I’m running a pretty consistent 2:11 today. In this case I’m following a yellow S4 for a while, then leading him for a while. Will post some photos tomorrow evening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTq5myI-GQ8&t=4m10s
New GoPro mount. I found a bolt for the crash bar to secure it to.
that was so fun to watch!
At first i was thinking “oh no, it’s another one of these brakes too early and drags them on for too long” type of videos…bc that’s how the driving was when you were following the s6/a6. But once you got around it, the real show started!
Man, your brakes haul!
There is this big long left hand sweeper with a very late apex. I notice your car has room to get on the power earlier for that corner. I do not see/hear telltale signs of pushing yet. But apart from that, wow, that is a wicked video!
Do you have any in car ones? I’d be very interested to see your steering inputs now with the new setup. Should be much reduced compared to before. The car is pushing a lottttttt less (not claiming to be familiar with ur car–but knowing ur car had stock suspension before–I’m very familiar with the pushiness of that :D)
Cool vid. Great wide big Sky view and fun to watch.
What’s with the 2 second long gear changes… Is that normal on the road course? Could explain why road course guys suffer at the dragstrip. You’re not as focused on quickness as you are on lines. Unfortunately at the dragstrip you’re coasting for 5 or 6 seconds out of a 12 second run. MPH killer.
Astute observation. I can add in throttle at the entry of turn 8, the long left uphill sweeper that goes onto the blue paint. That’s one of the more white knuckled turns, but my confidence in the suspension is high now. It hasn’t done anything unpredictable.
I am a slow and deliberate input person, which includes the shifts. To me the cost of a mis shift is too high. Typically on a straight I’m breathing and relaxing, anticipating topping out 4th gear, and not worried about faster than that. There’s room to shift quick and hit 5th for sure.
Though I put a lot of conjecture and mental masturbation on the Internet, I get results IRL.
One note on the Pilot Sport Cup 2: these tires have a huge operating range in terms of temperature and pressure. One lap on a 45 degree F track and they are sticky enough to pull the eyeballs out of your sockets. They’re a no nonsense no excuses tire that seems to be totally streetable, won’t kill you in the rain, won’t cord for 10-12k miles, and will hang with the stickiest rubber that came out of last decade. Superior chemistry at Michelin.
You need data overlay with those vids, that would be cool
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Day 2 @ Thunderhill
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esBydPnfzLU
Lovin the pictures. Great stuff.
Those brakes look awesome.
Yeah understandable West.
all of the misshift/money shift blown engine situations I’ve heard of over the years are on the road course, not the dragstrip. It’s likely a result of car angles on turning messing up with your sense of where 2nd is vs 4th for example. Your orientation gets a bit skewed.
You’ll find most north american road racers shift slowly.
It’s much easier on the synchros and the time lost is insignificant compared to a botched line.
With the number of shifts you do per lap, being easy on the synchros is worth it 
The transmission actually moves quite a bit and the gate orientation can change. This is a big problem on the GTI. I’m not sure the S4 has the issue as bad but I don’t want to find out.
When I tracked my STi, I ended up swapping out all the transmission/motor/differential bushings for solid or hard plastic materials. It made a tremendous difference in shift predictability.
Thinking about shift speed… On the road course, I tended to shift slower than on AX.
In AX, the car is in a constant state of transition. There are usually a few things going on at once, and it is highly dynamic.
Whereas on a track, it is like everything is slowed down and you have much more time.
I was chasing down this clown who kept blocking me but disappearing on the straights!
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-umLa7842gUw/VA2fPLCBkcI/AAAAAAAAAf4/DuXXHpFycPc/s1600/458.jpg
Eventually, I was finally able to get some clean laps by the end.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ee3e51uO2hM
Caution: Understeering stock car content ahead XD
This was on the stock tires, which lasted only 2 “full” lapping days. The wear went beyond the wear bar.
This car eats tires (especially fronts!) for lunch!
