#hotlaps

What do you need to do to gain just one-tenth of a second in one corner? Not much, right.

If you were to enter the corner with half-a-MPH more speed, you would gain a tenth of a second.

If you used an additional few inches of track at the turn-in, apex, and exit of the corner, you’d gain a tenth of a second.

If you were to get to full throttle a car’s length earlier exiting a corner, you’d gain a tenth of a second.

If you compressed your brake zone approaching a corner by a couple of car’s lengths, you’d gain a tenth of a second.

If you began releasing the brakes a car’s length earlier (but not necessarily finished braking and taking your foot completely off the pedal any earlier – in fact, maybe you’d even keep a little bit of pressure on the brakes longer), you would carry a little more speed into the corner and still be able to get the car to turn in and follow the line you want – and you’d gain a tenth of a second.

Let’s look at this the other way around.

If you turn in to a corner from a foot away from the edge of the track, barely get to the apex, and are not right at the edge exiting the corner, you will lose a tenth of a second.

If you release the brakes too quickly at the end of the brake zone and cause the car to become less balanced, you will lose a tenth of a second.

If you hang on the brake pressure too long – trail brake too long – you will drag off too much speed, and you will lose a tenth of a second.

If you begin applying the throttle too soon, resulting in having to ease back up off of it before going to full throttle, you will lose a tenth of a second.

If you don’t unwind the steering enough exiting the corner – “pinching the exit” by holding the car in the corner too long – you will lose a tenth of a second.

If you “crab” in from the edge of the track at the entry to a corner, you will lose a tenth of a second.

If you jerk the steering into the corner too abruptly, you will lose a tenth of a second.

If you ease up on the throttle in that fast corner when you could take it at full throttle, you will lose a tenth of a second.

Now, imagine you’re driving a track with ten corners, and you gain a tenth of a second in each corner. Just a tenth of a second! You’ve now improved your lap time by a second. What would you give to gain a full second in lap time?!

Many drivers, when looking to improve their lap times, go looking for too much. They believe they’re a full second off of what the car is capable of, so they try to find that entire second in one place. Inexperienced drivers may be able to find a second in one or two places, but as you know, that low hanging fruit gets picked fairly soon. And then it’s a matter of finding little gains in time.

As you improve your driving, the gains become harder and harder to find, and they also become smaller and smaller.