Our Team

GHIT 0126: Breaking “Barriers” That Are Keeping You Off Track or From High Performance Driving

Strap in, its a long one

Christian “Mental” Ward joins us for a very special episode where we try to break down any barriers that are keeping you from getting started and trying high performance driving or going out to a track or autocrossing etc. As with every Mental episode, we have tons of stories and go very, very long.

So strap in for a great episode where we show various ways for you, YES YOU, to start TODAY! PS this will also apply to getting some improved training opportunities for the new drivers in the family. Avoiding an accident is the best safety system. If you enjoy taking the fun way home from work/school, if you enjoy going around exit ramps, but you haven’t tried anything further, this episode should show you how to break through any barrier that prevented you from REALLY enjoying your car.

“That guy can sure spin a yarn” – Jeff Wakeman

Barriers Broken during this episode:

1) I don’t have a racing license

2) I don’t have a car to race with

3) My car isn’t ready

4) It’s too far away

5) I am too intimidated by the people or the other cars/may car, or the track

6) I don’t know how to get started (Hint you can contact us or E1R etc.)

7) I’m a ______ e.g. Girl, too young, too old, out of shape, the wrong shape etc. etc. etc.

8) I will one I _____ (insert any number of wonderful wish list items)

9) It costs too much

10) I don’t have time

11) Ego issues

12) Where can I find where I can ______

Our Dominating with Dawson segment for this episode goes into the often overlooked art involved with downshifting, how and when to do it properly, how to practice during your daily driving, and how it can help your car last quite a bit longer during a race.

We hope you enjoy the episode!

Best regards,

Bill, Vicki, Jennifer, and Alan

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training podcast

and team members in the GHiT

Immature Endurance Racing Team

Highlights from the episode include:

1) References to Hamsa and Matt

2) Hot tub rule #1 at the track

3) Details of the Deer Incident/Inside Joke can be found at

4) Your race car is never, ever finished. Ever.

5) Waiting to get your car faster or a faster car will actually impede your learning progress. Counterintuitive but absolutely true.

6) Teen driving training discussion and resources (a few links below)

7) This episode may contain some tough love, but it’s all with love.

8) We take advantage of the opportunity and hit Mental with the Fast and Furious questions, finally

Descriptions:

Autocross: Racing usually in a large area around a temporary course usually composed of orange cones

HPDE: High performance driving education – Where you can learn to drive better, usually on a race track Track Night in America: an event held at a local track where you can drive your car around a race track and dip your toe into the pool

iRacing: a brand of sim racing on a computer that the focus is on more realistic racing than a traditional racing game.

Lots of links:

SCCA: https://www.scca.com/

NASA: https://www.nasaproracing.com/

Track Night in America: https://www.tracknightinamerica.com/

Go Carting: Lots, use Google

24 Hours of Lemons: https://24hoursoflemons.com/ Lucky Dog:

Home

AER: http://americanenduranceracing.com/

Champ Car: https://champcar.org/

WRL: https://www.worldracingleague.org/

Race Seats for Rent: Lots (Google) including The Dog Pound for Lucky Dog and OK Stupid for Lemons seats and Kingpin Motorsports.

Driving Experiences: Lots, use Google

Grass Roots Motorsports magazine Link: https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/articles/guest-blog-open-letter-lgbtq-car-enthusiasts

No Money Motorsports: https://nomoneymotorsports.com/2020/06/09/the-14-most-effective-tips-to-spend-less-on-track-days-and-racing-maximize-your-track-time/

Motorsports Reg: https://www.motorsportreg.com/

Teen driving Training near Atlanta: https://atlantamotorsportspark.com/teen-driving/

B.R.A.K.E.S: https://putonthebrakes.org/

Race Image: http://www.raceimage.com/

Racers Parts Wholesale: https://racerpartswholesale.com/

GHiT Handy Links: https://garageheroesintraining.com/racing-resources/

EVO School: http://evoschool.com/

Team O’Neil Rally School: https://www.teamoneil.com/

Skip Barber Racing School: https://www.skipbarber.com/

DirtFish Rally School: https://dirtfish.com/

Bondurant: https://bondurant.com/

The “Marks” clubs, e.g.

BMW CCA: https://www.bmwcca.org/

PCCA: https://www.pca.org/

Audi: https://audiclubna.org/

No Man’s Land Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_c0dj11dn98

The Wraith Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC1DRl26Guo

GHIT 0126: Breaking “Barriers” That Are Keeping You Off Track or From High Performance Driving

GHiT 0127: Our Team Answers the Fast and Furious Question – By Request

We try to give answers to questions our listeners want to know, usually to help them progress as drivers, but sometimes we get requests to answer questions that are not going to help you drive any better, ever. This is one of those times and one of those episodes. Several of you have asked us these questions at the track or via the inter webs, so here they are, as requested.

