Getting Started

Your First Autocross

How should I prepare?
1. Your car: Remove any loose objects from inside your car. Make sure your battery is secured. Pump up your air pressure in your tires- 40 PSI is a good place to start. Torque your lug nuts, and remove hubcaps if you have them.

2. Your picnic basket: Pack sunscreen, a hat with a brim, lots of water (1/2 gallon per party) some snacks, wet wipes, folding chairs for your friends, cash/check for the registration fees, your pre-filled registration form if you have one, and any special tools (i.e. damper adjusters, wheel lock tools, etc.) Your friends might want to bring cameras/video recorders, but only for off the course. Loose video cameras are not permitted in the vehicles on the course. Alcohol consumption is not permitted during the event. If you want to enjoy a cool one after the event, we usually meet at Famous Sams in Sierra Vista afterwards.
3. Your head: Expect to lose to the cars that you would laugh at on the street. Driver skill will generally be more valuable than horsepower on the course. Learn all you can and HAVE FUN! The biggest reason people don't come back after one event is the blow to their ego when they don't meet their expectations. Ask to ride along with other drivers. You may have a lot of misconceptions about what "fast" means and how to achieve it, so you will come away with a whole new perspective if you are accustomed to driving 1/4 mile at a time on a straight stretch.
What should I expect when I get there?
1. Show up early. Get to the event by 8:15 AM so you have time to register, go through the tech inspection, walk the course, and ask questions.
2. Take time to walk through the course with someone and listen to their impressions. Some people will wish to walk the course alone and develop a plan of attack, so don't bother the folks who are mumbling to themselves and staring off into space.
3. Go fast on the course, but take it easy in the paddock and on the drive home. The speed limit is 5 mph driving from the paddock to grid.

SSCC's Autocrossing Tips

The collective wisdom of several national level autocrossers as reported on Team.Net

Rocky Entriken "Other things I tell newbies:"

Late apex everything. It's usually my first lesson in getting a newbie through a course. Later I get into "late apex as early as possible" as well as recognizing when early apex is the way through. I contend a late apex is the fastest way through 90% of the time and the way that keeps the newbie out of trouble 100% of the time. Walk the course until they kick you off of it.

Stay ahead of the car. Probably one of the more difficult concepts, so it is not usually one I introduce right off the bat. I will try to get there by the end of the day.

Hand positions -- 10 & 2. Such a basic thing, surprising how many newbies DON'T do it. and in line with that, so many rest their right hand on the gearshift when they have no need to use it. when I ride with a newbie, it is almost always something I need to get them to fix. (I accept 9 & 3, often depending on where the spokes of the steering wheel are).

Also: Don't worry about the top guys in your class. Just beat yourself. Your goal is to go faster on the third run than you did on the first. What someone else did is irrelevant. Early on, what you are after is personal improvement.

"Don't throw a lot of money into the car right off". If you want to spend money, spend it on the driver. Do a school. Go to other events. Travel. Get seat time. But drive what you've got, run the street tires, until you begin to see your improvement level off. THEN start to do things to the car. (By then you may decide you want a different car, or want to go Prepared, etc.)

Mark Sirota says:

(1) "Look ahead." I believe that almost everything else is secondary, including lines. If a driver has a good academic/ intellectual understanding of lines, and looks ahead, the lines will come naturally.

(1a) "Don't stop turning your head when you get to the A-pillars". It's okay to look out the side windows." It's interesting to ride with novices and see them do this. Happens all the time.

(2) "Go slower in the slow parts, and faster in the fast parts." It's almost universally true that novices go too fast in the slow parts and too slow in the fast parts. Of course, a key component of this is developing the skill to recognize the slow parts and the fast parts.

(3) "Spend as little time in the corner as possible." Mostly applies to hairpins and other long, slow corners. People think about maximizing speed, rather than minimizing time.

(4) "Try driving at 9/10ths. That's more like everyone else's 10/10ths." I say this to people who chronically overdrive, and I've had pretty good results. (John Thomas actually said this to me at the McKamey Phase II school.)

(5) "If you can't tell where to make up time, the answer is usually 'a little bit everywhere' or 'a tenth in each maneuver.'" Pick up a tenth in each of 20 manuevers, and suddenly you've picked up two seconds!

(6) "What are you going to do differently on the next run?" Far too many novices don't put enough of their attention span into paying attention to what happened. Without doing that, there's no way they can make adjustments for the next run.

(7) "If you have a choice between slowing down here and slowing down in the next manuever, slow down here." It's almost always better to give up earlier rather than later"

Jeff Cashmore "the lines I use most often."

Cliche #1 "You paid for the whole course, use it." ie: wider lines in AND out of the turn allow you to keep the speed up. Every car I've ever driven had better brakes than acceleration, including the V8's and twin turbo's.

Many newbies drive down the middle of the course never getting close to the apex cones, etc. If you go all day and don't hit a cone, chances are you weren't pushing it as much as you could have.

Cliche #2 "The turn before the longest straight is the most important" ie: don't overcook it. If you have to wait to get on the gas you don't just lose speed for that turn but for the next straight too.

"Go fast in the fast spots, slow in the slow spots" Oversimplified, I know, but too many newbies try to do the whole course at 35 mph. They're going too slow on the straights but too fast through the hairpins.

"Brake in a straight line" It's more efficient and lessens the chance that you'll flat spot the tires. Yes, there are times when you can trail-brake but for the most part it just get's people in trouble.

Doug Miller reports:

Some trivia that I remember from folks.

Every 6 inches you are off a cone in a slalom it costs you .1 second. So if you are off 1 foot in a 6 cone slalom, you lost 1.2 seconds (Byron Short et al).

To memorize a course, first look at the longest straightaways. Straightaways are anywhere where you are at wide open throttle. Once you find the longest straights, look at the corners immediately before the straightaways, and make the straightaways even longer by sacrificing early braking into that corner (late apex). (team.net)

When in doubt, do not make a straightaway longer by braking deeper into the next corner. If you brake too late and bake a corner, it costs you LOTS of time. If you brake too early, and have just a tad extra time where you coast deeper into a corner before you turn in, you probably didn't waste very much time. (Byron Short).

When looking at a corner, there are lots of cones, but almost always there are only three that count. 2 on the outside, one on the inside. Often there is only one on the outside. Find those two or three, and ignore the rest. (Stacy Molleker)

On some courses there are really tight sections. In some tight sections there is no way to make up time, only lose time. So make sure you go through those sections plenty slow so that you don't lose even more time. (Mike Billings, Dave Thompson).

Pat Washburn says:

1) Focus only on those few cones that matter. It is easier to evaluate your lines when not distracted by all of the other cones.

2) For those that are executing well, but still not turning fast times: Enter each corner a little bit faster than your brain is telling you is acceptable.Drive outside your comfort zone a little...you need to scare yourself a little.

3) For those who are chronically overdriving: Enter each corner slower than your brain is telling you is acceptable.

4) Speed does not always equal fast times, i.e. Slow in; fast out.