Why MSF Instructor Training Is More Intense Than A Race Weekend

Welcome to Off the Racing Line i am your host Carlos Espitia and coming back from vacation is Mike Moore mike welcome back we missed you
yeah thank you i don’t know who that bald dude was you had in his hair last time but he was awful so I’m glad that I could come back and save the show
he wanted to take your spot so it’s it’s good to have you back he’s got a day job he can stick to that
in today’s episode we are going to dive deep into instructor training school far just recently held its inaugural instructor school at Homestead and to help us get a perspective from the mentor side and the candidate side we brought in two very special guests Jerry Deiro correct yes
um you served as a mentor for Farara who are one of the senior instructors uh with Farra and Trevor B who you got your certification as an instructor about a year ago from Chin and you’ve been serving as an instructor uh for about a year now so we wanted to get your input on you know both of those sides so welcome to the show guys
thank you
thank you thank you for having us
so to lay down the foundation of what instructor school is Mike I’m going to turn it over to you why is instructor school important what is it let’s start with that
sure yeah so uh the instructor school is there is I guess you sort of have to start at the beginning of the story with the motorsport safety foundation which is an organization and their goal is to sort of set a baseline benchmark of what it takes to be a high performance driving instructor so there are three different levels uh you can get your certification as level one level two or level three level one is an online test uh you study some books take the test get your level one certification level two certification is then where we do some in actual incar training uh so we put together a comprehensive uh agenda a bunch of training materials we submitted that to the motorsport safety foundation they gave it their blessing uh which enabled us to actually run the MSF level two program so the MSL level two program is you would get some senior instructors together that have a great deal of experience not just in age of course but also in uh in just experience and handling different situations different types of students and then you get some mentor or get those are the mentors and then you get some instructor candidates those folks are already MSF level one certified they’re trying to get their MSF level two certification we put both of those people in the car together uh do some role playing sessions and those candidates that pass become MSF level who certified and then there is the MSF level three certification uh which obviously you and I both have which is comes with significantly more experience you have to have instructed at at least three tracks done some classroom stuff um 25 26 days I think in a car over the last two or three years so it’s sort of the the the cream of the crop if you will so three different levels of certification um and yeah really excited that FAR was very recently earlier this year um blessed to be approved to run the level two class and that’s what we did a month or so ago
yeah that was absolutely uh an amazing experience and you laid down the foundation for that program for for FAR
yes
which was uh very instrumental to get that thing off the ground
right with a great deal of help uh we would be remiss if we did not thank Motorsports Safety Foundation for all the assistance that they did in putting together those uh that helping us put together that program uh you and I both had had served as mentors before with Chin so we sort of had a good understanding of what happened obviously along with all of our experience but they were instrumental in helping us out there
yeah absolutely so Jerry let’s turn it over to you you served recently as a mentor
right
for FAR for the FAR instructor training uh school um what was your experience like being a mentor it was fun actually i have to Can I tell the story about my course my the Tim about Tim tim Timid Tim remember Timid Tim
Timid Tim Tim is one of the uh personas that we have to role play yes okay
so my mentee right
the candidate the candidate shows up in a shift Malibu perfect
so when I looked at that I was like I I I’m going to have to fall into character here big time so
and you were driving his car
i had to drive his car correct so he you know he got into his character he was telling me he was looking underneath the car telling me all kinds of stuff and I was and then I said “All right I got to do this.” I told him “Hey don’t tell anybody this but my wife doesn’t know I’m here.” And right there he kind of lost it stepped into really got into character yeah which is which is probably something that actually happens
yes and then he and I said “Let me check the back door here make sure the car seat’s not in here cuz my wife cannot know about this.” And he and I see he’s kind of losing it already yeah
so we I got and then he was pretty good though the whole time i I we went through the whole thing the flags and everything and I was driving everywhere that I shouldn’t be cuz it was my first time on track i tell him and I kept I kept reminding them said “Listen don’t tell anybody about this.” All right
and so that that was good and then then there was the next one right there was u um
we had stubborn Steve is the next one so I I guess for anybody that’s listening in that doesn’t understand as the mentor you have to role play the different uh personas that you would typically find in a student and so we usually start out which is the easy way to start is with Tim somebody that’s just really shy you kind of have to push them to pick up speed and then we slowly progress into Stubborn Steve and eventually the lovable Crazy Carl which one was your favorite i think other than timid Tim was crazy Carl because I know I had you know Peter right peter had he rented your
Yeah
so I had to show him what a Miata could do i had to so I told him I said “Listen we um I have to you have to do a a a check ride.” And he says “Okay we’ll do a check ride.” So I took him in the Miata and I did about 8/10 you know with him and when he got out he got out he took his helmet off and he said “I did not know a Miata could do all it ditches.” There you go and it’s true
for like you know because you you’ve drove in one you drove one and you said “All right I got to get one.” Right
driven one
uh due to my height I actually don’t I’ve tried uh numerous times but I just I don’t fit in one if I fit in right if I fit in one I would have one cuz Miata is
anybody that wants to go with me for a ride cuz I have it’s full you know I have the seats the harnesses I have everything so if anybody wants to go with me I’ll take them for a ride
all right there you go um so let’s let’s advance from the the fun part that you had would you do anything differently did you learn anything along the way as you were doing the the role playing as a mentor
