Garage Heroes In Training

WOOT 0 281 :  (Spoiler Filled)  We review Spiderman:  No Way Home and Most of 2021's Movies (& The Matrix Resurrections) It has been quite a year and we decided to review the recent Spiderman:  No Way Home movie and then we go into many of the other movies that we went to this year including Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and all other MCU and DCEU and related movies and TV shows includ...

On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, Alex joins us to help define what the rain line is on a track and how to find it on a track, especially when it is our first time at a track.  The discussion wanders a bit, but all of it should help you in determining the rain line and allow you to optimize it to that specific day's track conditions and your car. If you would be interested in helping grow o...

GHIT 0 278 :  Our Annual Season Review and Goals Episode Starts our 5th Podcast Season We take a look back at how our team and drivers 2021 racing season went and compare it to our planned goals.  We did have quite a year and accomplished quite a bit.  How did we do versus how we wanted?  As always, you will have to listen to find out.  And as always, the episode ends with each of us giving our go...

On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, we try to answer the potentially unanswerable question that we hear at the track "What Tire Pressure Should I Use?".  Alex joins us as we try to answer as best we can.  First we go over  several  of the factors that can affect what the answer could be.  Next we try to go into the various methods that can be used to actually determine the correct answer.  To...

GHIT 0 276 :  Mike Kramer Honda Challenge Racing Driver Mike Kramer has been racing in Honda Challenge and is the two time H2 champion with NASA Southeast.  In addition, he also races in endurance racing with the 24 Hours of Lemons and Lucky Dog.  We have several goals for this episode and one of them is not so subtly aimed at convincing Vicki the our 1993 Honda Civic being a front wheel drive car...

GHIT 0275: The 2021 Escape from Moscow Lemons Rally - Conclusion You hoped we had forgotten, but no, here is the final review of this years Escape from Moscow rally.  Rally master Jeff Stobbs joins us to review the event and we also had a chance to talk to two of the team members that drove a Peugot 505 for the event and ended up finishing on the podium for the event.  As we discuss in this episod...

DwD 0 273 :  Double Apex Turns  On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, we cover two of the potential ways to approach several turn types that you will encounter on a track.  In longer turns/turns that require a large direction change like a 180 degree turn etc.  In several of these turns it may be faster to try to get through the turn with a classic late apex, but in some turns, it is often bett...

GHIT 0 272 :  Tim Bagnall - Starting a New Endurance Racing Team Tim Bagnall recently contacted us looking for getting started in endurance racing.  We thought this could be a great episode and an informal 11th episode in our how to get started series that we had earlier this year (2021).  Tim did most of the heavy lifting and asked us a ton of great questions and we answered as best we can at thi...

DwD 0 268 :  DwD Storytime - The One About Fred Lobster Trying to Kill Ben and Ann  On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, we have our second DwD Storytime episode where Ben recounts a recent track day event where he found a peculiarity in the "Fred Lobster" car that led to a weird issue where the steering and brakes would not respond.  If this was a new car, it would likely be a safety nanny pr...

GHIT 0 270 :  Jaime Garcia from the Race FF Podcast Reviews their Sonoma Endurance Race Jaime Garcia from the Race FF podcast returns to review his recent endurance race at Sonoma with the 24 Hours of Lemons.  His team prepped their Toyota Corolla for the race for the last several weeks and had a great time at the event.  They had a series of good and bad events during the race but ended up bringi...

It is day three of this years Escape from Moscow rally.  Rally master Jeff Stobbs joins us for today's update and then we talk to one of the two brothers (Max) from the Great Race team that is participating in the rally in their '67 Plymouth Valiant (former) race car.  Points are not yet updated to reflect today's events but who cares anyway?  We will try to have a larger update tomorrow evening a...

It is day two of this years Escape from Moscow rally.  We interrupt the festivities at a local Korean restaurant for an update from Jeff Stobbs and two of the teams on the rally.  Todays events have been quite lemony.  We go through some of the highlights of the days journey and how the teams are coping with the itinerary and we have several teams "succeeding" and gathering a ton of points.  We wi...

