[D_o_S]

Hi,

does anyone know of any driving-specific exercises that would help you become a better driver... something you can do at home while you're not driving? Like something to improve your reflexes, perception, awareness, etc...

Thanks.

[Ramos]

Any eye hand coordination excercises I would imagine would help sharpen your reflexes.

[mike-y]

Grid, Forza GT, or Gran Tourismo 5 :-D

except you might think that casual contact with other cars and bouncing off walls is perfectly acceptable when driving to the grocery store at 100 miles an hour.

[nicknaz]

go to the gym and lift and do cardio. you'll be able to stay focused longer before fatigue sets in when you are driving if you are more fit

other than that, there's no replacement for building muscle memory either in the car or in a good simulator (i'm really not convinced gran turismo counts as a good simulator)

[satakal]

We can agree to disagree, but I learned lots about Infineon from the Sony game. My first session there ever, after few laps of adjusting to the elevation changes I was working on finding speed while other drivers were working on line.

Besides line, lessons of weight transfer, trail braking, and smoothness are greatly rewarded in "The Real Driving Simulator". I've talked with guys that wheel-to-wheel race and they say that you can learn lots of good race-craft and setting up passes in a sim. The guy that was telling me this was an advocate for Forza.

Why the video game hate? Or just the popular ones?

[kenneth]

Just ordered myself Ross Bentley's Speed Secrets racing books. There are 7 in all. Check it out.

Comes highly rated, and books do cover what to do in "oh shit moments".

[TSM330i]

Besides the driving sims (I'm a huge fan of them - they really help you find lines and understand what works and what doesn't without costing you a ton of money) I'd recommend reading "Going Faster." It's nice to get some of the preaching behind the practice. It'll help you understand why you're supposed to do what you're doing.
http://www.bentleypublishers.com/product.htm?code=GDBA

[Z22Z]

Originally Posted by mike-y

Grid, Forza GT, or Gran Tourismo 5 :-D

except you might think that casual contact with other cars and bouncing off walls is perfectly acceptable when driving to the grocery store at 100 miles an hour.

my car just flips itself right side up everytime i roll it and all the damage magically disappears so this isn't much of a problem for me.

[nicknaz]

Originally Posted by satakal

Why the video game hate? Or just the popular ones?

you asked.. and i'm in between meetings.. so here's a long answer to your short question!!

i agree the video game is good for getting a general sense of which turn is coming next (i personally like video better, but whatever) after that, I completely disagree that video games teach you anything about weight transfer, braking, smoothness etc etc... like really.. the $200 steering wheel bolted to your coffee table has anything to do with real life?

perfect example as a guy i met at my first motorcycle track day. we were in the novice group, i was on a reasonable starter bike EX500 with 3000 miles and 3 months of riding under my belt. i was scared sh1tless at the idea of making my knee touch the pavement at 80mph. buddy next to me with a race replica gixxer 600 "has been riding for 2 yrs" (but with even LESS mileage than me.. no clue how that is possible) but "has done a LOT of tourist trophy/gran turismo" and so "knows how this works" he proceed to make stupid unsafe passes (just like the ones in the video games) and caps off the day by high siding and getting himself a ride home in helicopter (medical evacuation FTW).

to this day i believe that if he had NOT pretended video games had anything to do with real life he would have had a healthy respect for physics and the track would have been a safer place for everyone.

you think hitting square to brake, pressing left button and hitting X is anything like threshold braking from over 100mph with rear wheel almost lifting, counter steering to get the bike to max lean with your knee down, rolling on the throttle and knowing that if you F up and grab to much you are going to lowside into concrete... i definitely agree to disagree with you on that one

sure sure.. bikes and cars are different.. but IMHO, everyone who tracks a car needs the same attitude as someone who tracks a bike. in a car if you f up you spin, take some dirt off your wheels whatevers. on a bike you get hurt or you die. (this is a big reason i'm in cars now btw) i think everyone who gets on a track needs the sport bike 'small bites, be conservative' mentality, and video games (IMHO) promote the exact opposite by tricking ppl into thinking all the time in front of the TV gives them skills (other than knowing which way the track turns next) that translate into real life

[Joonsup]

too bad there's no thunderhill track on gran turismo. lol

[Ray]

Originally Posted by joonsup

too bad there's no thunderhill track on gran turismo. lol

lol, including this course would be the end of that series

[satakal]

to summarize: you refuse to believe that nothing other than "LINE" is learnable in a game. All because a dangerous driver found all his hubris from playing xbox? Sounds like an ego and safety problem and not one of a game teaching bad lessons. You really think a game is to blame for his high-side? Or is he to blame for not seeing the deliniation between real life and pixels?

