Kaveman
Born in USA(not Kenya)
- Location
- texas but soon tejas
Last Sunday evening I had the privilege to go to Texas Motor Speedway and hop in a Nextel Cup car and drive 10 laps around the track.
This was the second consecutive year to do so. When you arrive first you register. After registration you sit through about one hour of instruction. When the class is over the instructors put as many of you as they can stuff in a Chevy van and drive you around the track and show you the lines. Once the van ride is over it is time to drive the car.
In the passenger (I know, Cup cars don't have passengers) side sits an instructor to assist you with the driving. The car is extremely busy with noise therefore all communication is done through use of hand signals.
It takes about a lap and a half to get the car up to speed. The instructors are VERY strict about how you MUST drive the car. At the beginning of the corner you completely lift of the accelerator to weight the front of the chassis so the car will turn. Slightly before the apex you get back into the throttle and maintain your speed adding about 10% throttle. Near 2/3 of the turn you get fully back into the accelerator all the way through the tri-oval or back-straight. When you get to the next turn do it all again.
It's pretty simple actually. The fun part is that there were 7 other cars on the track this year and 9 others last year. The instructors stagger the starts so that there are slow and fast cars on the track at all times and non-stop for about 2 hours, 10 laps at a time. When you first get on the track on the back straight a car passes you so fast if feels like he is going to rip the stickers off your car. By the time you make it back around there you are the one peeling stickers off of someone elses car.
These cars were billed to be the same 700hp cars that are raced on the weekends. Not the ACTUAL cars but the same. The difference is the rear end ratio. These cars run a .291 final gear ration rather than .500-.630. This keeps the rpms lower (around 7000) than the 9200 rpm one day engines used in nascar. It also reduces torque. The instructors state that in race form if you stomp the gas at 150mph it will break the tires loose.
These cars are capable of nearly 185mph. My instructor stated that we were doing somewhere between 165 and 170mph.
It was an awesome experience both times. This year my instructor was a lot looser than the one last year. Probably contributed to the 10mph gain this year.
This was the second consecutive year to do so. When you arrive first you register. After registration you sit through about one hour of instruction. When the class is over the instructors put as many of you as they can stuff in a Chevy van and drive you around the track and show you the lines. Once the van ride is over it is time to drive the car.
In the passenger (I know, Cup cars don't have passengers) side sits an instructor to assist you with the driving. The car is extremely busy with noise therefore all communication is done through use of hand signals.
It takes about a lap and a half to get the car up to speed. The instructors are VERY strict about how you MUST drive the car. At the beginning of the corner you completely lift of the accelerator to weight the front of the chassis so the car will turn. Slightly before the apex you get back into the throttle and maintain your speed adding about 10% throttle. Near 2/3 of the turn you get fully back into the accelerator all the way through the tri-oval or back-straight. When you get to the next turn do it all again.
It's pretty simple actually. The fun part is that there were 7 other cars on the track this year and 9 others last year. The instructors stagger the starts so that there are slow and fast cars on the track at all times and non-stop for about 2 hours, 10 laps at a time. When you first get on the track on the back straight a car passes you so fast if feels like he is going to rip the stickers off your car. By the time you make it back around there you are the one peeling stickers off of someone elses car.
These cars were billed to be the same 700hp cars that are raced on the weekends. Not the ACTUAL cars but the same. The difference is the rear end ratio. These cars run a .291 final gear ration rather than .500-.630. This keeps the rpms lower (around 7000) than the 9200 rpm one day engines used in nascar. It also reduces torque. The instructors state that in race form if you stomp the gas at 150mph it will break the tires loose.
These cars are capable of nearly 185mph. My instructor stated that we were doing somewhere between 165 and 170mph.
It was an awesome experience both times. This year my instructor was a lot looser than the one last year. Probably contributed to the 10mph gain this year.
