[Howard Jones]

When I was a young man I used to race bikes and I found the best way to lower lap times was to closely follow a faster rider as he worked up to speed. I had a close friend that was always faster than I but we would go out in practice and with him in front he would wait until I would pull along side and then just pick up the speed a little more until I came along side again and then he would pick it up another bit.

I really learned a lot this way as you can clearly see that a given line will hold a given speed. This works best with bikes that have very similar grip and power. I am sure this will work with cars as long as the car you are chasing has pretty much the same corner grip.

Have someone who is faster than you AND you know will help you out drive your car so that they will know how much grip it has in relation to his. Then just go out together and follow him as he works up to speed. Pretty soon you will be turning lap times much faster than you would ever have done if left to youself without a reference.

One other thing. If you can, record EVEY lap time you ever run on a closed track. Have the wife run the watch for you and put all the days data in a log book. Record tire pressure, track temp, gears, spring rates, rollbar settings, etc, for each run of the day.

It also helps to record your thoughts as to what you may have done to improve your driving, changing your line through a given corner or using a given braking sign etc. Then when you go back to the same track again you will have a nice baseline setup to begin with. This sort of stuff is really fun to look at later over a beer. And reviewing it all later will really put the day into focus for you.