Give a pro driver a crappy car experiment

[Frankentruck]

The only chance I'd have is by wrecking him as he lapped me. It might happen without me even trying.

That sounds like a strategy!

[juicedcoupe]

The only chance I'd have is by wrecking him as he lapped me. It might happen without me even trying.

That sounds like a strategy!

The pro driver will be looking at me funny, saying something like "I don't know why he has that huge bumper and nerf bars".

And I'll just be like "You will. Oh, you will".

[1911Colt]

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"You will. Oh, you will".
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[1911Colt]

[[/quote]

I have this theory that lesser drivers would be more competitive with crappier cars and, that better cars, highlight better driving skills. Then, the race might be a lot closer between the drivers? Maybe...
[/quote]

I agree if the lesser drivers are still fairly decent. The pro would have more tuning options on the better cars. So they would win on setup and also win on driver skill. They would effectively have a faster car and also the ability to fully exploit that extra potential. So the gap would be wider. Also, modern cars present a bigger challenge to reflexes of a lesser driver because of the greater speed everywhere and especially at corner entry. It is a lot easier to "stay ahead of" a Grasshopper than an EVO L1.

On the other hand, if the "lesser driver" is me, the gap between me and the pros will be strictly a function of the speed at which the marshalls find my car and turn it over again and again and again.

[TokyoProf]

....on the ride home from a parking lot on road race, I stopped at a local off road track/ I had an old yokomo sedan that I was racing and a buddy wanted to see it. When I brought it into the track, I was challenged to race the sedan against the off road buggies...had a blast and was able to win with it...and I'm not trying to brag, just using it for context since I was not a "pro driver," I was just a long time semi sponsored club racer that would typically finish at the tail end of the factory and pro drivers at the big races...those guys don't make mistakes and that is worth a lot on the track...

You won an off-road race with an on-road car? Please provide more details about that crazy story. Even with decent tires, that would seem to be BIG handicap!

[RPMfieldtester]

You won an off-road race with an on-road car? Please provide more details about that crazy story. Even with decent tires, that would seem to be BIG handicap!

The track was an indoor, hardpack track...not blue groove but hard. At that time, the sedan tire wars had not started and at the parking lot races, we all were running an HPI treaded tire. I had raced that day and stopped by the off road track on the way home. I had a yokomo mr4 (I think) and sedan racing was relatively new to the area. Someone wanted to see it so I brought it into the track. Somone then joked that it wouldn't be able to get around the track. This was the late 90s and the jumps were nothing like they are today so I looked at the track and said that I thought it would be fun...think rally racing. I raised the body up as high as I could and started in the back of 2wd stock. With the 4wd, was able to hug the slick inside of the corners and it pulled hard out of the turns.

[Frankentruck]

There was a video on here, I think last year, of someone racing a VTA touring car on an indoor off-road track. It was awesome!