As far as I can see, nowhere does he say you should leave the car in neutral for longer than the actual shifting process. He says brake first, then downshift and be smooth. He also says, quote: "There isn't a successful race driver in the world who doesn't heel and toe on every downshift. (...) In fact that's the only way to drive all the time."
I would have been really surprised, if a pro race driver would think otherwise and advise to put the car in neutral. Haven't heard or read a single instructor doing that. It's true that it doesn't have to do with engine braking, though. But it's the smoothest, most predictable and fastest way to downshift.
So, I think you should read that book more closely and not read anything into it that's not there.
That article is to show that engine braking isn't the reason for heel-toe.
And that engine braking isn't the right thing to do. It can make things worse since you can't control it without maintaining throttle through the braking zone.
Edit: and I have to dissagree with him on one thing, not every successful driver uses heel-toe. I've seen many that don't, They just put the car in the right gear, come to the end of the braking zone and then blip and let the clutch out. I've even SEEN a pro driver nutral while braking, so they do it.
The reason I was taught to do this is because if you have to select a different gear than your expected exit one for any reason, you already have the shifter in place, and it just takes a quick flick to put it in the right gear.
Edit: I was just told in this thread here: http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=35459&page=2 That my Dad's way of driving could be from when double clutching was needed. Which is likely, because He stopped racing before I was born. Like before 1980's
However, it still works, and I can go just as fast around a track with it as anyone who heel-toes, provided they are at the same skill level.
Edit2: you make it sound like the car is in nutral for a long time, it's only there untill you finnish braking, and it doesn't always go there as you start, usualy I put it in nutral just as the current gear drops below usable RPMs.
Lots of older cars didn't have brakes strong enough to lock up. Engine braking is a benefit from heel and toeing not the sole (or main) reason for doing it necessarily, however, if you make a statement that isn't true I will argue the toss with you.
I very much doubt he says stick it in neutral and completely disregard the engine until you've gone round the corner. In fact without reading the article properly I didn't see anything where he suggested you shouldn't heel and toe but he'd explain it if you really wanted to know, the way I saw it he explained heel and toeing as an essential skill. Can you please name me one world champion who didn't heel and toe or any successful post-war racing driver at all in any discipline who braked in neutral. The only case I can think of was a few very early road racing cars where they disengaged drive to go round sharp bends due to the amount of inertia in the engine and high gearing compared with the complete lack of traction.
You'd kill yourself pretty quickly IRL if you didn't give some kind of a blip on racing downshifts in a 911.
Could you name who this 'pro' driver is? What was he driving and where are you sure he wasn't just freewheeling round town? Just so you know a 'pro' driver implies we're talking about someone who drives racing cars professionally and earns their living from doing it. Your dad going club racing (and seemingly he didn't get the hang of it) doesn't count.
Isn't that the reason why race drivers heel and toe to a lower gear? So that they are always on the right gear and they don't have to guess which gear they should engage and to what revs they should blip their throttle.
the main reason to H&T irl is so as not to destroy your gearbox whilst downshifting! the upsetting of balance, or not, if done perfectly whilst braking, is secondary IMO that said "trail-braking setups rely on this forward weight shift, to load up the outside front tyre
Alex are you ok mate? you seem a little prickly tonight :P
It sounded like that was what you meant in one of your earlier posts. What I am saying is, that you should never leave the car in neutral or apply the clutch for any longer than the actual shifting takes. The reason being that you essentially have three means of controlling the car and it's weight shifts: Throttle, brake and steering. If the car is in neutral, you're losing one of them, the throttle. Therefore it's not recommended when racing.
And yes, putting the car in neutral might work fairly alrightish, but only up to a certain level. When you're really on the limit, it's neither the fastest nor the safest.
I don't agree. To prevent upsetting the balance of the car is the main reason by far for heel&toe. At least from all I've heard and read about it. I'm sure most race drivers would agree. Of course you'd put a lot of stress on the gear box if you downshift very early very fast, but that's not what you should do anyways.
As far as engine braking is concerned, I haven't made my mind upt, yet, whether it has it's place in racing, but generally I agree that brakes are for slowing down the car in a racing environment, not the engine. If your brakes are not capable of locking up the wheels, they are certainly not strong enough. I doubt that it has ever been any different, even in the early days of racing.
And you certainly don't heel&toe to make use of engine braking. Quite the opposite, really.
this is true because if you shift down in a rear wheeled car to quickly you can send the tail out, try it in lfs, go to the car park get into 3rd or 4th gear and shift down, then do it using heel and toe, you'll see a difference
No you heel and toe to let you safely sequentially downshift early, hence letting you sue the engine braking rather than waiting and doing a block shift, or far worse putting it in neutral.
anyone that wants to put a car into neutral while doing heel and toe at that speed is silly, for instance if its a cold track and your wheels are cold you can make the car slide very easily, so say your doing 150mph your heavy on the brakes your cars in neutral and your car begins to slide, you put your foot down to pull it out of a slide but o wait, cars sliding and you have no engine pulling power as your in neutral, its a rather silly thing to do really
The time it takes to get it in gear either way is basicaly the same, you still have to get it to the right gear to be able to accelerate out. Nutraling in the braking zone means that you are in nutral long enough to let the car come to a slow enough speed that you can just simply blip once and put it into the gear for the exit. Your in nutral for such a short period of time, that its basicaly a double clutch.