i don’t think I would change much i think I would get into character again for all three
yeah you you like that
it was fun i didn’t think I was going to do it but I I actually did it
was it was it nerve-wracking cuz the first time I did it I think I was more nervous than my instructor candidate probably like I was studying the things and trying to make sure that I it definitely it was like I’ve never acted before what the hell am I doing so
as soon as I got in that Chevy Malibu I think I was okay it helped you get into character
yeah yeah it was good
all right let’s move on to you Trevor you recently graduated from instructor training school with Chin um so you went through the program as an instructor candidate what was your experience like as a candidate sure yeah uh just over a year and a half ago um it was a pretty intense experience uh I think it took a the full day i didn’t expect to be as busy as we were cuz you you have your car there you have a few sessions that you can go on track but I had no time to go on track you were always busy doing something and um studying in between or or like thinking about what you’re going to do next um but yeah it was a great experience it was intense it was a lot more than I was expecting um but it was it was great i think it laid a great foundation for our journey
what surprised you the most about the instructor school
um I guess how intense it was going to be like how much they were kind of in a sense grilling you or testing you um the role playing I think that was a little surprising as well i I knew some of it but I just couldn’t put it together until it actually happened to see it in action it’s something else right
exactly yeah to to your to your point about it being busy i can’t tell you the number of people that like instructor candidates that reached out to me beforehand and said “Oh you know are we allowed to drive our our cars on the track during the sessions that happened between I was like you’re you’re welcome to.” And I don’t think a single one of them ever made it out on track it’s intimidating it it’s it you know it’s like oh crap this is real it it we and it’s supposed to be a little bit scary right because the first time you actually instruct
it’s it’s a little terrifying so I think it does a really good job of
sort of walking you through exactly what it feels like you know I mean once you get to our point where you’ve done it so many times we can do it with our eyes closed it’s like okay this is fine but yeah for that relatively new uh instructor to the the hobby I think it I think it does a really good job of preparing them for it well you know even as a as a mentor um if you are actually committed to that candidate
you’ll find that
you’re not going to get out on the track very often either nope
because once you come off the track and you do your download session that’s really where the instruction starts happening and that’s actually the time that you are supposed to be on track you know as your free track time so um so that’s something to keep in mind is it seems like you’re going to get a lot of track time but in all actuality if if you’re committed to to the position you’re not going to get a lot of that
um Trevor is there um any feedback that you received that kind of stung but uh ultimately help you grow um I think it was during the role playinging where my my mentor was trying to uh rile me up or or you know get me pissed off at him or or get me to to get mad at him and I think because I knew he was playing a role it was hard for me to like
take him seriously
exactly like I was telling him stuff like “Yeah you know you know you’re not supposed to do that we have to go in we’re gonna we’re gonna sit you down in front of the chief instructor blah blah blah but he wanted me to get mad at him and and yell at him and I wasn’t doing that
right i actually had um quite the opposite experience at the last time that I was a mentor um I went into it knowing um that it was going to be a difficult uh candidate because at lunchtime we switch we switch candidates you know so the mentors essentially switch um or they exchange notes so the mentor in the morning comes to me and says “You’re going to have your hands full with this guy.” And so I went into it not on purpose to push his buttons but I knew that we had to essentially get him to the point where he realized that look one this is training and two you can’t lose your temper you know when you’re out there and it’s something that we did on purpose during our instructional video for the mentors
bleep and Randy propes
yes
yes
it’s terrible to use an inside joke on a podcast that nobody like seven people understand
so essentially what happened I’ll tell you the story real quick um the mentor tells me look this guy I’m trying to tell him what the line is and he’s saying well Randy Pope told me a different line and so Randy I think Randy knows what he’s talking about and so I’m I’m making mental notes i’m like oh okay I got it so when we go out there and he’s he’s teaching me the line and I tell him I’m like well you know Ross Bentley showed me a different line and I think he knows what he’s talking about and and that started the the process of him losing his mind he was so upset by by the time we got to I don’t even know if we got to crazy Carl like like he was he was so angry that he was just like I don’t even know what to tell you anymore i don’t I I can’t coach you like everything you’re doing because I’m like well what am I doing wrong like tell me i’m still I’m still role playing right i’m like I don’t know what what I’m doing wrong he goes everything everything you’re doing is wrong and I I was like I I can tell and usually it’s the other way right as an instructor once you lose control of the student you’re like “Okay why don’t we go in into the pits?” So me as the student
said “Hey you know what time time out we’re going to go in let’s discuss this.” So we go into the pits and um and I said “Okay um I’m I’m not role playing anymore this is Carlos again.” And I’m I’m looking at him and he just he’s looking straight ahead he’s just you could tell he’s just like clenching his his teeth he’s not even looking at me
i’m like “Listen
you can’t take this personally you know.” I was even like you know like “Hey relax relax.” You know like
you can’t take this he’s like “Listen I just I’m not used to anybody ever questioning me like that.” like it’s going to happen you know and you can’t lose your stuff out there while somebody’s doing 130 140 mph it’s like okay yeah yeah I got it and so we go back out there and I go right at it again i just start pushing his button i could see just he’s fuming right so um so that was the my my toughest case was was that guy
i actually did that with stubborn Steve
