Another day, another lesson learned. Loose is fast! Tight is not.
It's not that I never knew this. I mean it's more or less the mantra of karting. It's just that I thought we had the kart as loose as we were ever going to be. What I learned this weekend is what I learn any other time that I become complacent and feel I know what I'm doing and that is, I'm wrong again.
My son and I were just talking this weekend about how he misunderstood me when we got into this sport. He thought that I said since I had 12 years of auto racing experience under my belt, this kart thing was going to be a breeze. For the record I never said that in those exact words. I think it may have been more along the lines of me feeling that with less equipment to have to dial-in this would be simpler than anything I had worked on in the past. On the contrary karting is much more complex and challenging than anything my Formula Ford could have thrown at me. And I mean no disrespect to the Ford guys. It's not like you just show up at the track and throw fuel in your car and race. There is plenty for you to do as well. It's just a different animal. Someone once told me something along the lines of this: If you only have three things to do verses sixteen, those three things being done right are going to be that much more crucial in the outcome of your efforts. The less you have to do, the more you have to be absolutely perfect at each one of them. I think we were actually talking about drivers in road racing verses drag racing, but I think you could apply this theory to the guys turning the wrenches as well. The less you have to work with, the harder it is to get the results you're looking for.
Up until recently I thought that I had my end of things sealed up for this season. I believed that everything I could do to give Sam the best kart possible had already been done and now it was time for him to step-up his game and show me something. All the fine tuning was going to come from him in getting our lap times down further. Wrong yet again!
Jim Bennett, father of James (who is leading our class in points), comes up to me in practice and says we need to do something to loosen our kart up and get Sam through the corners easier. He noticed Sam was holding the steering wheel in a constant position through the corner and that the kart was never "pitching" into the corner. It was more like plowing. Shorter hubs and a track adjustment then back out we go but not before making Sam realize that the kart was now going to slide around a bit more than he may be used to. And slide it did, but through all of this we still managed to consistently lower our lap times. Now that the first plan of attack is complete it's on to Phase II.
With the back end taken care of we now had to narrow up the front track in an attempt to get it to slide around just a bit more. It looked really good in the last session but we thought there were still gains to be made. We sent him out on his final run of the day and noticed a big difference. He now just had to flick the steering wheel slightly into the corner then bring it back straight, allowing the kart to drift through the turns instead of being steered through them. This was no easy task for him and in one occassion it sent him looping off course with his eyes as big as saucers in his helmet! He managed to keep it running and finish the race but the most important thing for me was the fact that now the attitude of our kart was looking more like what I was so used to seeing with James.
For the most part we actually have a new kart. One that doesn't act like the kart of old at all. That one was too safe, too comfortable, and slow at best. With this new set up we have a kart that is going to require a little more work to drive right and a little more guts to accept. Sam almost has to teach himself to drive all over again but I'm not really worried about it though. Through all of this he still managed to keep his times fairly consistent and low. We never beat our personal best that we set out to do today, but I feel what we got instead is far more valuable. With a little more work and the time to get comfortable with it again, he'll be well on his way to the 41's that we felt we'd never get.