In order to drive a quicker lap time in a sim, you actually have to drive better. Some games allow cheating like bouncing off of walls, and "8 wheels is better than 4". There's no way that you're going to drive better in a sim without applying real world lessons. GT discusses the theory of the Traction Cirlce just a few pages after they expalin that X is go and square is stop in the manual.

[Highflyr]

Originally Posted by Nick Nazareno

you asked.. and i'm in between meetings.. so here's a long answer to your short question!!

i agree the video game is good for getting a general sense of which turn is coming next (i personally like video better, but whatever) after that, I completely disagree that video games teach you anything about weight transfer, braking, smoothness etc etc... like really.. the $200 steering wheel bolted to your coffee table has anything to do with real life?

perfect example as a guy i met at my first motorcycle track day. we were in the novice group, i was on a reasonable starter bike EX500 with 3000 miles and 3 months of riding under my belt. i was scared sh1tless at the idea of making my knee touch the pavement at 80mph. buddy next to me with a race replica gixxer 600 "has been riding for 2 yrs" (but with even LESS mileage than me.. no clue how that is possible) but "has done a LOT of tourist trophy/gran turismo" and so "knows how this works" he proceed to make stupid unsafe passes (just like the ones in the video games) and caps off the day by high siding and getting himself a ride home in helicopter (medical evacuation FTW).

to this day i believe that if he had NOT pretended video games had anything to do with real life he would have had a healthy respect for physics and the track would have been a safer place for everyone.

you think hitting square to brake, pressing left button and hitting X is anything like threshold braking from over 100mph with rear wheel almost lifting, counter steering to get the bike to max lean with your knee down, rolling on the throttle and knowing that if you F up and grab to much you are going to lowside into concrete... i definitely agree to disagree with you on that one

sure sure.. bikes and cars are different.. but IMHO, everyone who tracks a car needs the same attitude as someone who tracks a bike. in a car if you f up you spin, take some dirt off your wheels whatevers. on a bike you get hurt or you die. (this is a big reason i'm in cars now btw) i think everyone who gets on a track needs the sport bike 'small bites, be conservative' mentality, and video games (IMHO) promote the exact opposite by tricking ppl into thinking all the time in front of the TV gives them skills (other than knowing which way the track turns next) that translate into real life

+1

Saw the same thing in both my MSF courses and my first track day. Takes a lot more than playing a video game to learn to ride/drive. After a summer of track days on my bike I started to find the xbox quite boring when it came to racing games.

[nicknaz]

Originally Posted by satakal

to summarize: you refuse to believe that nothing other than "LINE" is learnable in a game. All because a dangerous driver found all his hubris from playing xbox? Sounds like an ego and safety problem and not one of a game teaching bad lessons. You really think a game is to blame for his high-side? Or is he to blame for not seeing the deliniation between real life and pixels?

In order to drive a quicker lap time in a sim, you actually have to drive better. Some games allow cheating like bouncing off of walls, and "8 wheels is better than 4". There's no way that you're going to drive better in a sim without applying real world lessons. GT discusses the theory of the Traction Cirlce just a few pages after they expalin that X is go and square is stop in the manual.

wrong. I don't believe anything other than "LINE" is learnable from a video game because I've tried video game, actual seat time on a bike and actual seat time in a car and surprise surprise, real life is nothing like the video game!!

let's go thru some use cases (i love dead time between meetings)
How do i know my bike is about to lose traction? because when i roll on the throttle it add a "tiny bit" too much yaw which i feel through the seat of my pants. maybe you have a mega $$$$ PS3 setup with hydraulics and everything. i just have the controller and the controller can't simulate what i feel when i am riding.

how do i know i am running out of steering angle? because my knee pad is on the pavement and next my footpeg feelers will be dragging and next my exhaust will hit the ground (bad juju!) pressing the analog stick left and holding it until the computer screen doesn't tilt doesn't cut it

what about shifting? click R1 and L1 to shift. i don't even want to bother describing how this is different from going from 3rd to 4th with your left toe and both hands while you are leaned over.



here.. let's call in a 3rd party (thanks for the excuse to look for videos btw)

3:00 = "that's not a corner on the playstation"
3:38 = JC says he can adjust mid corner in the game not in life
4:45 = further discussion on the difference between game and life


we're talking xbox ps3 here right? video GAME like the real world. now, a SIMULATOR with motion feedback etc etc. that i definitely buy as being helpful to the real world, because it gives the motion feedback that helps build muscle memory and teaches the difference between 'small ok yaw' and 'you better save this sucker now or you are going into the concrete yaw' which is so subtle, happens so fast, and is a key reason why i'm ok trading off performance to be in a steel cage when i track (because i get that i rock in GT4 but i will kill myself if i try to ride like that in real life)


i'm sorry dude. /thread closed as far as i am concerned.