but I said that’s not what Jerry told me and he again he lost i mean it was it was kind of fun you it looks like you had a more of a like it’s intense mine was more fun it’s like that’s not what Jerry told me to do i’m just going to do this and he was like no no don’t do that so it’s different
i think at some point um I realized what what was going on i I started seeing the dynamic there and I think he was at some point also upset with himself i think he started realizing I went through this school and I’m probably not going to get the certification because I just completely blew it out here i think that’s what was going on through his head so I was trying to at that point I became more of the encourager i’m like “Hey listen let’s fix this let’s go back out there and let’s let’s redo it.” Ultimately at the end of the day he did pass you know it it wasn’t with flying covers uh colors but it was
definitely with some reservations and so we talked to the uh the organizers the the chin organizers and we let them know hey this guy needs like a novice novice student somebody that’s just not going to question him or push his buttons and they got it but that brings up actually a very interesting point you and I Mike were talking about some of the I think we had two uh candidates that were very iffy mhm
um at the end you were there um we get together with all the candidates uh sorry with all the mentors and we asked for feedback we want to know hey who’s good to go who’s going to get the the thumbs up and who’s not and we had two guys that were just like uh we don’t know about this about this one what was interesting about that and we’ve seen it with other examples where a a candidate we’re not very sure about and then they go instruct they turn out to be fantastic instructors their reviews from the students that they get are just five stars
yep
so there’s something to be said about that right like let’s now that that we have our first school under our belt now we know like even the guys that are a little iffy
right
they might actually be really great instructors
right and you pair those guys with people that are hey it’s their first track day and they’re coming out in a Ford Focus something that’s not insanely high horsepower you know you pair them with somebody that you know okay you don’t know you never can you know obviously judge a book by its cover but you can have a a pretty good sense of okay this this this novice is probably not going to give them too much trouble right they’re they’re going to be able to handle that and you you just have to grow as an instructor just as if you grow as a as a driver you know it’s it’s anybody that’s done both will tell you that it is almost as hard if not more difficult to instruct than it is to drive and it’s really hard to learn how to drive properly so to learn how to instruct properly uh it’s not for everybody um and it’s it’s not as easy as it sounds
yeah I would say it’s very mentally taxing so I think from the mentor side it is usually kind of fun cuz you’re just role playinging and then you kind of have to break character every once in a while and correct a few things here and there but from somebody that already knows how to drive on the track and now they have to learn how to instruct they’re not used to talking through every single corner and it’s exhausting
yes it is something that they don’t realize going into it at the end of the day like like you’re you’re spent mentally um all right let’s move on to how do you evolve as an instructor right and this is a question for for both of you i’ll start with you Jerry um how do you continue to sharpen your instructor tools and how do you add more tools to your instructor toolbox what have you done to do that uh I think it’s just personality really i have the same if even if the guy is terrible i’m okay with it just let’s Okay let’s let’s go back in the garage let’s talk about it let’s go back out okay you’re doing the same you’re doing that same habit every time turns whatever turns six seven whichever turn it is so I think just my personality just I just keep going forward i don’t like
So you’re refining the way that you approach it okay
yeah I think that’s
Thank What about you Trevor um yeah I think as you get more experience with different types of students you probably learn skills or or uh ways to handle certain situations so um I think I’ve learned a lot in the last uh year in terms of um what to do and and what approach to take so uh that has helped a lot and probably continue to do that as you have different type of drivers with different type of cars
and and again there’s a parallel there to driving right the first time we went out on the track you weren’t trail braing all the way down to the apex in turn three at Sebring right it was just like all right I’m going to do I’m getting all my braking done in a straight line like a a good little novice is because I don’t have the ability to do that car control right so as you as you gain experience with driving you get more comfortable with and learn how to do some of those more advanced techniques and the exact same thing happens with instructing right instructing you’re going to go out there the first time with your novice that’s never been to the track before and you’re going to tell them break into a straight line but eventually just like you how you yourself learned how to trail break you are suddenly going to get to a point when you’re working with a novice that maybe it’s their third or fourth day and you’re like “This person seems very capable they seem very competent right they have good car control let’s try and introduce some trailb breaking to them and as that light goes off with them yeah it the parallels are really
Yeah eerily similar
uh Trevor let me rewind a little bit tell me about your your first student as soon like right after you graduated from instructor school and you were paired up with your first student what was going through your head like just kind of walk us through that were you nervous what happened uh yeah a little nervous mo mostly because um I think it was a manual BMW um
Well there’s your first problem is that it was a BMW
come on man
but you know I’m familiar with BMW so I’m pretty sure that’s why I was paired with with this particular student um but no I was just uh kind of comprehensive or apprehensive in my approach because it was his first time on track you know he had just recently gotten a manual BMW and he wanted to bring it out and he wasn’t a very strong driver uh so it’s a lot of things to be figuring out at at your first event your first time out on the track there’s a lot of information coming at you and you could even easily be overwhelmed um so I I was just trying to figure out ways to tame that and and approach it in a manner that um it’ll be safe you’ve been instructing for about a year now
about a year and a half now it’s It’s like June time flies when you’re having fun exactly
in that time and since your first student have you had moments of doubt that you said “I don’t know if this is for me.”
