THSCC Forums

Okay.. let us have it... How was the school this past Saturday??

Tell us the good and the bad. Besides, starting this thread will help to keep the other threads on topic.

Let me save you some typing time-
We already know these areas were "less than ideal."

1) Registration/entering the site was not what we originally planned or wanted. We did the best we could after having our plans change every 5 minutees on what gate we enter. Had it not been for Ann Jagger, Christine Allen and Tonya Mauldin, the morning would have been much worse. They made lemonade out of lemons. By the way, Christine and Ann volunteered at the last minute to come out at 7 and do something that they weren't originally supposed to do until 8:00 or after.

A related issue is having to stop cars from running for people to enter/leave the site. Don't even bother to complain about that one. This was simply a matter of a number of last minute decisions handed down to us by the airport about where we could and couldn't enter. I stopped even bothering to let everybody know about every change because they were happening so often! We couldn't help it and there was no way to change the course on such short notice. Besides, for a school, it just wasn't a big deal except in the morning with trying to get people through the course while the instructors were practicing. So, yep, I know that was not convenient either.

2) Instructor course walks took longer than we planned. However...... I suspect it was generally time well spent.

3) Worker changes... we know that's an issue and it's got to improve if we do this again. Shuttling workers out/back may be the only option. Thanks Scott / Sally for doing that!


What I want to know from the students and instructors is:

1) Pros and cons of this format compared to a multi-station school.

2) Was there enough seat time for students?

3) Was it enjoyable for the instructors? (I think this is just as important for without instructor volunteers, we have no schools!)

4) Should novices be allowed in this format? Or is it really only for intermediate/advanced students?

5) Would you want us (THSCC) to do this again?

6) How was it specifically having one long course to deal with? Was it too much? Overwhelming? Students managed ok??

7) Misc comments....


Thanks again to all the instructors who came out. You gave your all and many students got to benefit from your contributions.

Thanks for your input!

Miles Beam
worn out event co-chair
(I took a four hour nap today!)

1. I really enjoyed the format. I like the way it was setup because it better simulated a real autocross. I think it is important because it gives novices an idea of how real events work. I never participated in one of the multi-station schools but I assume that they teach you how to attack different elements. While I think that would be good one of the important things in autocross is looking ahead and linking the different elements together. I thought this course did a good job of showing the importance of this. There was some segements that looked really fast however taking them too fast lead to being out of position for what was ahead.

2. Yes. For the amount of people participating I thought we got plenty of seat time. IIRC I believe it was said that we actually got more in this format than the other.

3. Obviously the instructors will have to comment on this one. I certainly enjoyed having Miles and Graham work with me. I actually didn't know if you guys would be able to or not considering what all else you had going on. You guys have been a great help to me at this event and the previous two I have attended.

4. I think so. Like I said above I think it is good for them to see how a real autocross is handled before actually running in one. OTOH I can see how running a long course like Laurinburg could be a bit overwhelming to them.

5. Without a doubt!

6. Perhaps. I ran my first event at Laurinburg in July so I kind of knew what to expect as far as length was concerned. I let others comment here.

7. Overall I thought the weekend was excellent. Thanks once again to Miles, Graham, and all the others that made it possible.

Here's an opinion from one of the nabisco guys:



I agree with this. I thought that the format used would be better for advanced students, rather than novices. For novices & intermediates, I'd prefer lots of seat time on smaller courses to lots of time spent talking about a big course.

I also think the course may have been just a hair too fast for novices. Perfect for advanced guys looking to push the limits, but a slower, more technical course would benefit the novices more in my opinion.

I do think that lots of people learned lots of stuff, though. I just think they could've learned more by running a different format. I like the multiple courses that are linked together to form a larger course at the end of the day.

1. It was a multistation school, you just had to link them
2. Six runs was ok, could've used a couple of more
4. Great for intermediates, could have been overwhelming for n00bs.
5. Yes
6. Long course was good; however, there were some features there that could/should have been eliminated. They appeared to be there only to cause confusion, something that shouldn't be there in a school-type atmosphere (or a real autox for that matter)

_________________
Has no responsibility whatsoever.

I agree with Kevin. This format was inappropriate for the novice students. Too much to information to process for novices. This format is great for a intermediate/advanced school and of course there were intermediate/advanced students at this school who obviously benefited from it. However, I think those students who were complete newbies, would definitley benefit more from the traditional style school in which we have individual sections that concentrate on certain things, then tie them all together in the afternoon to breifly expose them to a full course. This format resulted in insuffcient seat time for the "first timers" I feel.

As for the course walks, they took a long time and I'm not sure what all everyone was talking about, but I'm betting whatever was talked about, was too much for the novice students to comprehend and apply. Its my opinion that with a novice student the focus of any course walk should be just trying to memorize the course, particularly a long one like we were working this weekend. I've been doing this for quite a few years and the focus of my first couple course walks is still just to memorize the course to the point that I can visualize it. Then I spend time on more technical things, like course evaluation. I certainly may be wrong, and welcome others opinions and am sure I'll get them. On the other hand, and intermediate/advanced student could definitley benefit from an hour long course walk/evaluation with a top level drivers, so the audience is very important. Maybe since the audience is so important, we should consider not mixing student groups and having firm novice schools and intermediate schools. I think this is what was done a few years back.

