on the front wheels. This means that not only is the car slowing, and there is very little grip in the rear, but also, there is nothing slowing down the rear of the vehicle, so much like a car with more rear weight bias, the rear of the car wants to continue going, while the front is trying to stop. This causes very quick oversteer, which many even moderately experienced drivers find hard to control.
Trail-braking is a bit more technical, and more difficult to do. The idea behind this is to enter a corner faster than you would otherwise be able to. As you enter your braking zone coming up to a corner, you carry a little extra speed. You then release the brakes most of the way as you turn in. Ordinarily the front end of the car would now push wide, as you are asking to front tires to do too much work, and they are unable to turn the vehicle as sharply as you are asking them to at this speed. The tricky part here is to find the perfect amount of braking force needed to transfer just enough weight to the front wheels that you get enough extra grip in the front to get the car to turn, without leaving yourself too little grip in the rear causing you to over-rotate, and spin. (Be ready with quick hands, and those good counter-steering skills that you should have long before trying this.) You can also do a form of trail-braking mid corner called Left-foot-braking. This is advantageous in that you can transfer weight to the front mid corner like you would with lift-off, but now you can do it without lifting off the throttle. This becomes a very large advantage especially in turbo cars, as this means that you turbo does not un-spool. But honestly, I am not practiced enough with left foot braking to be giving any type of lecture about it.
So what is a situation in where a Novice driver should have tried one of these technics, but didn't?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3D6HXocBFlY
At around 0:14 the white Evo enters a decreasing radius corner too quickly. As he increases his steering angle around 0:19, you can see that he continues to push wide. He is asking the front tires to do too much. He is going too fast for the tires to get the vehicle turned. In the following seconds, he continues to turn, and if you watch the angle of the left front wheel, you can see how much the wheel is turned, and how the car is not following that angle since there is not enough front grip. As he continues to push wide, he eventually ends up in the dirt, resulting in a spin. Had the driver either lifted throttle, or used the brakes to transfer more weight, and in turn more grip to the front wheels, he could have gotten the car turned enough to make the corner. That said, with an obvious lack in experience in this type of situation, he likely would have transferred too much weight, and did exactly what the WRX in the first video did.
There are many mistakes that newer performance drivers make, and most of their crashes are caused by simple ones that involve improper weight transfer, causing either the front or the rear of the vehicle to lose traction.
Wow, that was a lot longer than I thought that it would be, and it's late, so I am not reading back through it to see if any of it makes sense...
08-07-2011, 03:17 AM
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You write much better than I can, but just FYI:
You mean technique not technic.
--edit-
Upon further research, apparently technic can be used interchangeably with technique. It is just not commonly used, and is limited to American spelling..
So what is a situation in where a Novice driver should have tried one of these technics, but didn't?
--edit-
Upon further research, apparently technic can be used interchangeably with technique. It is just not commonly used, and is limited to American spelling..
08-07-2011, 06:10 AM
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It seems to me that people believe that public roads are their own private playground. It's good that douchebag crashed, too bad he isn't maimed enough not to put other people in danger ever again. Too bad he somehow didn't crash into the chase car and maim him too. Two sets of retards less on the road would be fine by me.
Everyone thinks 300Hp isn't much. They get on sights like this and read about 500+Hp AMGs, Lambos and Ferraris and never realize that this is crazy HP levels. Most of these kids crashing have never driven a truly terrible chassis with 450HP, skinny little tires, and no driver aids. They have no respect for a fast car, they think that traction and yaw control are to help them go faster when playing around. They play video games and grow up thinking that an Evo or WRX is a toy because that is what they get used to seeing. They don't understand that these cars hold on right up until they don't, and when they don't they crash in a big way. They watch TopGear and those imbeciles slide cars around like they are toys and every retard on the planet thinks they can do the same up and down my street.
The mistake isn't that he let off the throttle or hit the brakes at the wrong time, the mistake is that he left the house in the morning thinking he was on a private road course and that his fancy little rice burner would do all the work for him. All I can say is that I'm glad he didn't kill that guy on the bike just before he crashed.
Everyone thinks 300Hp isn't much. They get on sights like this and read about 500+Hp AMGs, Lambos and Ferraris and never realize that this is crazy HP levels. Most of these kids crashing have never driven a truly terrible chassis with 450HP, skinny little tires, and no driver aids. They have no respect for a fast car, they think that traction and yaw control are to help them go faster when playing around. They play video games and grow up thinking that an Evo or WRX is a toy because that is what they get used to seeing. They don't understand that these cars hold on right up until they don't, and when they don't they crash in a big way. They watch TopGear and those imbeciles slide cars around like they are toys and every retard on the planet thinks they can do the same up and down my street.
The mistake isn't that he let off the throttle or hit the brakes at the wrong time, the mistake is that he left the house in the morning thinking he was on a private road course and that his fancy little rice burner would do all the work for him. All I can say is that I'm glad he didn't kill that guy on the bike just before he crashed.
08-07-2011, 07:02 AM
#4
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Upon further research, apparently technic can be used interchangeably with technique. It is just not commonly used, and is limited to American spelling..