Um not really
or what am I doing here
yeah no not really i think um one of my mentors as well said that when when he was driving my car and I was in the passenger seat he was trying to you know get get some slip angle or or get it to misbehave but I knew my car was capable of handling it and traction control was on so I wasn’t really concerned um but he was like “Yeah it takes a lot to to phase you in terms of of that.” But he he wasn’t able to do anything so I wasn’t worried jerry um have you had any moments of of doubt either why am I still instructing or maybe this is not for me anymore
well there’s always a few students that are overzealous right
mhm
like you’re talking about turn three turn five turn five at Sebring luckily this it was a BMW M3 it was well set up he did not trail break in five he just let the car go and I’m thinking is this car going to stick and sure enough it did and I said “Don’t do that again because we will go off track next time.”
So got lucky on that one but yeah there there’s there’s some there’s some moments
some moments that made you question whether I’m I’m in the right place
yeah for that yeah mhm and there was one guy in the GT3 Porsche at Homestead he said “Can I turn the traction control off?” I said “Absolutely not.”
Not but Right
yeah i won’t be in the car if you do but yeah so
you have these people that are kind of like overzealous
yeah yeah did you want to add something Trevor
i was going to say I’ve been pretty lucky so far where a lot of my beginner students they haven’t really done anything too crazy um so yeah
and I will tell you that it’s not luck i I think that you just haven’t you haven’t been just lucky right i’ve been doing this for decades and have there been a couple of people that I’ve been working with that I thought to myself at the end of the day I’m glad that’s over you know I would not want to work with that person again sure it’s happened but I think I’ve mentioned this before the overwhelming majority of people that are still at the level that they’re getting instruction are fall on the timid Tim side of the equation versus the crazy Carl side of the equation right it’s it’s a very humbling experience so you will find that 5 years from now you may still think “Wow I’ve gotten really lucky that I’ve not had Crazy Carl yet.” There’s not a lot of Crazy Carl’s out there right we we we include Crazy Carl in the role playing just so that if it ever happens you have some experience and you know hey I’m in charge of my safety we’re coming in right um but that’s a very small minority of drivers especially ones that are still getting instruction
yeah yeah i like don’t you like when you get a student that gets it he doesn’t get it in the beginning but by the third session you’re like “Okay yeah go ahead just do your thing.”
Those are those are the fun ones
well it’s what makes it so rewarding to be an instructor is when that light bulb That’s what I was going to say is that I I in the last uh few times that I did instruct I wasn’t getting that from the student they they that progression wasn’t there and I started like one doubting myself and then doubting whether like this was for me after all because that I don’t know that that reward of seeing that progression from the student just it wasn’t there anymore and uh I was it was kind of getting me down
well that’s because you’re a terrible instructor
that could be the case yes
didn’t you miss me
yeah uh no okay
but I am happy you’re here um I want to talk about something that’s probably we haven’t talked about this and I think it’s it’s worth discussing and uh it’s I’m entitling this call this when instructors fail why are lazy instructors dangerous and and I’ll I’ll frame that a lazy instructor is essentially somebody that has been doing this for so long that they they’re just kind of going through the motions right they’re not really investing in the student anymore it’s just like I’m here i’m going to get my free track time i’m going to make sure this guy doesn’t kill us and that’s about it and I’m going to check out why are those instructors dangerous well I think that they’re just doing a disservice to growing the hobby right like your novice is there to learn it would be the same as you know insert any random you know kindergarten teacher high school teacher whatever like you can tell the difference between a teacher a trainer an instructor a coach of any sport hobby class whatever you can tell the difference between somebody that’s passionate about it and somebody that’s there just for a paycheck or to get summers off or for free track time and they’re just doing a disservice so yeah if you’re letting somebody develop bad habits without giving them proper instruction you’re setting them up for failure and you know I’d like to believe that you would be disappointed in yourself if you were doing that
so Mike you as the chief instructor for FAR how do you recognize that behavior right
and how do you address it
right so first of all I think what we’re doing is great in the fact that we are going to mandate every one of our instructors be MSF level two certified right that’s a huge step in the right direction because you already know that the person has passed this baseline that they have experience they’ve instructed in the car before they’ve dealt with at least those three uh different personality types that that we role play so that’s a huge step in the right direction
but we do it by gathering feedback right i I exchange emails with every instructor and student and when I say we gather feedback it’s both ways we gather feedback from the instructor on how the student did and we gather feedback from the novice on how their instructor was right so we get we uh do evaluations at the end of every event there’s you know 10 questions that say how did the person do this how did the person do this um and like I said gathering feedback directly from the students sort of is our way to ensure that the the the instructors that we have are up to the caliber that we want them to be have you ever had to call out an instructor
um I’ve had some conversations now you have to take it with a grain of salt right because some people just don’t get along right and it’s not that one of them is right and one of them is wrong it’s simply that sometimes personalities don’t match right we had that situation at the instructor training school where we had to swap somebody right and it wasn’t that the instructor candidate was bad and wrong and it wasn’t that the instructor was bad and wrong he’s got a ton of experience and you know is great people great driver so it’s not that either one of them was wrong it’s just simply the their communication styles didn’t match um so in that instance I didn’t really have to talk to the people because there wasn’t anything wrong you know have we had to give anytime we get feedback from a student I share that with the instructor now depending on how it was worded I may soften it up or otherwise but fortunately because all of our all of our instructors have gone through MSF level two training um you know we’ve got cream of the crop type people it’s not like I’ve ever had to reach out to one of our instructors and be like “Hey this is the you know fourth bad review you’ve gotten so we can’t have you back.”