You don't realy have to leave it in nutral either, It just takes that one extra step out of it when you hit the end of the braking zone.
Also, on older cars you where taught that you had to double clutch on downshifts as well as up shifts. but you still blip the throttle, the difference is, you never go 5-4-3 its always just 5-3 or 5-2 or whatever you need to go to.
I wish I could post a replay in the XRG, but my computer with the shifter attached (I use FFshifter) is currently unable to play LFS, It crashes because of an incompatablility with my motherboard drivers and new graphics card, so I've been playing without an H pattern for about a week now.
I think I just haven't gotten it across properly that the time it takes to do this is very short, since you don't put it in nutral untill the revs come down to a point where you won't get power in that gear.
Then you put it in nutral, finnish braking and put it in gear.
I can see that you have never ever driven a RWD car on a track.
You said your dad could lock his brakes at 140Km/h - what tires does that car have? A R-compound tire or a slick is very hard to lock at high speeds. Its doable if the brake balance is way off. An old street tire is not comparable grip-wise...
They where normal road tires, practiacly new. However the brakes are normal as well.
Just watch a formula one race during a crash, they do lock up, even at 200km/h.
Cars in LFS have way to low braking force on most downloadable setups, they are set not to lock up. But a proper race setup CAN lock the wheels. Any race car driver will tell you that.
You really have no idea of what you are talking about. Get out on a track and test and you will see.
You cant compare a F1 car with a road car. Not one single part will be the same. The brakes on a F1 are extreme. They are made for stopping the car/spaceship from 400km/h with a downforce more than the weight of the car, of course you can lock them at "only" 200km/h!
Whats a "race car" to you? There are many stock classes that uses some kind of R-compound tires that you cant lock at 200km/h with that given car.
Have you ever driven a car with R-compound tires or racing slicks? What tires did you use? How wide? What car?
how about this question, have you ever driven a race car?
If a car can't lock its brakes theres something wrong, every car I have ever seen never mind driven has been able to lock it's wheels.
I haven't driven a race car in real life, but I've done my research. If a car can't lock it's brakes it can't effectively hit the threshhold. You have to have a threshhold in order to cross one remember, so if you can't lock, you can't tell if you are getting full traction out of your tires durring braking. and no amount of tweaking will help that, because you are going to need to apply more pressure when the brakes fade, meaning if you can't lock to begin with, you won't get anywhere near optimal on hot brakes.
What car? What brakes? What speeds? A proper race setup should not lock your brakes if your not upsetting the cars balance! Of course you can lock the brakes while trail-braking or going very slow (in genaral 150km/h is not considered that fast in racing) etc, or if you slam on the pedal without giving the car time to balance the weight to the front wheels, but thats all about skill and brake balance.
You are refering to all these "race car drivers", who are they? They cant be that fast...
No there is no wrong with the car. If your stock tires are 205mm wide for example, and you mount 255 racing slicks on that same car i can garantee you that you cant lock your brakes at 150km/h.
Many classes deamand that you use the stock brakes, so this apply in REAL racing.
As i said, if the car has a good setup you shouldent be able to lock all your wheels at HIGH speeds. Locking the wheels are bad, you know that?
I will not continue this discussion because you dont know what you are talking about and have already made up your mind.
Locking the wheels is bad, but not being able to bring them to the point of locking is worse, definatley if the brakes are cold. because then that tells you that you are going to loose alot of potential braking force when they get hot. remember, the pedal only travels so far, and then its just pressure sensitive, the hotter the brakes, the more pressure on the pedal you need to get the same braking force at the wheels. If you can't lock at all to begin with at maximum pedal pressure, than you are limmited by that maximum pressure you are able to apply to the pedal, limmiting you to less than optimal braking force.
I have my brakes in LFS set so they can lock if I completely cram the pedal to the floor, however, I still outbrake other drivers because I don't lock, I get to the point of almost locking, and don't go any further.
Locking your brakes is FAR worse. On a good day you will end up in a sand pit with dirt everywhere, if not you are more likely to hit a armco and destroy your car. Locking the brakes is a drivers nightmare...
Like I said, I don't lock the brakes, thats a bad thing to do. But being able to lock atleast on cold brakes is neccisary to maintain good braking force when they get hot.
I don't know who set up these "race cars" you drove, but if they can't lock up even on cold brakes, they arn't going to give you very good braking when those brakes get hot.
In real life, I don't drive cars, I repair them. Everything from high performance to the lowest of low end.
Double declutching isn't fast and there's absolutely no need to do it on any modern road or racing car and it will make you slower. I'd love it if you could find a successful racing driver who doesn't shift sequentially and double declutches for the sake of it.
I'm pretty certain that a Formula 1 car cannot locks its wheels above 180mph with typical brake strength and downforce they run. Equally I'd have thought that no Group C cars locked up above those kinds of speeds.
the upsetting of balance, or not, if done perfectly whilst braking, is secondary IMO