Hot rubber...cold track

[richard.d.birkenstock@xxxxxx]

>>
As a tip, try to get behind a real race car (with big slicks) in the
staging
lanes. Then just follow him (or her) out onto the track, and line up right
where (s)he did. You can be sure that there are two wide, clean, warm spots
on the starting line if you do this, and if you line up right in those
tracks, you'll get the best traction available.
>>

>From what I've managed to pick up hanging around the pits at Indy...as the
track warms up, the speeds go down - significantly.  Seemed totally
counterintuitive to me so I had to ask somebody why that was.  A race
engineer told me that it is quite simple - as the track heats up, all the
bullshit (oil and other gunk) that has become soaked or embedded into the
concrete rises to the surface and makes things quite slippery.  Therefore,
while it is advantageous to have warmed up the rubber, you'd actually want
to be running on a colder - not warmer - surface.  Gotta believe the same
principle holds true at the dragstrip.

Hope this helps bring down your times even more!

Rick
'95 ///M3

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