The Thrill of Victory…
Managing expectations is the key
Focus forward, set yourself up for success
Readers might reasonably think that this post will add to the inevitable moralizing on the increase in incidents, both single car and multi-car, in both professional and amateur competition and track day/HPDE events.
But that looks backward, so we’re not going to go there. In the words of my marvelous friend and colleague Mike Zimicki of Sliderule Motorsports, we want to instead “focus forward.”
The question is how do we keep our focus on what is really important? How do we do our best to pre-ordain our own success?
The range of motorsport is huge. I freely admit that I gain as much enjoyment out of grinding out laps at a track day as I did going three abreast with two National Champions into the Keyhole at Mid-Ohio, Vic Skirmants and Kent Prather in my Fiat 124 Spider.
I LOVED the epic challenge of the 24 Hours of LeMans and could sympathize and relate to what was going on in driver’s minds who experienced both the thrill of victory and for twenty-two teams this year, the highest rate of attrition since 2012, the agony of defeat.
The whole range of emotion is there, no matter the motorsports venue or the experience and level of the driver. To be an Intelligent Driver, we need to pay attention to all of the factors that go into making the best decisions we can on-track. Every one.
KNOW the venue and STUDY other drivers
While not a big fan of cultural colloquialisms, there are a substantial number of drivers who are “siloed” in their natural pre-event approach. In their mind, they are going to go out, be exceptional and slay all who lay before them. Depending on the car and the class, they’re going to out-accelerate and no matter the car or class (or even physics!?!), outbrake every other car on track. They’ll have a superior line, have a demon tune, brake pad or tire that will give them an invincible advantage.
Ummm, no…
So much of the recalibration of drivers in schools, orientation programs and coaching I’ve done over the last thirty-five years is to actively dampen those expectations. I do this by turning it into an almost academic study, having been attracted to this sport because I believe (and the data supports) that SMART people make better drivers and racers.
To make drivers think, I point out that there are so many different levels of driving experience and talent, so many potential opportunities and roadblocks to this fantasy (or even parts of this fantasy, don’t tell me you’ve never had some of these thoughts) that it’s imperative to instead focus on the study of the venue, the culture, the cars, the drivers and their performance not just what you see, but how they progress, gain or loss, over time. Because the track (age and condition), the drivers (fatigue) and the cars (degradation of tires and brakes) are ALWAYS changing.
Once we can start thinking strategically instead of tactically, already there has been a good move towards “focusing forward.”
Aim low, shoot high
The correlation of a drivers expectations to satisfaction in their own performance is directly related to the model they build before the go to the track and before their sessions or races.
Less experienced drivers are learning things so fast that they are often at a loss why another driver in a similar car might zoom away in slow corners. “But I was closing on them SO fast in the brake zone?;” they lament. Not enough experience and “big picture” thinking going on. Hanging on the brake too long along with late completion to wide open throttle can devastate sector times, for sure.
More experienced drivers often miscalculate the proper balance between their expectation of superior performance along with confidence bordering on cockiness and being unreasonably disappointed when they find that their own skills/capabilities/executions AS WELL AS FACTORS OUT OF THEIR CONTROL (sorry for the caps but TOO important not to) place them well down the order from “where they SHOULD be.”
I ran into roadblocks early in my racing career after winning nearly every race the first year or two (after a frankly lucky start with thin competition). Challenges with car unreliability, stiffer competition and larger fields as well as my own inexperience got me down. I couldn’t make sense of it, but with more experience, taking a deep breath and improving the car and myself, I started proactively to prepare my expectations better.
I began to aim low, scan the entry list and think to myself, “this is where I’d like to be, this is where I think I SHOULD be, but let’s see if we can crack the top five or the top ten depending on the strength of the field” (of thirty similar cars). I am as competitive as any one but became more of a realist and pragmatic.
When on-track, I would shoot high, focusing on the BEST execution of fundamental skills, drive as quickly as I could as SOON as I could, leaving a margin around folks I didn’t know while logging intelligence and do the BEST I could. By following MY plan, containing my emotions and executing well, I would usually end up near the top of the timing sheet, if not the top. I was back!
The idea was to always be pleasantly surprised instead of disappointed, or worse. There are enough challenges without making yourself and your outlook another challenge to success…
Personal responsibility, the first step
Many years ago at the old Road Atlanta School with Doc Bundy as the Chief Instructor, he stated as unequivocally as he could; “EVERYTHING that happens on the race track is YOUR fault.” Someone piped up and asked; “EVERYTHING?” Bundy replied; “If a lightning bolt strikes you on the back straight, it’s YOUR fault, because you put yourself there.” That stuck with me!
In hundreds of post-incident forensic investigations I’ve been a part of, extremely rare is the single-car incident caused by “something on the track.” Most ably supported by the fact that when that DOES happen, multiple cars have the same obvious issue in the same place and at the same time.
In multiple car incidents primarily in competition, while there is lots of good advice, specifically Terry Earwood and Randy Pobst’s “Vortex of Danger” write up, there’s no amount of regulation or even regulatory guidance that covers what is going through the mind of the driver(s) involved.
As Ian Korf says his terrific blog; “I think we all have to accept that the racers around us have some degree of idiocy. Choosing who we race with, race against, and avoid altogether is a big part of the game.”
Oops, I said at the beginning that there would be no moralizing!
On the Sports 2000 pole at IMS for the SVRA Brickyard Invitational
Don’t be a prisoner of your expectations
High performance driving and racing is an activity that attracts driven, successful people, but the skills and practice that have made them successful does not usually translate to instant or even longer term success in the on-track discipline.
The more you can do to take a deep breath, focus on controlling emotions and avoid a sense that you “deserve” to be in a higher run group, doing a particular lap time, passing more cars, be further up the field or on the podium every time out or even most of the time, the more you can predicate success and insure that instead of being disappointed or spent at the end of a couple days or a weekend, you’ll be pleased and want to do it again.
There is a natural ebb and flow to your own performance, to the reliability of your machine, to the groups of people you run with and even their performance, which can influence your outcomes. The longer you do this, the more obvious this becomes. Not every event will be a new personal best, but you can always grow and learn.
Have fun and see you at the track!