Racing

`4:50:44`

— What are the things you're paying attention to when you're driving? What are the parameters? What are you loading in? Are you feeling the grip? Are you basically increasing the speed and seeing what like a constant feedback system effect that has on the grip and you're trying to manage that and try to find that optimal slip angle? Are you looking around using your eyes? Are you smelling things? Are you listening just feeling the wind or are you looking at the field too? Like how'd you not hit that guy at all? You get close with an inches, right? So you have to pay attention to that too. It's really interesting about that specific battle where we're literally a few inches apart. I can't fully explain it, but humans can develop an incredible sense of space. Where I can't see the edge of the back of my car, but I can know exactly where it is. I can have a mental model in my head

`4:51:45`

that gives me the exact dimensions of this car just that I can run within a few inches of a competitor car or within a few inches of the wall and not hit either when things go well. The car is about two meters wide and it's quite long, five meters. And you can't see everything. The mirrors are actually kind of shit. There's no rear view mirror in these cars. You can't see out the back. You can only see through your two side mirrors. But you formed this intuitive mental model when you get good enough at this. But what I actually pay attention to most is I run a program. What I try to do when I go to a racetrack is I try to load up the best program I know how for every single corner. What's my break point? What's my acceleration point? What's my break trailing curve? And I try to pick up that program in part just by finding it myself and how fast I can go. But even more so than that by copying my professional competitors or not competitors, co-drivers. So I usually always race with a pro.

`4:52:47`

And modern race cars produce an absolute enormous amount of data, and you can analyze all that data after each outing. You can see an exact trace of how much you pushed the brake pedal, how much you did in terms of steering inputs. When you got on the gas, you can see every millisecond you're losing is evident in those charts. So what I try to do is I try to look at the chart and then I try to load that in and like that's what I gotta do. Oh, in this corner 17, I have to be 10 bar lighter on the brake. So I try to load that program in and then I try to repeat it now. Then there are all the things that changes. Your tires change quite a lot. These tires are made to only last 40 minutes in many cases. Sometimes at Le Mans we can go longer, but at some racetracks they'll last as little as 40 minutes before they really fall off. So you gotta manage that. That the grip is constantly changing. So your program have to suddenly fit those changing circumstances. And then in endurance racing, you're constantly interacting with other cars

`4:53:49`

because you're passing slower classes or you're getting passed by a faster class. So that's part of the equation. And then you're trying to dance the car around the limit of adhesion. So you got all those factors playing at the same time. But above all else for me is to try to become a robot. Like how can I repeat this set of steps exactly as I'm supposed to for two and a half hours straight without making 100 milliseconds worth of mistakes? — Yeah, low latency algorithm. — That's really a huge part of it actually. Your latency is enormously important in terms of being able to catch when the car starts slipping. You get this sensation in your body that the G-force are a little off, the slip angle is a little off, and then you have to counter steer. And obviously the best race car drivers just feel like an intuition. I have some intuition. I don't have all of it, so I do occasionally spin my car. But that's the challenge. — From everything you've studied and understand,

`4:54:51`

what does it take to achieve mastery in racing? Like what does it take to become the best race car driver in the world? — Obsession is part of it. When I read and hear about Senna and the other greats, they were just singularly focused. Max Verstappen is the current champion of the world and he is the same kind. Max has been fascinating to watch. I mean he is a phenomenal race car driver, but he also literally does nothing else. When he is not at the racetrack, he's driving sim racing. Like he's literally in video games doing more racing when he is not doing all the racing he's already doing. — Is there a specific skill that have that like stands out to you as supernatural through all of that obsession? Is it a bunch of factors or are they actually able to, like you said, develop a sense? Is it they're able to get to the very edge of the slip? — They're able to develop very fine tuned sensibilities for when the car's sliding. They can feel just these tiny moments