Q: “I am an instructor and often suggest to students that they review your Virtual Track Walks in preparation for a DE day. They have asked me, “What does he mean by “collect up” the car in turn 2? As you will recall, there is a discussion of racing ovals and using a “diamond” line. We teach either the single apex or a double apex approach. I can’t explain to them what you mean by “collect up.” When we teach double apex, we are taking a relatively fast, straight entry, braking to apex 1, releasing/rotating and driving to apex 2 and tracking out to the right side of the track. Perhaps the double apex approach with braking to Apex 1 and then turning is the same thing as “collecting up”, but I’m not sure.”
A: When you drive the car in fast using a double apex/diamond line, at the point between apex 1 and apex 2 where you rotate the car (the point of the diamond), you should feel as though you need to collect the car. In other words, if everything is calm and easy, then you haven’t driven the car in fast enough. Instead, at around the mid-point in the corner, after rushing the car in, the car should be understeering, oversteering, or in some amount of a slide. That’s when you need to “collect” it up – controlling the slide, so you can drive it out of the corner.
That’s the mindset you should have – that you have to “collect” the car after driving it in so hard, and before you get back to power hard to exit the corner. You should feel as though you drove the car in hard/fast, collected it briefly in the middle, and then driven it out hard/fast. This is a different mindset than the usual “in slow-out fast” way of approaching a corner.
I answered another question about double-apex or diamond corners a while ago – specifically about how to drive them. Go to https://speedsecrets.com/q-when-should-i-use-a-double-apex-in-corners/ to read that post.