[satakal]

Pointing out that a screen, speakers, and a controller is a poor substitute for the sensations of real seat time didn't have to take that many words.

If you define the difference between a game and a simulation as the addition of motion feedback, that's fine. If only I had access to that Wirth Research setup!

You'll probably have to take my word for it, but you have to have your head wrapped around the subtelties of driving in order to turn fast game laps. (admittedly, with limited feedback and inputs, you only have access to a percentage of these "subtelties") If you can pick up some of those subtelties in the pixel world, one less lesson for your next track day.

[TSM330i]

http://www.iht.com/articles/reuters/...-SIMULATOR.php
All F1 drivers have used simulators to learn tracks.

No, a simulator is NOT going to replace the real thing, but it's not going to hurt to help you learn a circuit and understand lines. To say they are a hazzard is rediculous.
I use Gran Turismo to learn lines and to understand what braking points are. This helped me out SO much when I finally got onto the track. I, unlike the idiot that was taken away in a helicopter, was scarred sh1tless my first time on the track. I slowly built up speed and confidence over 3 days of driving with an SCCA instructor. He commented on how well I was able to work on my line and how my reading actually helped me get up to speed. I was bumped into the intermediate group the last day because I was essentially lapping everyone in the beginner group.
I say ANYTHING that can help you, use it. Like others have said, you have to use your brain when you're out there and make sure you and everyone stays safe.

[Spydeputy]

you can always practices your shuffle steering, and get out of that old habit of hand over hand nonsense

[Hoothout]

i think playing playstation or xbox with racing games can teach you the basic physics on how the car is going to react to differant scenarios while driving.

[blipblip]

I think 'simulator' helped. 'Game' though, not so much.

In my opinion, GT, Forza, GRID, etc are very very good games that are very close to being a simulator.

I personally prefer LiveForSpeed, rFactor, and those from Simbin. They are much more focused, and simulates real world driving a lot better.

[nicknaz]

Originally Posted by Spydeputy

you can always practices your shuffle steering, and get out of that old habit of hand over hand nonsense

Jury seems to be out on that one. BMWCCA guy kept trying to get me to cross my arms and "stop moving your hands around"

edit: i didn't listen to him

[blipblip]

Originally Posted by Nick Nazareno

Jury seems to be out on that one. BMWCCA guy kept trying to get me to cross my arms and "stop moving your hands around"

edit: i didn't listen to him

Hmm...I still don't understand why shuffle steer. For me, if I have to turn so much that I have to let go of one of my hand to turn the wheel more, it means I made a mistake or I took the wrong line.

[The HACK]

Originally Posted by satakal

We can agree to disagree, but I learned lots about Infineon from the Sony game. My first session there ever, after few laps of adjusting to the elevation changes I was working on finding speed while other drivers were working on line.

Besides line, lessons of weight transfer, trail braking, and smoothness are greatly rewarded in "The Real Driving Simulator". I've talked with guys that wheel-to-wheel race and they say that you can learn lots of good race-craft and setting up passes in a sim. The guy that was telling me this was an advocate for Forza.

Why the video game hate? Or just the popular ones?

Really? My experience was the opposite. I find that the game itself set my driving at Sears Point back by a mile. The physical track was too much different from the track in the game. The game track appears to be "shorter" and it screwed up all my timing in real-life. I ended up turning in way too early and was forced to "unlearn" the track first before I got comfortable pushing the car again, and basically threw away all my game visual reference points and re-learned the on-track, physical cues.

The only place where it helped, was that I knew the turn coming up is going to be a left or a right. Which doesn't mean squat especially since if you've done more than a handful of schools you'd figure out how far you need to look and don't need to know if the turn coming up is a left or a right, since you would have already figured that out 2 turns ago. What I find, is that having driven the REAL track a couple of times actually helped my "game" driving significantly. I'd pick up several seconds per lap after driven Laguna Seca in real life.

I dunno. Maybe it's just me. Although several instructor friends who have driven both tracks live and on Grand Turismo have made the same comment independently. Too much of the game driving actually screws up their real driving.