The recent snowfall has many people hiding indoors, but for motorsports enthusiasts…what better environment could you ask for? I had the opportunity to attend Audi Club Northwest’s winter driving clinic at Bremerton Motorsports Park. It was an absolute blast.
What did I take away from the event? If you live in a potetial snowy area you should prep and clean your car for the winter. Don’t run summer tires as the rubber hardens during the cooler winter months. Do not run all seasons winter tires at a lower PSI; it is a myth that you should underinflate tires for more traction. This is especially true with AWD.
When you’re cleaning snow off your car, remove it from the roof as well (you’ll see people who brake, and the snow from the roof will obscure their vision).
Quattro and ABS dont work when your wheels are locked up…you can only affect change if you’re moving.
Understeer usually happens when you go in to a corner too hot and the front tires dont have traction. When the car is not going where you are steering towards, you are understeering. At this point, additional steering in the direction you want to go more will not help. To recover from this situation you’ll want to straighten out your wheels, apply throttle, once you hook up, steer the direction you want to go.
Oversteer occurs when the rear tires lose traction. To induce oversteer on our cars, gain some speed, then turn the wheel 45 degrees. As you do are turning the wheel, lift off the throttle; the momentum that the rear end has combined with throttle lift should be enough to kick the rear out. Immediately apply throttle to bring it back in. By modulating the throttle you can “steer with the rear”. The rear end was even more tail happy with the STaSIS diff!
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Next up for the autocross. The car was equipped with Dunlop Wintersport M3s.
Lunch time! Kidna funny…the trucks were all stuck.