Throttle steering is the subject for our Dominating with Dawson segment this episode. This is one of the ways that you can make a car turn without using your steering wheel.

We hope you enjoy the episode!

Best regards,

Bill, Vicki, Jennifer, and Alan

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training podcast and team members in the GHiT Immature Endurance Racing Team

Highlights from the episode include:

1) Somehow we combined the Fast and Furious questions with the Newlywed Game during this episode.

2) Who has driven the fastest on our team. Any guesses? Unfortunately, not all have hit triple digits, yet. New team goal for our next HPDE!

3) Alan wanders off during the podcast with his wireless microphone. Can’t even herd cats on the podcast.

4) Jennifer stretches the limits of what a car sound is, just a bit.

5) What were some of our team members “Ahhh Hahhh” moments.

GHiT 0127: Our Team Answers the Fast and Furious Question – By Request

GHIT 0124: GHIT Flashback to Thompson 2018 with the 24 Hours of Lemons

Award Winning GHiT Team — We Won (well, at least we got an award)

On this flashback episode, we cover our team’s second ever race at Thompson with the 24 Hours of Lemons series in 2018. How did the race go? Well, it was our first ever two car race. It was the first ever race for half of our team (Alan, Jennifer, Casey, and Pete). It was our first time on track with the SpiderStang and our friends at Prompt Critical showed Liam and Cassian how to “adjust” the boost on the SpiderStang. The Capri died and is still dead to this day. We won the “I Got Screwed” award. Details of our weekend and what we learned shall be provided. PS Never show your new to racing teen age team mates how to adjust the boost. Also, on this episodes Dominating with Dawson, we go over car control and what it means when someone refers to a car “rotating”.

**Capri’s dies while the SpiderStang makes its debit**

SpiderStang Makes its Debut — **Capri’s dies while the SpiderStang makes its debit**

We hope you enjoy the episode!

Best regards,

Bill, Vicki, Jennifer, and Alan

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training podcast

and team members in the GHiT

Immature Endurance Racing Team

Highlights from the episode include:

1) We quickly gloss over the new raspberry additions that Alan and Bill added to Vicki’s garden area.

2) We cover from post-race of our first race at NJMP to the conclusion of our second race at Thompson

3) How our team grew from our first race with 4 drivers to where we had a two-car team with 8 drivers. Our preparation was not quite up to what it should have been. Especially with 4 additional drivers, two of which that had never driven a manual transmission before.

4) The advantages and disadvantages of a teen drivers on a racing team

5) How a perfectly performing a running car from our last race did not stay that way during the trip back from the track, to the great surprise of all involved. Carburetors are not our center of expertise and decided to let us know.

6) How the SpiderStang theme came to be and what we learned in doing it. It ended up looking great, but the process was not one we would recommend. Sometimes you learn what to do and sometimes you learn what not to do. We also mention how we built “Bondo”, a PVC and spray foam version of a mannequin to be used as Spiderman on our car.

RV Plumbing Fitting, not Automotive Grade, lol.

7) Vicki’s trials and tribulations for her first time driving to a race with a race car trailer. It did not go very well.

8) How our first time trying to stay at the track went. In a word: poorly. We have come up with much better sources for renting RV’s to stay at the track since then.

9) How our new drivers first time driving went. Quick checklist, panic attack at being strapped in, panic attack about going on a racetrack in the pit lane, first ever racing in the rain and heavy fog, and how to be a rolling chicane on the track.

10) Prompt Critical helped us with our cars but gave away a bit too much information to Liam and Cassian. They now knew how to adjust (read as increase to maximum) the boost of the turbocharger. After all, more is better, lol.

11) How to dial in a brake proportioning valve during testing.

12) Alan’s chipmunk powered internet popped up again, a few times. Bill had no idea on how to edit this, but it seems pretty funny.

13) How we became an award-winning racing team at this event. It all started with Jennifer and her license in driver tech inspection. Well on our way to minor internet celebrity status. Still on the way to this day.

14) Things we learned at our first ever rain race and our first ever fog race, all at the same race.

15) The story of the death of the Capri and the birth of El Jeffe, The Bad Hombre.

16) We share the secret concoction to keep fog off your windshield that was shared with us by the Three Pedal Mafia.

17) Alan treats his body like a temple? And we finally found the root cause for why Alan doesn’t want to work on the Capri.