The mistake isn't that he let off the throttle or hit the brakes at the wrong time, the mistake is that he left the house in the morning thinking he was on a private road course and that his fancy little rice burner would do all the work for him. All I can say is that I'm glad he didn't kill that guy on the bike just before he crashed.
Canyon driving is a very debatable subject. My personal opinion is that there is a HUGE difference between a fun canyon drive, and driving at the limit of grip, where a small change in surface conditions, unseen bump, or need to stop quickly will result in a crash. I personally get my aggressive driving out of the way at the track. Though I have been known to go do a fun drive in the canyons. The difference is that I am nowhere near the limit of grip when I do a canyon run, so if I do have to make an unforeseen maneuver, there is plenty of grip to do so. That is one advantage to daily driving the a car that is setup for track use, there is WAY more grip than should ever be used on the streets, so there is always more grip than I am attempting to use. Plus, if I do happen to hit an oil slick, blown fluids from another car, ice in the winter, or other road hazard that would get the car sideways under any driving speeds, that I do have the track experience to have a very good chance of correcting most any slide.
I am a VERY strong supporter of having people have to do performance driving, or at least a skid-pad before getting a license.
I remember riding in my cousins car one winter. (Bronco II in 2WD at the time) I could feel the car slipping on ice from time to time, and it was clear that she could not. We came to a left turn, I could see as we turned that there was ice. As we turned she stepped on the gas because it was about to start going up hill, and the rear slid out immediately. Her reaction, which with her driving skill was probably the correct one, was to jam the brakes, and do nothing with the wheel. We ended up doing a small 360, and hit nothing. The part that bothered me was that she didn't understand why we spun, or that it could have been very easily corrected. Needless to say, I took her, my sister, and a few other people to an abandoned parking lot the following week when it snowed, and attempted to teach them at least a little car control. IMO, if you can't correct a slow speed slide, then you should not be driving.
08-07-2011, 12:56 PM
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBoj0KbwaeY
I have not read through all of your post yet, but I thought I would post a link of a recent crash on the famous Nurburgring. This same driver had a crash on this track last year 1 corner after this. It was minor so he repaired is Silverstone and had it sprayed black. This year, after about 2 months with a perfect car... this happens. Very amateur mistake that cost him the car. I think this video goes right along with the topic.
I have not read through all of your post yet, but I thought I would post a link of a recent crash on the famous Nurburgring. This same driver had a crash on this track last year 1 corner after this. It was minor so he repaired is Silverstone and had it sprayed black. This year, after about 2 months with a perfect car... this happens. Very amateur mistake that cost him the car. I think this video goes right along with the topic.
08-07-2011, 01:10 PM
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^ At 0:11 It looks like his brake lights are one. He then loses control, and gets on the brakes again at 0:13. Another part that makes this corner difficult is that is falls off camber on corner exit. My guess is that he felt the front start to push as the track went off camber, he went to the brakes, and at this point he was done. Going through camber transitions on a track can be a very odd feeling, and makes proper input hard. IDK why he didn't continue to track out, and use all of the available track on the left side. Even if he hadn't gone to the brakes, the rear may have stepped out just from the camber change.
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08-07-2011, 03:18 PM
#8
^ At 0:11 It looks like his brake lights are one. He then loses control, and gets on the brakes again at 0:13. Another part that makes this corner difficult is that is falls off camber on corner exit. My guess is that he felt the front start to push as the track went off camber, he went to the brakes, and at this point he was done. Going through camber transitions on a track can be a very odd feeling, and makes proper input hard. IDK why he didn't continue to track out, and use all of the available track on the left side. Even if he hadn't gone to the brakes, the rear may have stepped out just from the camber change.
08-07-2011, 05:05 PM
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It's hard to tell without seeing what he did with his hands, or how the break in traction felt. (And keep in mind, I am not pretending to be the be all, end all in driving skill and instruction) As far as line goes, I would have suggested to have tracked out a bit more. There is no reason to be off throttle, and trying to load up the front end when you are that close to the inside of the corner on exit. I think that the fact that the corner falls off camber has as much to do with why he crashed in this video as what his line was. My guess is still that he felt the front lose grip and panicked a little, and went to the brake, which unsettled the car. I think that he would have been fine had he allowed the car to slide a little as it transitioned from on to off camber. He certainly had a lot more room in that direction to let things happen than he did on the inside.
Not knowing exactly what was happening, yes, I would have continued to maintain speed through the corner and not lifted. The only reason to lift mid corner, (other than to avoid something, or stop for something,) is to increase rotation, and turn into the corner more. So had he continued to push wide, it would have been smart to gently transfer more weight to the front.
Not knowing exactly what was happening, yes, I would have continued to maintain speed through the corner and not lifted. The only reason to lift mid corner, (other than to avoid something, or stop for something,) is to increase rotation, and turn into the corner more. So had he continued to push wide, it would have been smart to gently transfer more weight to the front.
08-07-2011, 05:08 PM
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I would be curious to see if other regular track drivers would have the same take as to what happened in the various clips as I do. Again, I am not claiming to know everything.
And does anyone else find that clunk-clunk noise that the s2k made as it hit the wall to be the most awful noise ever?
And does anyone else find that clunk-clunk noise that the s2k made as it hit the wall to be the most awful noise ever?