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Ross Bentley, world class racing coach and author, was kind enough to join us to help celebrate our 150th episode!\xa0 Since Ross has literally written THE book on racing and high performance driving, we always look forward to talking with him any chance we get.\xa0 Our team has improved in the almost year since Ross came on episode 100, but have our questions?\xa0 You will have to be the judge of that.\xa0 As always, Ross is able to answer everything we are curious about and even provide some insight into the area that we had not even thought of to this point.\xa0 If you want an episode that will help you drive faster, Ross is the perfect guest.\xa0 We have already started our new list of questions in case we can talk him into episode 200.\xa0 If you have any, please let us know.\xa0 Also, Ross has resumed his weekly podcast and if anything, it is better than ever.\xa0 You can subscribe to it on any of the podcasting platform of your choice.\xa0 Also, his book Speed Secrets is the most essential resource we know of to learn to be a better driver and race driver.\xa0 The great thing about Ross is he can answer every single question we can think of.\xa0 The bad thing about Ross is he makes you think about it in another way.\xa0 This ends up with many more questions and usually Bill goes off and overthinks it, again.\xa0 Vicki missed a really good one this time (she was fixing her broken MX5 suspension in the hotel parking lot.

How to get better at the turns is the (potentially) surprising subject of this Dominating with Dawson, but we attempt to discuss how to approach a fast corner and a slow corner.\xa0 Depending in the specific track, one or two of the turns will be most critical to a fast lap time and it can often be one of these two types of corners.\xa0 This will be the first part of this area that we discuss as there is a lot of detail and discussion to be had in this area.\xa0 We did use several specific turns at Road Atlanta, Laguna Seca, Monte Carlo, and Mid-Ohio to describe these types of turns explicitly.\xa0 We are also sure, Ben slipped in a VIR reference at least once or twice.\xa0 For this discussion, the term fast is usually referring to a turn with a minimum speed of over ~60 mph or ~100 kph.

We hope you enjoy this episode!

Best regards,

Vicki, Jennifer, Alan, and Bill

Hosts of the Garage Heroes In Training Podcast and

Garage Heroes In Training racing team drivers

Highlights from this episode include:

1)\xa0 Ross quickly gives away why he is back on the podcast with us.\xa0 Lol.

2)\xa0 We talk with Ross about our (then) upcoming skid pad event at Lime Rock Park and he was kind enough to go into what we could do to maximize the learning at the skid pad.\xa0 It turned out that this was almost exactly what our friends at Safety Third Motorsports had already arranged for the event.\xa0 Even after the event, we still have a long way to go to be able to catch up to Ross\u2019s friend Johan Schwartz who was able to hold a drift for 232.5 miles, with live refueling while drifting.

3)\xa0 Ross goes on to explain a way to have a car turn more when understeering by reducing the steering input you are asking from the car.\xa0 Its counterintuitive but exceedingly helpful.\xa0

4)\xa0 How does practicing on a skid pad help your street driving, as well as your driving on a track.

5)\xa0 When to use slow hands and when to use quick hands.

6)\xa0 Bill even asked the questions that he is over thinking, again.\xa0 Things like is there a relationship between the apex and the resumption of throttle during a turn.\xa0 Bill\u2019s pursuit of foundational axioms continues, lol.\xa0 And why is he talking about thermodynamics on a podcast about racing?

7)\xa0 A great discussion of what sometimes can fool you on track.\xa0 For instance, sometimes as lap of a turn may have felt \u201cgood\u201d but ended up slower.

8)\xa0 Ben comes up with a truly new question to Ross!\xa0 Nicely done.

9)\xa0 The importance of focusing on what to do and not solely on what not to do, especially in racing.

10)\xa0 Jennifer asks a great question:\xa0 what can she do to improve during the off season?

11)\xa0 Ross goes in depth on mental imagery techniques and actually gives Jennifer (and everyone) an exercise program that has shown to significantly improve your driving outside of being on track.\xa0 Summary: Relax body and slow breathing to slow your mind down

11a)\xa0 Monday night:\xa0 entering and setting up to drive the track at speed, and push pace a bit with actually mimicking the physical movements.\xa0 Focus on the technique of driving Pitt race.\xa0 Refresh the same for 10-15 minutes the following morning.\xa0 Mantra:\xa0 Pitt Race etc.

11b)\xa0 Tuesday night:\xa0 Close eyes and focus on personal driving confidence improvements and then drive the track again. Follow with a Wednesday morning refresh.\xa0 Mantra:\xa0 Confidence or I\u2019m here etc. (in driving)

11c)\xa0 Wednesday night:\xa0 focus on ultra-sensory perception and expansion of details.\xa0 Follow up Thursday morning.\xa0 Mantra:\xa0 Sensitive

11d)\xa0 Thursday night:\xa0 Focus on race craft and starting scenarios and racing scenarios and try to envision ways to gain position.\xa0 Repeat refresh next morning.\xa0 Mantra:\xa0 I\u2019m ready or I\u2019m going to the front

11e)\xa0 Friday night:\xa0 Focus on adaptability of dealing with a car that isn\u2019t quite correct.\xa0 i.e. left turns aren't same as right, you lost a gear, brakes are an issue, shock going away, etc. etc.\xa0 Mantra:\xa0 Adapt

11f)\xa0 Saturday:\xa0 Focus on a specific driving technique you are working on, like brake pedal release etc.\xa0 Mantra:\xa0 on the technique

11g)\xa0 Sunday night:\xa0 Focus on the thrill of driving at the limit and just driving without conscious thought.\xa0 Mantra:\xa0 TBD by you

12)\xa0 Ross and his students have all found the value of the using mental imagery and seen large benefits, especially when expanding the practice beyond the physical driving as we described above.

13)\xa0 We also went over several other off season, off track practice topics that anyone can do while in the off season.

14)\xa0 Bill also brought up the relatively recent release of the Garmin Catalyst, how it works, and how it can help most if not all drivers at the track.\xa0 It does not replace a coach, but can definitely help anyone to be faster and try new techniques on the track by looking at what you are doing and helping you to optimize from what you are doing to a better approach.\xa0 Most of us would be surprised by how it can help you break a plateau.\xa0 (We are still working to get a guest on the show to diver deeper into the Catalyst.\xa0 We have not given up.)\xa0 Ross coincidentally has helped in the development of the Catalyst and it really shows.\xa0 The Catalyst even helped Ross improve his personal lap times and we are sure it will help you as well.

15)\xa0 Ross covers what areas are typically key to focus on at various driving levels of proficiency.\xa0 Several of the habits are similar across the driving levels, sometimes even to the highest professional ranks.

16)\xa0 We go into the relative importance of driving at the limit vs driving the perfect line.\xa0 It looks likes Robin for NASA Great Lakes was correct with his tip to Bill at Autobahn CC this summer.

17)\xa0 A few brake light stories that Ross has \u201cheard\u201d about, as well as a great story about Ross driving the most \u201cevil\u201d car he ever drove at Nazareth.

18)\xa0 Ross was even willing to entertain us with the fast and furious story time questions that we haven\u2019t asked him already.\xa0 Some will surprise you, but all were very entertaining.\xa0 We were especially looking forward to Ross\u2019s answers to his favorite corner of a track.