Jerry you’ve been doing this for a while instructing that is have you ever had to call out a fellow instructor not an instructor no not really okay that’s got to be rare I think right have I mean I was involved in that incident with the because I had remember that that was a
Yeah
you know they had they they switched me with the
somebody was unhappy with you
no no no
no in the instructor training school
when we had to switch the instructor and the the the he was Yeah he was the fix yes right got it got it all right
and again to fix is the wrong word because it wasn’t broken
right yes yes of course uh let’s transition uh over to segment number three i’m going to talk to you directly Trevor um transitioning from SLS which is our SuperLab series which by the way you got uh the 2024 SLO3 champion you were the you are the champion and you are wearing
the champion hat i brought that as a prop right here
yes talk to us about transitioning from that from being a super fast driver for essentially a time attack over to wheel-to-heel racing which you started doing this year and the Spec E90 series what was that transition like and what did you learn along the way um well I’m I’m still at the beginning of that journey i think um I have a lot to learn um I’ve only done two race weekends so far but um I would say that uh Superlap Series prep helped prepare me in in a sense for qualifying so I was very comfortable doing one or two hot laps right away i can I can nail those without an issue um the the problem started to come throughout an entire stint um
you’re not used to staying out there for 30 minutes
exactly i’m not used to to keep going lap after lap doing your fast you know lap and uh I was making mistakes towards the end of the the sprint i felt like I was I was getting hot because it is Florida and I think my first weekend I didn’t have a cool shirt so that that um that wasn’t great um but also the experience I I was new to it i I hadn’t um done a lot of laps at at that pace um for that period of time and I needed I needed more practice and and seat time
and I would I would assume that the first time you cross start finish right green flag cross start finish you’ve got your marker for where you’re going to turn in at one and you’re just like “Well this is normally where I turn in but there’s a car inside of me and I have to wait for him to turn in or her to turn in.” Or if you’re turning in from the inside you’re like “Okay well I used to be 8 feet wider here so now I’ve got to adjust my line and I can’t track out because there’s a door next to my door.” So I would imagine that’s the the difference there has got to be huge
oh yeah definitely um but also that’s the fun part of it um I enjoyed going wheelto-wheel side by side uh throughout the course that wasn’t really my issue it was like keeping up the pace while doing that right
like uh there was a few times where I think I got passed by we went three wide into eight at Homestead and I had a prototype car on the inside and another BMW on my right side and both of them passed me but I felt like that turn was amazing right
nice so the Super Lab series helped you essentially to become a really great qualifier qualifier drive qualifying driver what it didn’t prepare you for and just for anybody that’s listening in the Super Lab series is our our time attack you’re we’re out there essentially maybe four laps at most you do your warm-up lap maybe two then you do a hot hot lap
and generally there’s not a car within 300 yards of you if you’re doing it right we usually space each other out so you’re out there for maybe 15 minutes max so you’re out there for now you’re learning 30 minutes and every lap counts what at what point did you realize when you were out there I am not prepared for this physically or mentally um I don’t think
turn two of lap one is the answer
yeah i I would I wouldn’t say I realize that I’m not totally prepared for it i think I I was comfortable out there but I I wasn’t as comfortable as I thought I would be
well physically you and I talked about the physical component of it i think the physical part was mainly the heat um and the heat coupled with uh the mental exhaustion I think that was more of a a drain an impact than the physical part of it jerry you also race and uh you recently with your team which is Apex Racing
yes you guys you race primarily in Champ Car which is an endurance uh racing series correct
and you guys your team won you took second place in your class
17th overall out of 140 and second in class yes
at Daytona
at Daytona
which is a huge accomplishment i mean just finishing the race the cars usually don’t last
second try the first try and the cars was kind of teething still right it was brand new we didn’t make five hours on the first rate the first Daytona last year
but this year
it it it had a couple issues that we already know what it is for the next time but yeah to it’s an accomplishment so you already being you know familiar with racing and with the Super Lab series how does your does your mindset change from one to the other is there like just subtleties that you know that you have to adjust to
oh definitely oh yeah
what are they
spatial awareness when you’re in wheelto- wheel cuz there’s cars coming everywhere or you’re trying to pass and and you know Oh it Yeah so the Superlap series because I have a Miata and I go out with some faster cars so there was an issue where I was online and somebody had to go around me and then there was a it was a question of you know why didn’t you get out of my way i’m think I was on a fast lap so sometimes it’s hard to tell if you’re driving me on fast lap
that’s not match exactly but I was going fast
we know that you do so Uh but other than that um I think uh just you know the wheelto-heel experience plus I’m I’m driving a front-wheel drive car now right in a Champ car
which is a CR it’s a CRX it’s a Honda CRX so that’s frontwheel drive now I have to adjust again mentally
