paulhus@euclid.DEC (04/16/85)
Starting Racing 1. We must first separate racing into two areas - hobby and career. Many start in racing as a career and either drop out or continue as a hobby. (saying: There can be no Great Art without the striving of a great many artists to become great.) This is very true of racing - many try, few reach the top. 2. Both career and hobbyists should start the same: pick a class that you can afford and that will give you lots of track time per $ spent. This means a popular class with a common chassis and engine. Go to a good driver's school to get the basics down first. (I'm not sure how drag racers get started - could someone comment here? I think you use street cars and run against an index, or something like that.) Oval and road circuit racers intermix more now-a-days than previously, so the distinction is not so critical. 3. Your concerns during your first year or so should be: Safety, reliability, competitiveness, and just learning the ropes. (One good way of learning the ropes is to crew for someone on their vehicle or to work as a race official. Crewing gives you the basics of vehicle preparation and logistics, while race working can give you a very good idea of good driving (the Line, passing moves, etc)). Your vehicles should always be well maintained, neat and clean. Why? Unless you were born with $$$, you will someday have to rely on sponsorship. Nobody wants to sponsor a sleazy looking car (or driver, for that matter). Look at the best merchandised race series: NASCAR Grand National. Note the appearance of the cars and drivers. Note the public behavior of the drivers. That should be your goal. Meanwhile, you have to learn to drive, and to field a decent effort. 4. For oval and road racers, I'd like to pitch karts as a starting point. There are both oval and road races in karting. Kart ARE a valid and cheap way of learning to drive and maintaining a vehicle. To illustrate: I ran an enduro kart. After I had an accident, I had a promising local Formula Ford driver drive the kart in races at Bryar in New Hampshire. We had one good weekend with few mechanical problems and a good 1 hour enduro race. The very next weekend, he drove his FFord in a regional SCCA race. He dropped his lap time 2 seconds a lap, with NO changes to the car! This was a top 10 car- driver combination in a very competitive class. Do you know what most competitive drivers would do for 2 seconds? Kill is putting it mildly! One reason Brazil is putting out many good drivers is their farm system which starts with karts. France has a good system, courtesy of Renault, that starts with R5s. 5. Racing is just partially driving. Once you really get going, your career success depends almost as much on marketing and public relations as on your skill behind the wheel. Few want to face this truth. They end up as hobbyists with lots of skill and lots of complaining. "On Track" recently had some good articles on getting started and the plight of skillful young drivers - do read them. N. Chris Paulhus DEC-Maynard decwrl!dec-10382!dec-euclid!paulhus
jayj@hpisla.UUCP (Jay Johannes) (04/18/85)
RE: Getting started in Racing Very good article. I would just like to add one area to consider for the beginner. That would be autocrossing. Autocrossing is a closed course timed run without other cars on the track. It does an excellent job of teaching chasis tuning and competitive driving without adding the problems of interacting with other cars. My first year of racing was dirt track ovals, and I found that learning chasis tuning took second place to learning how to survive around the rest of the field. There is definitely an etiquite to learn, as you need to be able to trust the person who is broadsliding 6 inches away from you at 90 mph. Autocrossing gives the novice the opportunity to learn how to drive competitively without being a danger to others. Equipment investment is minimal, repair rate is low. To find events in your area, try the sports page of your local paper, contact the SCCA either in Denver or your regional office, or look for events in a competition newspaper such as Autoweek. Good luck. Jay "Step on it. The longer you wait the slower you get" Johannes