DAY 1 - We broke the class of 17 people into three groups. The groups went to the skidpad, threshold braking exercise, and vehicle dynamics class. We went to the skidpad first, and all classes rotated through all three activities.

Keeping the skidpad wetted down, the instructors worked us around the pad, had us come off the throttle, and would randomly pull the parking brake, sending us into skids. They taught us skid "CPR" - correct, pause, recover.

In the vehicle dynamics class, we discussed loads on the suspension from acceleration, deceleration and cornering. Then we factored in driver input at the throttle, brakes and steering wheel.

They had a great way of demonstrating that with a steering wheel that had a string attached to it, and a loop at the bottom that went around your right foot. With your foot up off the pedals, you can apply 100% steering. As soon as you put your foot down on a pedal, the string tightens and you have to give up some steering. It effectively explained the relationship between them, which came in real handy on the threshold braking, and especially the second day activities.

In the afternoon we did more of these exercises, including an on-track exercise on heel-and-toe-downshifting. I learned why I was having so much trouble with it - I had the last part of the sequence on the pedals wrong. Now I gotta break that habit!

DAY 2 - We split up again, between "brake and turn" maneuvers, skidpad (with turn ins, apex and turnout targets), and class on the autocross, focusing on figuring your line and using the cars' energy to max your speed on the course. We rotated through these in the morning.

In the afternoon we rotated through driving responsibilities and safety (a dynamic lecture on the subject the likes of which most people have never had), the "champagne slalom", emergency lane change, and the autocross.

The champagne slalom had us driving school cars through a course with decreasing radius turns, compromise turns, increasing radius and a chicane, as well as specific gates. On the hood a bowl was attached magnetically, and a tennis ball was attached to the bowl with a string. (OK, so it was a tennis ball slalom.) We worked in driving teams of two, and you had to lap the course as fast as possible without taking out any cones (2 second penalty) or dumping the tennis ball out of the bowl. If you did, you had to stop, unbuckle, get out, put the ball back in, buckle back in, and finish the course. So losing the ball was basically death to your time.

In emergency lane change, your first tossing one lane, then two, into cone boxes separated by about 50 feet, from about 35-37mph. The taught us "toss, recover, brake." Even though instinct tells you to go for the brake, you HAVE TO use 100% steering to make the maneuver, then threshold brake into the second box.

The autocross, was of course, the best. Instructors ride with you, talking you through the line and encouraging you to push the limit harder and harder. You drive like you never thought you possibly could (at least I did!) First this was in the Neons, and then in the Vipers.

The Viper. It listens to everything you tell it, and will do EXACTLY what you tell it to do. You tell it to do good things - it does them REALLY WELL. If you tell it to do bad things - it does those REALLY WELL too. Extraordinary brakes, and very fast steering. Acceleration - well that goes without saying. An incredible car.

Then it was time. We signed the waiver, and ran the course in the Mustang. We had upped the tire presasure to 40PSI that morning, so she was ready. With the instructors taslking us through the line, we both drove her like we stole her. And she did incredible stuff! The Mustang has a MUCH higher handling limit than I imagined. Overall performance was absolutely terrific. Weakest point, as I expected, was the stock brakes. They slowed us just fine and didn't fade through the laps we did. But we worked the ABS hard, and the stock pads would not have put up with that for very long. Steering was good, and acceleration of course was right on the money. It was a short enough course that you simply remained in second gear (in all the cars) and focused on the vehicle dynamics.

It's not cheap. But I cannot recommend the experience strongly enough. Just incredible.

 

Wow, sounds like you guys had a blast. I would love to do something like that someday. Must have been great to take the Mustang out. Now imagine how you can handle every day driving

 

Excellent! Some of the techniques you mentioned sound like very cool ways to focus your attention.

Now that you have experienced the Mustang at a higher limit than what you can on the street, don't be surprised if you become a regular at the local autocross events.

Enjoy!

PS - Have any photos?

 

Also let us know how much.

 

I have ALWAYS wanted to do that, and your write up just made it even more of a priority. Glad to hear you had so much fun!

 

Thanks for such a detailed write-up - great read!!!

 

Great write up; thanks for sharing.

 

Wow, that sounds like fun... I'd love to do something like that. I'm thinking about getting involved with a local club's driving school at Portland International Raceway... not as cool as Skip Barber's though...

 

The Skip Barber 2 Day Advanced Driving School is $1300 per person. They did give us 5% discount. It was worth every penny.

A few photos, but we're away from home, so they're stuck in the camera at the moment. I started editing a 3 minute highlight video today. I will have it done later this week and available for viewing. I will eventually cut about a 15 minute piece, which I will be happy to "YouSendIt" a Windows Media file to anyone who wants it.

Most of what you learn is directed to handling your car up in the 80-100 percentile for emergency situations. But ALL the techniques apply to autocross, and the Mustang performed like a champ. Comparing stock-to-stock, the S197 is not our dad's Mustang (or my first)!

Some of the biggest things I learned that apply to daily driving would be seeing farther down the road, elongating my following distances for many more reasons than just braking, and how to modulate my inputs on throttle/steering/brakes to truly get the car to do what YOU want it to do.

And yes, Tony - I suspect autocrossing will be in my future.

 

Those 2 things will pay great dividends when autocrossing. It is amazing the level of confidence and knowledge one obtains when doing at-the-limit driving in the kind of setting you just did.

Thanks for sharing the experience - excellent!

 

It seems like such an obvious thing - look at where you want the car to go, which is not always where it is going at the moment. But it is a major element when working your turn-in, clipping your apex and accelerating to the next point. At first it felt weird to have my eyes "one step ahead" of the car. But after a short while, it really paid dividends in lap times and performance. My driving technique got smoother when I kept my eyes one step ahead.

And the demonstration with the steering wheel and the string - that really sticks with me too. It explained the throttle/brake/steering relationship like nothing else really has.

I looked at virtually all the footage as I started cutting yesterday. Now when I see an exercise done right I know what it felt like, and when it's done poorly, I know what went wrong behind the wheel!

There's nothing like "seat of the pants" feel to learn this stuff.

 

Sounds awesome!

 

Lee, it was - it was.

And welcome to the forums!

 

Please send me that vid when you get it cut and also if you put it in mpg format I can put it up on Google Video.

 

Will do, Josh. I just finished a 2:20 Q&D cut today. WIll convert and send to you when I get home!

 

Sounds like you had lots of fun. Like everyone else here I want to try that too. I really wish training like that was manditory when getting a licence.

I've heard of that string on the steering wheel thing before, great way to understand the concept.

 

OK, I have a finished a 2:20 video cut of the Skip Barber stuff. Hopefully I will have it hosted soon. I'll get a link up here as soon as I do. Anyone else want to host - I have it right now as an MPEG4 file, about 15.5MB. I can also convert to Quicktime or Windows Media if someone wants that.

It's basically a highlights/overview of the 2-day experience.