to that
sure um so Champ car initially started as a affordable way to get into racing um at what moment did you realize this This is not a joke like this is for real as far as champ car at Daytona
cuz you think
when the green went flying
yeah well we have there’s four or four four drivers i don’t go out first i think I either go out second or third and by then you things are already kind of already moving around you know there’s cars still but the beginning like to to start a race
it’s chaos yeah for sure because there’s 100 plus cars trying to get by you or you’re trying to pass oh yeah i had a um I had a good friend of mine David Maher who was on our first episode he he talked me into doing my first champ car race at Sebring uh this is a couple years ago at and and I remember um we brought down the owner of the team brought down the cost like dramatically it was it was so ridiculous that I just I couldn’t say no so I went out there uh he asked me “What stint do you want do you want to start the race i was like absolutely not i’ve never done any wheelto-heel racing all I’ve done is you know track days i said I do not want to start the the race so he said all right we’re going to we’re going to put you in um like either stint two or stint 3 i was like perfect um I get in the car I go out there and yeah like I it took me a couple laps to kind of get used to the lay of the land and you know cars just flying everywhere and I was like “Yeah I think I got this.” And then we go fullc course yellow and everybody gets bunched up and now it’s like my worst fears coming to life right now I’m like surrounded by cars and I’m like and and and I had to ponder what was about to happen for like three or four laps at Sebring those are very very long laps you know was close to four miles and under double yellow you’re going like excruciatingly slow so I’m just I keep going through my in my head like what is this you know green flag going to look like and then we finally went green i was like “Good Lord please don’t hit anything.” We managed to go through turn one you know side by side i was like “Okay we made it through there and the rest of the race was was okay.” But that was uh that was my my thought as well is I don’t I don’t want to start bunched up and ultimately that’s that’s what happened
the other thing is it’s a 2-hour stint
hour 50 maybe that’s a long time because I remember I thought I was in the car for maybe an hour and I thought is it is it two hours yet
seems like an eternity does seem like an eternity it does it does
absolutely
have you ever gone back did you just do that one race or have you done it again
i did that one race um would you do it again
yes yes absolutely um there were a couple things that went wrong uh that were outside of my control the the the cool shirt um what do you call it the
the the cool
the cooler the cooler yes the filled with ice
it became untached and it just started bounce down you know bouncing around
and so I’m driving and one of the cool things that I just I felt like like a superstar as I could like press a button on the steering wheel and I can talk to you know the the crew i was like “Oh I like this.” So after after a couple laps and they weren’t talking to me I would just like I would just like radio in i’m like “How’s it going guys?” I just I like to hear you know somebody on on the radio and they’re like “Hey are you okay?” I’m like “Yeah everything’s fine just checking in
just back here on the backstretch nothing’s exciting.”
Exactly the back straight so uh anyway so now this cooler is dancing around bouncing around i’m like I you know I I phone home right i’m like “Hey guys I got a little problem what’s wrong?” I got the cooler you know it’s bouncing around can you still drive yeah well then drive okay
thanks for letting us know
okay bye so I’m like “Okay.” And I had made a deal with myself and somebody had mentioned this to me it was a good idea like never keep the cool shirt running the entire time because the ice will melt and you’re out there for 2 hours you’re not going to make it so they said “Think of it like a sort of as a reward system right you turn it on on the straits right so on like the back straight turn it on then like the whole straight just leave it on and it’s like jumping into a cold pool of water right so I’m waiting around i go I get in the back straight and I’m like “Okay here we go.” And I you know I went to turn it on and nothing nothing was happening and I looked at I looked down as much as I could and I realized yeah the the cable was just flapping i’m like I’m disconnected like there’s nothing going through my through the veins of the the shirt and uh so I radio in again hey guys uh the cool shirt is not working anymore well can you still drive i’m like I I’ll try um I think about 10 minutes into it I started seeing black spots and I started making like just dumb mistakes and that’s when I realized like ah I better come in and I told him that i was like
I’m starting to see things out here guys i’m going to bring it in like this is the end of my stint so so that that’s that’s
But you do it again how long did that stint last
maybe 7 minutes maybe 40 minutes i think I was out there for about 40 minutes but it was it was July it was the Fourth of July weekend so when I got out of the car and you know this you’re supposed to help the guy getting in the car
i got out and I went to help him and I was like I just grabbed the car cuz I thought I was going to I was going to pass out yeah just from heat exhaustion it was It was that bad all right um we’re going to do a new segment called rapid fire all right these are going to be quick questions keep your answers short one to three uh words and then we’re going to do a round table all right don’t be nervous Jerry this is okay this is a safe place okay we’re going to start with you Mike and then we’re going to go around all right question number one most and and whatever comes to mind first all right most overused phrase by instructors
