DrifterFD3S

well i guess you didnt get the full version.... to me it looks like hes hauling *** down the straight compared to when he was gripping, anyways im tired of arguing over something that hasent been proved either way yet. till some evidence going one way or another comes up, ill leave this discussion as it is now, unresolved.

88GTU

What kind of evidence do you need? Are your eyes open? Can you name one race (the real term) series in which drifting is used? If its only due to tire wear would you not expect qualifying laps to be all drift? Did Schumacher drift last weekend? Did Alonso go sideways through qualifying to get 3rd on the grid? Hell, at the Solo II nationals did ANYONE drift their way to a win? One lap at a time, tire wear is not an issue. There is no grip vs drift debate... Its not opinion, just open your eyes.
-Matt

PS: For those arguing the title of this forum please note that it has been changed to "Discuss anything related to road racing and auto X." Now go form a drifting forum...

DrifterFD3S

in case you did not know, your car needs to be set up for drift in order to drift fast. "open my eyes?" how bout you shut the hell up and dont tell me what to do. there is no way that between qualifying and the race the crew would be able to get the EXACT right set up that the team spend thousands, if not tens of thousands of dollars as well as many hours at the track on testing and such to get the car handling right. i agree that we need a drifting forum, so **** like this doesnt happen anymore. people get so damn adament about their point of view that they are willing to be nasty and snide about it. god damn all of you shut the hell up and just let us believe what we want to.

Ranzo

Ok let me enlighten you about the REAL term drift....its is a RACE term used in timed, grip style events.......I will let you in on a little secret that people who really race cars know and now thanks to the internet and the persistance of idiots everyone will know it. The fastest way around a track it to run the proper line and run it at the limit of adhesion. Drift is what happens when you drive at the limit.

The drift you see in D1 and Drift events is an exaggeration of this and has been expanded to a motorsport because the the immense amount of skill required to do it consistentely. If you are racing F1 with Schumacher on those super long angle courses then there would be little if any advantage to drifting.......If you race on tight road courses lacking wide radius turns then Drifting becomes a valuable tool for getting a good time. Someday you might drive something besides boringt *** autocross and do something like Japanese style Gymkhana, then if you try to not drift or use the skill required to drift then you will loose and I will promise you that. If you really race then you will undoubtebly know that in qualifying there is plent of room to run the perfect line and there is less rubber on the track to cause traciton problems and you would know that consistency is the key to getting a good time.

Whether or not people like drift posts in here or not I really don't give a ****. If you don't like it don't read it! One problem with the world is bitchy *** people who go on and complain about what other people are doing when those people were minding there own business. Yet when pointed out as being an annoyance themselves they point to some technicallity to protect their right to bitch. So go ahead and bitch.......im used to it.

88GTU

Since when is this a secret? Every book on driving and driving course teaches this. Drifting in racing refers to the 15 degrees or less of slip angle you get when you are right at the limit. Its a shame but the term "drift" does not refer to that anymore. Go back and read the posts in this forum. Everybody arguing that drifting is faster is refering to showy oversteer opposite lock drifts, not the minor (almost unnoticable to the observer) drifting that is done in racing. I guarantee that if you showed up to a "drift" competition and drove the fastest lap around the track possible you would lose because nobody would be able to see your drift.



I'm sure they would also never have an engine, tires, suspension setup only for qualifying. Oh wait...


Easy enough if you can learn to post in the proper areas and spare people from having to read non related posts.

I have not read a more pathetic sounding statement in a long time.

-Matt

Mark'sMazda

It's REALLY obvious who has done any real racing and who hasn't.

Drifting is SLOW, yes it looks/feels fast, but think about it, your tires are slidding, scrubbing off your speed.

Last year when I was racing at a club level, if I went into a corner to hot, I would get oversteer, and my time for that lap would suffer.

Jerk_Racer

It's also obvious who has been paying attention to what's been written so far. The course you were on is not good for drifting. It's nice and wide open. That's obvious and nobody is saying that drifting like a madman around every apex is the fastest way around every course. That's insane and I hope nobody has read into anything like that. Now if there were extremely tight areas (smaller the the normal turning radius of your car) then making your car rotate will allow you to get through the course quicker. When conditions like that come up, you will need to know how to slide a car just enough to get through very quickly.

Ever see a WRC race on tarmac getting around a tight hairpin? To not slide in these situations you would need to turn as much as possible, then put it in reverse to line up with the road ahead and then proceed. At least you wouldn't be sliding because that'd be too slow, huh?

There are more race venues out there than just autoX and road course racing. Some of them are actually more intense measures of a drivers skill instead of just the car. Too bad most of the people that have a dislike for drifting are painfully unware of them or just don't care.

Mark'sMazda

The course I race on is VERY tight, narrow by road corse standards. Waterfordhills, have you herd of it? In the low HP car I was driving (spec racer) a little oversteer would kill my momentum, and thus my lap times would suffer. This is what I meant in my last post, but my lazy hands didn't bother typing it out.

I understand that drifting has it's place, on a low traction surface when the drag of your sliding tires don't slow you down nearly as much as they do on dry pavement. And like you mentioned about tight corners.