If you ever wondered about what a Lemons Rally is, this series will cover the daily updates from this years Escape from Moscow rally.  This year the rally started with a pre-event kickoff event at the local Circle Drive In theater and then the initial check in was at Montage Mountain ski resort.  The end point for the rally is Road Atlanta in Brazleton, Georgia.  The route is far from direct and s...

If you ever wondered about what a Lemons Rally is, this series will cover the daily updates from this years Escape from Moscow rally.  This year the rally started with a pre-event kickoff event at the local Circle Drive In theater and then the initial check in was at Montage Mountain ski resort.  The end point for the rally is Road Atlanta in Brazleton, Georgia.  The route is far from direct and s...

DwD 0 265 :  What to Do In A Turn  On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, we start off with a poor word choice and make the best of it.  The real subject for this episode is what to pay attention to in a turn from pre-turn in all the way through track out.  While there are many things to do and even more potential things to possibly do, we try to cover several of the fundamental things to do and...

GHIT 0 265 :  Kyle Lockrow Upcoming Professional Racing Driver Kyle is a racing driver who has worked his way from a grassroots racing hobby to a professional career that has reached the NASCAR level.  We had the opportunity to talk with him about his history and how amateur racing and especially amateur endurance racing has helped him progress and improve to the national level.  His story is stil...

DwD 0 264 :  Improving Your Sense of Speed on Track  On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, we talk about ways to improve your sense of speed on a track.  This includes the commonly referred to "butt dyno", but can also include several other ways and several other senses that the driver can use to determine their relative speed as well as their absolute speed.  We are sure we left out a few, but...

Do you know anyone who always wanted to drive on track but didn't think it was possible? Do you talk to people about driving on track and they don't understand but you know they would? Do you want a bigger racing budget?  Perhaps the CFO of the house isn't involved in our sport (yet).   Vicki and Bill have attended several Track Night In America events and had a blast.  It is a great way to see if...

GHIT 0 261 :  Our NJMP HPDE Event - Part Deux We had a large group of drivers at the recent NASA Northeast HPDE event at NJMP's Lightning course.  Since schedules did not fully coincide last week, we broke our group up into two different episodes.  We start off with our usual goals for the weekend and cover how the event went.  For this episode, we had Audra on who had never been to this track and...

DwD 0 260 :  Over Slowing for a Turn and A Few Ways to Stop  On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, we talk through the importance of the entry speed into a turn.  One of the potential problems that comes in this area is learning how not to over slow for the turn.  There is very little that can be done to make up for that lost time and speed.  This can be the result of several different causes i...

GHIT 0 259 :  Paul Gerrard - Author of Optimum Drive, Professional Racing Driver and Coach, and Top Gear USA's "The Stig" Do you REALLY want to be a great driver?  If so, this is the episode for you. Paul Gerrard is the author of "Optimum Drive - The Roadmap to Driving Greatness" and he knows what driving greatness entails as he has competed at many of the highest levels in motorsports and coaches...

GHIT 0 262 :  Jaime Garcia from the RaceFF podcast returns to Talk about his 1st wheel-to-wheel race and upcoming Endurance Racing Prep Jaime Garcia returns to discuss his first Honda Challenge H2 race which was his first ever wheel to wheel race and satisfied his lifelong goal.  We also talk through his upcoming preparation for his new 24 Hours of Lemons endurance race.  In Jaime's last episode h...

On this issue of Dominating with Dawson, we talk about the two types of drivers we have on our team.  Some of us approach track driving by overdriving the car and then backing down.  Others of us approach the limit gradually working up to the limit.  Both have their merits, but it is valuable to know what your default is and how to maximize your specific predilections, especially as an instructor...

Joe Adams joins us for an in depth discussion of all the introductory questions that we had related to oil and what their analysis can reveal within your car's engine.  We start with what the oil is actually doing within your engine and how through use it can indicate either the oil degrading or the degradation of individual engine components.  We also try to cover the individual components used w...

Part 1 of 2 On this episode, we cover our latest HPDE event at NJMP's Lightning track with NASA Northeast.  The track and the weather was a bit cold but we had a great time and a large groups of drivers and cars.  We even had all 4 levels of the HPDE groups covered with at least one driver in each.  To make things even better, Jen and Vicki's sister Debbie was driving in her first event and first...