All,
Quite a few newbies have come out of the woodworks and asked about what
mods they could do to make them faster.
Quite a few veterans have responded with the precious advice to "work on
the driver". I whole-heartedly agree. I've been autocrossing for about
four years now, and just completed my second full season of events. I
drive a bone-stock, 10-year-old Honda Accord Coupe, and I haven't done a
thing to it except keep oil in it (and I barely did that, which is the
embarrassing truth).
I drove for three and a half years on street tires, and only got a set
of used Yokohama A032R's halfway through this season. Yes, the tires
made me faster than I was. But I'm convinced that without my street tire
experience, I would not be as fast as I am. I was forced by my financial
situation to stay with the street tires as long as I did, but I consider
it a blessing that I did so.
Street tires on your car will make it painfully obvious whenever you
overdrive a turn or screw up in some way. You'll hear it as a squeal,
and you'll smell it in the form of rubber dust. This is not a bad thing.
It's good. It helps you learn how to avoid that (by slowing down).
R-compound tires are more forgiving. Sometimes this is bad for a novice.
You might have just over-driven a turn and you didn't even know it! If
you had driven it right, you might have been a second or two faster, but
the sticky tires aren't going to tell you *where* you lost that time.
If you are finally able to complete an unfamiliar course with a
relatively quick time on your street tires and without overdriving them
anywhere, you might be ready to do something with your car. Have a
veteran ride along with you now and then. If you can impress a veteran
driver with your handling of your car on street tires, you might be
ready to do something with your car.
Hopefully this explains why so many folks sound like they're
discouraging you from going out and buying all the goodies for your car.
The reason is, you'll benefit because you'll learn how to drive at, but
not over, the limits of the car and your tires. The transition to the
R-compound tires and other mods will then be a natural one.
--
John Crooke
HS Honda Accord
Silver Spring, Maryland
Crooke_John@bah.com
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