Just one person's thoughts...

I agree with the comments regarding it was too much for the average novice to digest at one time, due to the length of the course. I felt it made instructing novices difficult because there were so many elements it was hard to effectively communicate what adjustments they needed to make. In addition, it was hard for me to give quality feedback to novices when they were struggling just to determine where to go on the course, even in the afternoon. When you are getting lost it can make the experience less fun. Two medium sized courses would likely work better for a novice school. It quickly reduces the problem of getting lost and lets them focus on learning the key basics of autocross.

The format worked well for the intermediate students I instructed! It gave them a more advanced course to run & opportunities to work on key skills/sections to improve their overall speed. Plus, it was easier for the intermediates to recall what had happened on course, thus making for a more effective instructor/student dialogue.

Eric

Not trying to be an elitist ahole or anything, just making an observation, but...

I thought it was funny (and I heard the same from a few students) when Miles said, "blah, blah, blah, the coursewalk is very important, and you should do as many as you can, blah, many class results are decided before the first car is started, blah... Ok. Let's go do a course walk - you're only going to get one, and let's make it quick."



As for a solution to this problem, not much could be done about it on Saturday due to the length of the course. A much smaller course would be quicker to walk, and much easier for a noob to remember afterward, especially if he got to walk it at least twice.

Yeah. That could have been a bit much for an absolute novice.

I remember my first school at L'Burg. There were two fairly small, technical courses. One of them, if I remember correctly, had a double gate, a pivot cone, and a Chicago box, plus a handful of other features.

After doing a walkthrough on that course I felt pretty confident that I could read almost any course. (Not saying I could drive the correct line then or now.) But I could avoid DNFs from not finding the course.

As an intermediate student this time around, this school was great. It allowed me to work on piecing different features and sections together. Especially in linking those sections together smoothly in regards to braking and steering inputs.

Seems like there's enough room at L'Burg to have the best of both, but I've never chaired an event so I could be talkin' crazy.

_________________
Not spectacular just decent.
I'm not sure what I'm driving.
Maybe an ITR in DS.
Or half-assed STX prepped 330.

Here's my take on the format we used. It is for intermediate and/or advanced students only. We probably should not have let novices into this format. It was an awful lot of course to digest. I realize that now.

Since last year was my first year and I attended both schools I have to admit that the 2 small courses setup just for Novices has more merit.

The spring school is Novice only and the fall school is Intermediate only. By the time fall comes around the season is almost over and the intermediate folks would probably gain more than the novices at this time of year. The novices will forget much of it over the winter that the intermediate students are less likely to.

Graham

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http://www.greywinds.com

I've got to agree with this assessment. It seemed there were elements that were put in specifically to be a visual challenge, and that simply compounds the difficulty of the instructonal task at hand.

Scott

I think the course/school was great for intermediates. I was almost overwhelmed myself on Saturday and DNF'd 2 runs, but on Sunday I was much more focussed on learning the course during the walkthroughs and I was able to remember and go through it in my head before my first run. I had some great instruction from several people both Saturday and Sunday that really paid off.

In the future I would not do this format for novices but as stated above I think it's very good for intermediates. I think the visual confusion elements should be used because, guess what, you will come across some of it at other events and you should learn how to eliminate it from your mental map.

I had a blast!

_________________
'99 Mk IV Jetta VR6 now claimed by the better half.

'90 Miata A-package, Floats like a butterfly and buzzes like a BEE with loudspeakers.

Off topic for the school part:

I've been trying to concentrate more and learn the course on one walk. This is to (hopefully) make me a better rally driver by theoretically being able to drive close to the limit on very little information. There were only a few visually confusing areas of the Sunday course I thought -- the funky two-step slalom down the long taxiway after the P and the first slalom entrance after the sweeper. I was able to visualize both after the walk so it wasn't bad. Some courses I've tried this one-walk thing on were horribly confusing on the first run so don't beat yourselves up too much.

--Kevin H.

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2003 WRX (again!)

Like most have said already, this format works well for intermediate/advanced students. Not so well for a true noob being too much to digest at once. Most noobs I've taught spend most of their day just finding the course. When that happens teaching them how to drive never happens.



For the noobs I don't think so. For the others definitely. You don't get usually get 6 runs at a normal event.



Absolutely! Having time to run beforehand was great. It left Sonya with much less rubber, but I had fun.



I don't think so. This format doesn't favor a total noob at all IMO.



Absolutely. Make the changes as others have suggested and try it again.



I didn't have any real noobs, but my students did great with this course. Dustin and Mitch both had little problems. They both admitted the problems they did have were due to not looking ahead enough. They say the first step is admitting you have a problem right?



All in all I think Miles and Graham did an excellent job. I've co-chaired one of these things too and it's quite a task to keep everything running and stay on schedule. Good job guys!

_________________
Vincent Keene
'06 Ford Mustang GT (track rat)
'15 Dodge Charger R/T (yeah, it's got a HEMI!)
'07 Ford Fusion SE (205,000 miles and counting)
'98 Chevy Z-24 (retired)
'93 Acura Integra (Team SWB 24HOL Car)