Last week I coached two clients during a David Murry Track Day at Virginia International Raceway. David’s events are always an incredible lapping day opportunity for enthusiasts because it’s a unique format compared to a traditional HPDE (high-performance driving event). It’s just an open track from 9am until 5pm, with an hour lunch break, so you can run your day however you’d like to, rather than waiting for a session time.
I worked with two drivers with very different objectives: Michael is a Ferrari Challenge club racer, and he had a Ferrari F430, which was a lot of fun. He was looking to hone his skill at VIR, because it’s one of the circuits he races throughout the season. He wanted to improve his lap times and pick up three or four seconds, which would put him among the series leaders.
The other driver, Pam, drives a beautiful BMW E36 M3. She was looking to get more out of her driving as an enthusiast – she’s a spirited driver and wanted more consistent, efficient, and quicker driving skills.
It was fun coaching clients with such varying mindsets. I was helping Pam build consistency in general, while with Michael there was very specific data that we studied to get a certain laptime.
Both drivers had great results. Pam continued to go quicker and challenge herself, and she got to be pretty aggressive toward the end of the event, which was really rewarding to see. Michael was able to not only achieve but surpass his laptime goal, and he had some takeaways to work on for next time to allow him to get even better and go faster. It was an encouraging event for both drivers, even though they had very different goals.