Driver routes

THE MOST EXPENSIVE STEERING IS THE FIRST STEERING

At the gate the car has all of its energy and none of its speed.

Ollie Brower put the whole problem in one line in Derby Tech, May 1984: "ENERGY LOST SHOULD NOT BE LOST AT LOW SPEEDS." On the ramp the car holds its entire potential energy and essentially zero kinetic energy. A correction made there is paid for out of speed the car has not built yet, and Brower's point is that the time it costs is "hard to make up".

His instruction is concrete. If you intend to use a crown or a slope in the track, set the racer on that angle at the gate so the line needs no steering input at all. When you do have to come back straight, do it gradually. And after you have taken a slope, do not drift back to the centre of your lane unless the centre is genuinely lower or smoother than where you already are.

That is the difference between a driven line and a corrected one. Tony Carlini Sr., writing in the same issue about his son's 1983 double championship season, described it exactly that way: every run down the hill, "whether it be straight, fade, or swerve, was predetermined, and executed perfectly".

THE THREE ROUTES

Decide which one the track is asking for, then commit.

Which route is right is a property of the specific hill, the specific lane, and the day. It is a question you answer by walking the track and by testing, not one this page can answer for you.

FINE INPUTS

How the hands actually move.

1. Pressure, not position. On a taut cable steering system the useful input is a change in pressure between the hands. Think about leaning on one side rather than about moving the wheel or bar to a place.
2. Smallest input that changes anything. If the car responded, the input was big enough. Anything past that point is drag you paid for on purpose.
3. One input, then wait. The car answers a steering input over a distance, not instantly. Stacking a second correction on top of an unfinished first one is what produces the wobble down the hill.
4. Straighten on a ramp, not a step. Brower's word is "gradually". Bleed the angle out over yards.
5. Eyes long. Look at where the car will be, not at the front of the shell. Short vision produces late, large corrections.
6. Hold the finish. Steering does not stop mattering at the traps. Neither does head and shoulder position, which is aerodynamic surface.

THE POST-IT DRILL

Practise hitting marks somewhere that is not the race hill.

Route choice is a skill, and skills need repetitions under no pressure. The drill below builds the two things that decide a run: the driver's ability to put the car on a chosen point, and the family's ability to see whether they actually did.

1. Find a private hill. A closed road, a long driveway, an empty lot with a grade, or a track on a non-race day with permission. This drill does not belong on a live race hill or an open public road.
2. Cut targets about one inch wide. Thin strips of sticky note are ideal: they are visible, they take a wheel without upsetting the car, and they blow away instead of becoming debris.
3. Place them along the run at varied positions. Some early, some mid-hill, some near the end. Some to the outside, some inside, some dead centre. Vary the spacing so the driver cannot memorise a rhythm.
4. Call the target before the run. The driver states which marks they intend to take. Predetermined, in Carlini's sense, means decided before the gate and not negotiated on the way down.
5. Score honestly. Hit, missed inside, or missed outside, written down for every mark. A run where the driver hit four of five is data. A run recalled as "pretty good" is not.
6. Film from the bottom. A phone on a tripod at the finish shows wandering that neither the driver nor the timer will feel.
7. Progress the drill. Start with one mark per run. Add marks, then move them further apart laterally, then ask for a mark taken and a return to straight, which is the input that costs the most.

Safety governs everything here. Full race gear, a helmet, a checked brake, a clear and controlled run-out, and an adult at the bottom of the hill before the first run. If any of those are missing there is no drill.

WHAT TO RECORD

So the line becomes repeatable instead of remembered.

Write these down beside the setup sheet: the hill and lane used, where the crown or slope actually sits, the route the driver called, marks hit and missed, where corrections happened, and the driver's own description of what the car did. Over a season this is the record that tells you whether a slow run was setup or steering, and that is a question no scale or trammel can answer.

Everything on this page is driving technique. It authorises no change to the car. Steering hardware, cable routing, and every other component remain governed by the current ISBD or NDR rule book, your division plan, and the official who inspects the car.