I don’t understand why people don’t want to let others pass. Makes me extremely nervous when someone is on my ass like that, what if the front car brakes harder…dumb dumb dumb
Hey westwest…nice vids man. I saw one of your posts expressing concerns with flexing trans mounts. In case you’ve not tried this, thought I’d attempt to explain how to hold the shifter to prevent a 2nd gear pull…thinking you’re in 4th gear…or that downshift from 6th to 5th but catching 3rd.
OK, most of us will either grab the shifter from the top or the right side…with your thumb pointing up. The tendency with these positions it to pull the shifter slightly to the left…thus exacerbating the risk to miss the shift to the left of the intended gate. Heck, even if you pull straight and your trans if flexed…you’re going to eventually pull down to 2nd instead of 4th…when coming from 5th or 6th gear. Ask me how I know ;D I cut my teeth with a '95 M3 back in the day…stock trans mounts. Road Atlanta almost got the best of me. Thought I was pulling straight down from 5th to 4th, but caught 2nd. Went to let the clutch out and watched the tach jump and was quick enough to engage the clutch before damage to the valves. Got back to the paddock and talked about the what occurred. A friend was kind enough to share a little known fact…stock cars with rubber tranny mounts flex!!! So, to alleviate…change your hand position on the shifter.
Put your right hand out flat, now turn so your thumb is pointing down, hold shifter on the left side to make your shifts. This will cause you to PUSH the shifter to the right slightly and help avoid the $$$$ shift. Far better to miss the shift to the right than the left!!!
This truly works for stock vehicles at the track. Eventually, I went on and turned the M3 into a C-Mod Club Race car with solid mounts EVERYWHERE and could change my hand position back to grabbing on the right side of the shifter WITHOUT fear of pulling to the wrong gear.
One more thing bro…try to nail your apex EVERY time. That first vid…I could see a lot of space between you and the apex on several turns. Get in tight…be consistent and your lap times will drop. Not sure what you’ve done to the car…these are heavy beasts…but noticed that you tend to coast in and to your braking zone. If you’ve got a BBK…drive it hard to the braking zone…brake hard, release and go. That should help you also gain better times. If you’ve not been on the track with someone that races…you’d not know this. I can tell that you’re trying to be smooth. Going faster is a sort of a violent and smooth dance. ;D
Keep up the good work! Do you have plans to transform your car to a race car? I’ve thought about trying to develop an S4…just looks like it’s too much money as compared to building a bmw m3. Not sure what the b8 s4 is capable of getting down to in terms of weight reduction. The e36/e46 bmw’s can easily get down to 2400 lbs with full cage and some fuel.
Good tips. I’m only using 3rd and 4th gear so I’m not worried about missing a gate.
Keep in mind the camera position is on the driver’s side. On left turns you get a good overlap on the video of the apex. On right turns it looks like I missed by a car width. There’s a few places where I want to be adding more gas between the turn in point and the apex, working up to full throttle at the apex. I’ve clipped every curb on the track enough times to know which ones you can hit and which ones you shouldn’t.
Agreed that I have a lot more brakes than I’m using. I’m building confidence here.
This car is down over 250 pounds from how it was delivered to me at the dealer. It’s 3690 with no fuel and no driver. There’s maybe 100 pounds to lose from seats. I don’t know if I’ll go that far. I may keep this as an extremely capable street-track sedan and purchase a different car like a 2016 GT350 with the R package. If it was going to rain on an HPDE weekend, I’d take the Audi
Good tips on the shifting that actually all makes great sense.
“Agreed that I have a lot more brakes than I’m using. I’m building confidence here.”
Are you on street tires or have you gone to dedicated slicks or DOT race tires? If you’re still using a full street tire…going to a DOT race tire will instill more confidence with your braking. Are you attempting to threshold brake or are you getting into the ABS? Not sure how touchy the ABS is on the Audi. Personally, I’d stand hard on the brakes and get into ABS. Again, short but hard bursts.
Have you been dealing with boiling your fluid, warping or cracking rotors prematurely? Just curious why you might feel tentative.
Just a new Brembo front and RS5 rear setup (I posted about it in another thread I started). Also getting used to Pilot Sport Cup 2. It is easy to get into ABS. No fluid issues on Castrol SRF.