break break break break break break break jerry it’s definitely break trevor i’ll say the opposite th um ease into it or or something like that
go go go go go go go
mine was be uh smooth as fast
uh
but that’s true
in your experience what kind of cars do the worst students usually drive go
okay so I’m going to make my answer long here because I feel like I owe the Corvette community an apology because I always bash on Corvettes the reason that I bash on Corvettes was just my personal experience with my terrible 2002 automatic transmission base Corvette with allseason run flat tires okay so that is my apologies to Corvette owners i mean it’s too easy to say Mustang just because all the YouTube videos
but I’m going to say Mustang
from your experience at the track those are typically the worst um students mustang drivers that’s your answer Jerry
sedan drivers sedan
yeah big BMWs big cars
Mercedes big sedans
interesting trevor what about you
um domestic cars
wow
okay your Camaros Corvettes
uh Fi Dodges and all that kind of stuff
thought you ready to say a Fiero i was going to say please tell me you never need a Fiero after well I haven’t had much experience as as an instructor with a student with one yet but in my mind those are the ones that might fit that criteria okay uh if I have to generalize I I would lean in with you as well and I’ll just say American cars okay uh number three what what mod what’s the mod that instantly tells you a student is going to be a problem um would you count like somebody that put the fake brake caliper thing over their brakes cuz that would be awful that would be
just like one of those coffee can exhaust with the burbble with the burbal tune on it
yeah those are usually problem
okay Jerry what about
I have no idea three words forever
uh let’s say too many mods too much power
power
that’s what I was thinking
power over
whenever they they start off with well I got a tune like oh what kind of tune
that’s usually a bad indication all right number four um you’ve got 10 seconds to make sure make a student faster what do you tell them
slow is slow smooth smooth is fast
smooth is fast jerry gas it really
on the straight just go
just go on the straight slow down for the court
okay
i’ll say consistent for a full lap
consistency
no mistakes yeah
okay
that’s great advice not overdrive the car like right yeah you you slow down to go faster
my input would be eyes up right visibility I think is the
the key there
uh number five one thing every student thinks matters but actually does not tunes yes
power i mean honestly high horsepower doesn’t matter
high horsepower for sure
yeah i would say too much focus on Yeah again we’re talking about you know track usage so I think we’re all in alignment there uh power and in fact we talked about this episode two was it with uh with Jonathan we just talked about too much power is usually just a bad thing for for the racetrack all right number six uh what’s the most dangerous personality trait a student can bring to the track somebody thinks that they’re better than they are they’re not a good listener
ego yeah ego
okay
definitely ego i would say that they already know everything they know it all
yeah ego unwilling to learn
we’re in agreement with that all right number seven ever had to This one’s I love this
you ever have to fake it you ever had to fake enthusiasm for a student who just wasn’t getting it um I mean I don’t know if fake is the right word uh have I had to embellish what they were doing to
get them a little bit more excited when you know if they were if they were on a scale of 1 to 10 they were a five uh have I told them you know given them a a a cheerleading session that they were more like an eight or a nine absolutely but as long as they’re trending in the right direction that’s good enough for me jerry have you ever had to fake it
yeah there was a midlife crisis guy and I Yes he just didn’t get it i said “Great job.” And that was it
it had to be a Porsche driver
he did it for it was a Camaro Z1 whatever it was a nice car but he just didn’t
you were looking out for a Zag
that’s a good man right there what about you Trevor
no I haven’t had to do that yet
um all all my students have been fairly good and they progressed throughout the weekend so it was kind of natural for me to um you know keep encouraging them
okay
there is nothing more frustrating than being with somebody that just doesn’t listen like you you know that they can be better and you know the car can be better and you’re telling them this is all you have to do and they literally do the exact same thing every single lap and it doesn’t change all day it makes for a long day
can I tell you real quick about this guy though real quick he would not go past 80 miles an hour
and I kept telling him just go and then he’s looking he’s looking in his mirror the whole time and the Porsche comes by i said let the Porsche by and he’s all like flustered and he said he’s going to hit me i said no he’s not going to hit you this is not your car you’re not driving this is not your car i was like “Okay let’s okay I’m done i’m done with you.”
And what’s ironic is what’s ironic is that if he got to on the straightaway he got to 80 and he sort of lifted he’s probably the same guy that was doing 90 on the turnpike on the way to the track
probably
yeah i had a I had a student that I knew before um he was my student and on the street he was a pretty crazy driver like he would go stoplight to stoplight you know flooring it launching the car and at Homestead on the front straight he didn’t want to go past 100 miles an hour so he was always lifting early and I couldn’t figure out why until I started asking him he’s like “Oh I don’t want to go past 100.” I’m like “Oh okay well thank you for telling.”