I actually really like drifting, but I dislike false info being spread around about it. I follow WRC closly, and wish we had more rally cross coverage in the US. I am not a road course snob. I don't drift my car very much. After all the time and $$$ I have dumped it, I seem to have a hard time flinging it sideways at a ditch. I do introduce my left foot to the brake every once and a while though

Jerk_Racer

No worries. Low HP spec car? Yeah, the last thing you'll want to do is scrub off speed and lose momentum. Tell me about tight courses. Pacific Raceways has a nasty chicane at turns 3a and 3b. This is a site that has a vid of a lap on it - One lap of PR . It's a fairly tight area but sliding at all will result in sloppy times. I love driving this course (it's local after all) but I sure wouldn't want to try to slide around on it. But when is drifting most appropriate? When I said tight in my previous post, I meant 1st gear tight. A quick 180 tight. Look up some gymkhana courses that are used in Japan. They'd make most autocrossers have an aneurism. Now those are tight. As Ranzo pointed out, to not use drifting (or extreme slip angle driving if you will) will cause you to be the slowest through the course and lose to those that do slide.

This is the most appropriate section for drifting. One who is into it will setup their car and work on their driving skills as much as anybody that's into road racing and autoX. Heck, with autocross you might be behind the wheel for a total of five minutes per event. I wonder how such a small amount of time in a car can garner such a following? Hmmm... Well, I can't find another section on this board that is as appropriate for such discussions. There certainly are not enough discussions on drifting to warrant it's own section so there's plenty of space here to share. It's not for everybody, so everybody does not need to click on the posts that have the term "drift" explicitly stated in the tagline. But there's no reason to get upset by it being in a particualr section when there are no better sections for it to be in.

Me? I'll take seattime anyway I can get it. Grip or drift or inbetween. I like it all. It just seems some people are too quick to dismiss drifting as some passing fad or useless activity. Unless racing a car professionally is putting food on your table, RELAX. Racing shouldn't be taken so seriously. After all, I'd like to think that most everybody that does wake up at 4 or 5am to go out and race on a Sunday first started for the fun if it. That's what drifing is too. Fun. Serious fun.

Mark'sMazda

www.specracer.com www.waterfordhills.com

Sorry for hijacking the hell out of your thread.

Center of The Universe

Well seeing as there can be money in compeating in both, I dont see why they wouldnt do both.

ForsakenRX7

I think this whole arguement has started because (as was stated before) the term "drift" has become blurred due to events like the d1. Yes drifting IS used in racing. Very little if any is used in grip racing, unnoticable to the eye. However, in rally cross drift is insanely noticable. But they have to for a faster time. Then there is D1 style drift. The more popular drift. And whether people want to admit it or not its spreading here to the US. So bitching about it isnt going to make it go away. The only thing thats gonna take it out of this section is to form a seperate drift section. So I hope someone in charge is taking notes.

neotaku17

1.World Rally Championship
2.SCCA ProRally Championship
3.Manufacturer's Championship

Is three enough? Because that's all I could come up with in half a second.

Silkworm

Will someone put a stake in this thread and let it die already? Sheesh. You're not going to change Matt's mind, he's not going to change yours. We got it. Enough already.

7spiritR

I will not debate the effectiveness of drift over grip or grip over drift. I will simply let you all in on the fact that a tire's maximum grip potential is achieved at approximately 10% slip. (I'm sure you already know this Silkworm, I've seen your videos and you are obviously an experienced track driver). When accelerating from a standstill, you will actually achieve more traction if you put just enough power down to get the rear wheels to start to squeal. This is also true for braking. When your tires start to squeal as you are braking, you are achieving maximum traction. Your tires are actually slipping slightly (which causes the sound).

When you turn into a corner, if you overshoot the tire's maximum grip by 10% and corner in harder than you car actually has the traction capabilities for, your car will fishtail slightly and you will actually be able to carry more speed through the entire corner.

Whether or not you want to call that drifting is completely up to you. I have no opinion on the subject, but you cannot deny that for the fastest possible cornering capabilities, you must slide your car at least some. That's all I've got to say. Just come to an agreement that regardless of whether or not you call it drifting some sort of sliding is slightly faster.

sorry I can't help the origional guy's question seeing as I know absolutely nothing about race setup... d'oh...

ScaryFast_EJ20

Seriously fellas, Drifting is for FUN. I guess people are sick of trying to be the fastest, meaning you have spend top dollars to get them HP.

Drifting is just a fun way to people to compete their cars, and ultimately more important, style and technique of driver. All for PURE FUN OF IT. Just leave it at that okay?

Who really cares who goes the fastest? I like to see big smokey burn out, sideways driving, if there is a way for people to gather and compete how well they drift, why not?

Tire, suspension, engine setup are very different when u WANT TO drift for the FUN OF IT. so just leave it at that okay? What people do with their own car is their business, so stop argueing like school room sissies

Dont tell me seeing a highly tuned, RWD, Turbo charged car doing a 360spin into a turn and whip it into a full sideway drift at 60mph all the way through, wont put a smile on your face? FUN!!!!~