Sunday morning dawned dark and stormy, with thunder and lightning on the horizon. On the way to the track, we had spots of heavy rain and the clouds looked to be centered over Mosport, yet there was bright sky directly north. This was an indicator of how our day was to go.
In the first practice session, Shelby ran with the big guns in her class, easily matching their pace. Qualifying was a whole different ball game though, as the skies opened. As her first time in the wet, Shelby had more than her share of spins and a long, downhill, backwards slide into a tire wall. She qualified 7th out of 7.
In the first race, with a drying track, it was clear that the wet session had left a mark on our young driver’s psyche. The first few laps she was close to 4 seconds off her earlier pace, yet near the end of the race her times were within reach of the leaders. In the final, Shelby showed the inconsistency that comes with a lack of practice. While having a race long battle for last place, the lap times varied by close to 3 seconds. The bright side of this is that her faster times were actually pretty quick laps, so with lots of practice the consistent times will come. We have to remember that most of the other drivers in the class have 5 races and a few practice days under their belts so far this season. This was only Shelby’s second time out this season, in different karts than she’s used to. The rest of the season will be bright as she gets more and more seat time.
2 comments ↓
I was raised on the coast of Oregon so I grew up thinking I had a pretty good handle on how to drive in the rain. But as soon as I got on a road course on a rainy day I realized I wasn’t half as good on a wet day as I thought I was… talk about white knuckles! And if that wasn’t humiliating enough Allison Duncan, a good friend of mine was driving around me like I was sitting still.
The following week things changed a whole bunch as I met with my driving coach and it was raining. In the back of my mind I had visions of crashing into walls, car damage, and basically it was just going to be a day from Hell. As with any good coaching, turning doubt into confidence is key and that is exactly what my coach did. I’m not sure how a carting coach would deal with this situation but in my case my coach got into the car with me and away we went. Every time I began to back off the gas he gently reached over and without saying a word he would press on my knee. Before long I could “feel” the car control as I stepped on the throttle instead of lifting and it really began to get fun. I remember when he told me, “I could tell when you got the hang of it. It was as if a light came on.” Furthermore it was important to learn that on a rainy day, even if I did spin, due to the lack of speed as a result of a wet track it was almost impossible to slid far enough to hit anything important. It was that day that I realized racing/testing/practicing on rainy day will teach you more in one day about car control than you can learn on a 100 dry days.
So tell Shelby we all experience that same feeling but it’s all just part of becoming a better driver. Then get out to the track on a wet day and learn to step on the gas instead of lifting and it will be a blast.
You hit the nail on the head, as what usually happened was she tried to scrub off speed and spun in the process. If she didn’t spin under braking, she ended up with wicked understeer as a result of not carrying enough speed.
Over the next few weeks, she should see lots of seat time, so the consistency issues will get easier.
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