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Re: Stuff I Learned at the Evolution School

To: "Mark J. Andy" <marka@telerama.com>,
Subject: Re: Stuff I Learned at the Evolution School
From: "Kevin Stevens" <Kevin_Stevens@pursued-with.net>
Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2001 22:43:37 -0700
> There are some disadvantages though, IMHO.
>
> 1) you gotta do the foot dance if you need to shift.  With courses getting
> faster, this seems to be reasonably important in cars, particularly stock
> classes.  Its embarrasing when you go to shift and the car stops instead
> :-)

I disagree.  It's only embarrassing when you go to stop and the car keeps
going with the engine revving.  ;)

> 2) its almost _too_ easy to apply the brake.  Sam Strano once mentioned to
> me that intermediate drivers who LFB almost always use too much brake for
> a given "non-heaving braking required" situation.  He was of the opinion
> that the longer transition time from gas to brake of a RFB-er lets them
> sense a little better that the car has slowed enough just from a lift.

I agree that it's easy to overbrake.  However, if you break down the comment
above, it actually says that it's better to coast than to be on the gas or
brake.  I can't agree with that.

I've admitted elsewhere that I think my (current) biggest problem is
overbraking, but it doesn't have anything to do with LFB, I'm just consciously
slowing down more than I probably need to.

> MHO, yadda, yadda.  Certainly the transition time from gas to brake is
> less LFB vs RFB, but I'm not sure I believe that that's an important thing
> in terms of overall run time.

I wasn't sure either until I had such a graphic demonstration of it.  That's
why I posted it, it was pretty compelling.  (Well, apparently not in
description, but it was at the time.)

>Couple that with the need to teach yourself
> feel, the need to keep your feet straight when shifting is involved, and
> the tendency to overbrake, and I think LFB-ing is a skill that can wait
> until the other, more important things have been addressed (looking ahead,
> using all of the course, setting up the car, etc. etc.)

I agree kindof.  If you're going to do it, the universal opinion is that it
takes time to learn, and you may as well be doing it concurrently with the
other stuff (unless you're at a focus group like Evo or something).  But
certainly it isn't going to shave huge chunks of time off your run like some
of the other techniques.

KeS

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