Quote:
Originally Posted by agirls
trying to get back on topic here...
Kerri, do you heel and toe downshift? I just looked up what that is and damn, that sounds hard! I know, practice. I do the same thing on a motorcycle, but it is a lot easier! I'll have to work on that before you whiz me around the canyons!
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I do it some, and not real proficient at it, but I do not know if you noticed, but I seldom use the brakes, as I believe as soon as you brake there is a momentary lost of control/ tire rotation, especially on up hills, I tend to be in a lower gear maintaining 4-5k rpm which means when you ease up on the gas the lower gear ratio slows the car down a bit, using this to pull through the corner or downshift, if I do before I shift push in the clutch and give it more gas to raise the rpm to match the tranny speed. The downhills require more heel toe technique.
My overall objective when driving to be as smooth and controlled as possible, not jerky forward and aft (e.g. acceleration/ de-acceleration/ braking) and side to side (e.g. using the steering along with the power of the car, drifting and powersliding through the turns). (When I am riding the bike down these hills, it provides me the feeling and motion of snow skiing, even then I am braking and I am pedaling to keep the wheels rotation around these corner, front wheel braking tends to straighten out the bike and spend me more upright. Took one time to realize that, was turning from Piuma to Shuren (sp), braking around the corner, rear tire hit the paint on the road the bike slide out from under me at 30 mph, landed on my axx and slide to a stop, nearly ripped the shorts off my left side, it was fun riding home 20 miles especially up Kanan at noon on Saturday, with 1/2 my axx exposed and bleeding.)
While I have had the car since Oct 07 and put 4k miles on it, 3k were driving these hills. Each time faster and faster, in small increments, learning my limits and the cars limits. Took me a little time before I took it up enough to find the sweet spot where the car was starting to break traction, when use this to power/ slide around the corners. Push it too much and you are into the guardrail, side of the mountain or off the road. Knowing the road well helps, as you can focus more on technique and not second guessing the road.
While this is not the track and it may be safer on the track, I do not know if I would want to drive 2 hours to the middle of the desert, to go around in circle (track), where I can decide to take a run, in 5-10 minutes be in the canyon, get some of the best views of the ocean, scenery, and mountains. The "top of the world" still by far has the best view I have seen anywhere.
Now watch the guys chime in
, and say I do not know what I am talking about or how to drive, after all we are women in a mans sport. Unlike any other sport there is not a womens and mens league. But hey maybe we having something going here in a noncompetitive environment.
Sorry if I got a little long winded.