18) Bill tries to avoid sleeping in the bathtub even though we won the coveted “I Got Screwed” award.

19) Finally, we go over the post-race awards and the trials and tribulations we went through to get home afterwards.

GHIT 0124: GHIT Flashback to Thompson 2018 with the 24 Hours of Lemons

GHIT 0122: NASA Great Lakes HPDE at GingerMan – Post HPDE Review

Jennifer, Vicki, and Bill check in to review how the recent HPDE at GingerMan went with NASA Great Lakes. We are not in our usual location and are recording under a roof in a KOA near Traverse City Michigan so there may be a bit more background noise than normal but we wanted to record while everything was still very fresh, even though we were all pretty exhausted.

Post HPDE — Giddy after the HPDE this weekend at GingerMan

On this week’s Dominating with Dawson, we go into a discussion to clarify apexes and Ben’s approach and how the point of rotation can apply to your driving, including a discussion of Ken Hill s podcast and how we should approach this during he (at that point) upcoming HPDE at GingerMan.

Jen coming into turn 2 at GingerMan — **Jen going into Turn 2**

We hope you enjoy the episode!

Best regards,

Bill, Vicki, Jennifer, and Alan

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training podcast and team members in the GHiT Immature Endurance Racing Team

Highlights from the episode include:

1) We compare the structure of this HPDE which focuses on drills and with the COVID 19 separation not allowing for in car instruction at this point.

2) The advantages and disadvantages of a lead follow, especially if it was a group of three this became more of an issue.

3) How quickly NASA Great Lakes is responding to the new rules and conditions on track in a rapidly evolving climate and imposed rules by each state and track.

4) What aspects of racing Vicki and Jen learned at this HPDE and what skills they refined during the weekend.

5) How HPDE track days allow for focusing on the correct and repeatable line vs our racing where we rarely use the line and handle traffic while driving both on and offline.

6) The drills we used during the weekend, including running the track in reverse.

7) How a great track walk with a very large group led to great discussion and options for approaching several sections of the track that even some national champion drivers learned more about racing options at GingerMan.

8) Ways to practice on your daily drive to help improve your track driving.

9) Apex everything!

10) The comparative differences between the HPDE 2 and HPDE 1

11) The skid pad – Winter driving event we had scheduled for earlier this year is again one of the negative highlights for our season

12) Vicki and Jen both had issue with getting their vision farther down the track, especially in the lead follow used during their HPDE 1 group.

13) Both Vicki and Jen both felt their speed progressively increased on the track throughout the weekend. It really was almost as if we needed a 1.5 level for these COVID impacted events.

14) In car video issues during the weekend impacted our results but we discuss what we think the video will show of our driving through the weekend. We shall see once we download our videos later this week.

15) There were some pretty spectacular cars at GingerMan this weekend and we could not help but pick a few of our favorites that came to mind in our racing hangover induced state.

16) Bill tries to work through Jennifer’s acceleration issues during the weekend and hos hypothesis is that she isn’t fully revving

17) Bill inserts his foot fully into his mouth. He will likely be sleeping in the bathtub for the rest of the week.

18) Vicki almost got arrested for stealing as one night by mistake.

19) Somehow, Vicki and Jennifer were introduced to the term Camber during our track walk for the first time. Not sure how we missed it up to this point but apparently we did.

20) We also went through our thoughts on the track and several of our favorite and more difficult turns for each of us.

21) Vicki’s favorite track of the weekend was NamregNig (GingerMan backwards)

22) Bill tries to get out of the hole he dug with John Pagel.

A few hopefully helpful suggestions for NASA we think are:

1) Groups of two students with each instructor max

2) Group cars and instructors by style, i.e. low HP cars with low HP instructor cars etc.

3) Perhaps a 1.5 level with less lead follow and more with the instructor in the position watching the student from behind.

GHIT 0122: NASA Great Lakes HPDE at GingerMan – Post HPDE Review

GHIT 0121: GingerMan HPDE with NASA Great Lakes – Our Goals Going In

Jennifer, Vicki, and Bill are going to be attending the NASA Great Lakes HPDE at GingerMan, a new track for our team. This is a short episode where we cover our preparation for the HPDE and our goals and areas of focus going into the HPDE event. In addition, we cover coasting on a race track (Hint: Don’t) and how to avoid it in this episode’s Dominating with Dawson segment.

We hope you enjoy the episode!

Best regards,

Bill, Vicki, Jennifer, and Alan

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training podcast

and team members in the GHiT

Immature Endurance Racing Team

GHIT 0121: GingerMan HPDE with NASA Great Lakes – Our Goals Going In