Ask him why
um he said he just didn’t feel like it and I think it was the turn coming up like he didn’t want to go 100 into the turn so he just decided that he was going to let off at 100 you know better to let off at 100 than to
you know do the opposite and just keep the pedal buried into
Well at least he knows you know what his threshold is
right he said he said “I’m not crossing that line.” And and as instructors you know we abide by that
that is better than the opposite yeah and I was happy he told me cuz then I can adjust and we can work on other things we didn’t need to hit a top speed on the straightaway i not a huge fan of that anyways all right number eight one thing instructors say that sounds smart but it’s BS turn off your traction control because it’ll make you faster bs i I I I do not I run with my traction control on and
Well that depends on the car
it Well I guess it depends on the quality of the traction control that’s true if it’s traction control that won’t let you do anything at all before completely like basically going into limp mode then fine the overwhelming majority of people though if you come into a track day and it’s your first track day and you did a bunch of internet research and you read a bunch of people telling you traction control is the worst thing it kills your lap time turn it off as soon as you get there i’m sorry that’s a huge mistake sure for advanced drivers I I would definitely say that that is the case but for you know beginner drivers leave the traction control on what about you Jerry the one out of 10 times they hit the apex the one I say good job what about the other nine [Laughter] anyway
so so false falsifying your enthusiasm
i’ve been trying to tell them like remember I told you about the habits
the bad habits and everybody has a bad I probably have habits too
it’s that bad habit i said turn in now waits turns in okay we’ll try it again next time it’s just bad habit bad habit
forever what about you
um yeah probably a very similar where maybe they’re making a lot of mistakes but you just want to keep saying good job keep going you’ll get it next time or or you know keep trying to encourage them even though it might not have been what you were trying to
Sure point out
all right uh number nine best and worst car you’ve instructed in uh the best car I’ve ever instructed in was a 16-year-old girl in a 2012 I believe Porsche Cayman R she was absolutely phenomenal um it’s also very easy to drive that car uh the worst car that I’ve ever instructed in you know again probably something like a a Dodge Challenger RT you know just that really heavy um you know an Audi RS6 where it’s just you you know that you’re going to be doing well if the brakes last the entire day
sure Jerry best cars
your port is a GT4 yours
no mine’s a GTS
gts uh at Sebring the G it was a GT4 think that that was that was probably
best or worst
best worst i I can’t think of a worst
okay
yeah I really can’t um best one would probably be the Lotus Evora GT that I I had a student in at Sebring the worst one hard to say because worse in what way like uh there was a a 535 student that had um you know big 5 series that probably is not the great car but we had blast he did really well i enjoyed that
well a car that you just did not enjoy instructing in the race again it’s not a bad car it was probably a GR Corolla it those are supposed to be really great cars but it was probably slower than I was expecting yeah actually you know um with the with the GR86 I was I had a student in one of those cars and I was like “Yeah I was looking at it i’m talking to the guy and I’m like “This is going to be fun.”
And it just it felt slow
well it’s a Maza Miata with a little bit more power yeah but but here’s here’s the thing though here we go again
here’s the thing though it’s you know I’m looking at the car thinking this is going to be great but then I was thinking that this is a relatively new driver also so yeah he didn’t want to push the car it’s a maybe has a couple hundred miles you know on the engine so he didn’t want to push it switch that back to when we went to Autobon and we we rented the GRI86s up there at Autobon and I was watching David fight it out with uh with Todd Bores in those cars i was sold i wanted one no they’re fantastic
amazing car for me um I I’m not usually like a car fanboy but the one that just really impressed me was a Ferrari Pista i didn’t even know what that car was and um I was assigned to the student people just kept coming up to him and asking him questions about the car i’m like “It’s a Ferrari you know what’s the big deal?” Even the license plate said Pista you know so then I started looking I’m like looking on the phone like what’s the big deal with this car oh
we go out there and like wow this thing is amazing um my my I don’t want to say worst car but the car that I just I if if it’s ever assigned to me again I’m just like I don’t I don’t want that it was a um it was a track prepped Miata and it was probably a race Miata is what it was so no carpeting
hot loud
hot loud and for my likes slow right it was It was No I did not like that
jerry I love Miatas i want to be very clear about that
he’s poking me over here with the Miata Dave all right last question and take your time with this one well don’t take your time too much cuz we’re running out of time
we’ve done a terrible job with the rapid fire segment by the way
yeah you guys disappoint me in that matter but anyways um what’s what’s the one hill you are willing to die on when it comes to track driving or instructing something that maybe other people would be like “Nah you’re crazy.” Trevor you have anything um
inspiring
maybe a little bit i’d say that um a lot of people focus too much on car the car they’re driving or the mods they need to have and all that kind of stuff in order to come to the track you can almost have any car but decent brakes decent tires and just get get out there and have fun i don’t think you need a lot whereas a lot of people a lot of friends I know in the car community they have all these mods the car is fully prepped they’ve but they’re scared to take to a track day yeah that is very true anyways we are out of time unfortunately but listen this was episode number five this is our first sort of mini mini milestone so I didn’t think that we were actually going to make it this far so big kudos to us episode number five anyways thank you guys for uh for joining us today it was been great chatting with you guys
uh as I sign off remember everything interesting happens
off the racing line see you guys next time hey if you liked what you heard be sure to click like and subscribe if you are an HPDE driver instructor racer work at the racetrack EMT and you have interesting stories that you would like to share be sure to reach out to us we would love to have you on the [Music] show from dreamer to driver ain’t always straight kept my head down fueled by faith i lost some time but found a diamond out of me