Photo credit Zachary B.
Is my car faster than a viper, a GTR, or even a Lambo?
Well... my 276hp 2900 lbs. car, a Mitsubishi Evolution 4, can be... and here's my story.
I commonly go and do a track day and then return to work at my mundane job. As I head into my office a lot of the guys I socialize with are aware I just returned from a weekend of tracking my quasi-race car. Whether it be a lapping day, driving course, or a organized time attack event they want to know... How did you do?
I have realized its very hard for non-car guy types to gain perspective from car-guy types. They want to know what cars were there, and which ones did I get the better of and vice versa. This becomes a tough conversation that generally goes like this:
Photo credit Luke E.
Non- car guy: So what kind of cars were out on the track?
Me: A pretty big variety as always, GTR's, some Porsches, corvettes, Cadillac CTS-v's, some miatas, a few touring cars.....
Non- car guy: Wow so how did you do?
Me: I had a lot of fun, I was battling all day with this 2015 GTR. I was pretty happy cause he couldn't get by me....
Non- car guy: Crazy! so your cars faster than a GTR? Thats sick man...
Me: mmmmm sort of?
Unfortunately due to the Non- car guy's point of reference, because he knows very little about racing in general and less about what happens at the track this becomes a very awkward conversation. Do I want to lie to my coworker to make the conversation easy? If not do I then want to explain the dynamics of track conditions, track design, tire pressure, suspension set-up, driver experience or the dozens of other factors that make one car faster than another around a circuit? No not really.....
Is my car faster than a GTR in a road and track magazine type test? No, of course it isn't. However because of the dozens of factors involved in racing around a closed circuit on that day in particular with those cars and those drivers on that surface.... yes my car was faster.
Photo credit Luke E.
There are several contributing factors relating to being a quick driver on the track. One major one that tends to create the giant killing type scenario on the track (where a civic out laps a Ferrari) is managing your fear factor. The guy in the 250k Ferrari certainly doesn't want to go off track, Ferrari's are expensive to fix and even a small collision hurts the re-sale value of an exotic car. Is that guy going to be pushing 100% right to the ragged edge? He certainly could and would be rewarded with blistering lap times. In an amateur motor sports type setting however probably not.
The guy in the civic however can drive on the absolute ragged edge with the piece of mind that his entire car, if put headlong into a concrete barrier, is worth a brake job on a Ferrari F430.
Does that make his car faster? Yes it does.
On that day, in those conditions, in those particular cars, he is the faster driver and by correlation the faster car.
The moral of the story? Suck it up and drive hard.
Photo credit Luke E.
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