Speed Secrets: Sim Training for Real-World Track Drivers — Part 2

Welcome back to Part 2 of how to use a sim to improve your real-world driving.

Considering everything I covered last week in Part 1, the following are some (but not all) basic training methods and drills I use (all, and more, are available in detail in Sim Racer Academy). I should point out that I’m writing this with real-world drivers who use simulators (or should be using them) in mind. This is not aimed directly at pure sim racers (although most of it will still apply).

1. Sensory input sessions: In the past, I’ve gone into detail about how valuable and effective Sensory Input Sessions are at the track. Using a simulator to do those sessions is just about as effective, and it’s easy to do far more of them.
2. Vision training: Being deliberate about how far ahead you look, and how you move from glancing ahead to focusing on specific reference points, and even using your peripheral vision, to some extent, are all things that can and should be practiced on a simulator.
3. Slow speed track walks: Because the visuals of most simulated tracks these days are so accurate, drive the track at walking speed and make note of reference points and the shape of the track. The driver who soaks up the most references usually wins, so use the simulator to help with that — to ingrain them in your mind so you don’t have to consciously think about them when at speed. A slow tour of the track is next to impossible to do in real life, but easy on a simulator.
4. Skill/technique development: Whether it’s unwinding the steering wheel exiting a corner, releasing the brakes more smoothly, using a breathe of the throttle to change the balance of the car, or anything else, repetition is key. There’s no better place than a simulator to get that repetition. Of course, you need to be repeating the right things, as doing the wrong things is only going to make you better at doing that! Having a coach or a video of your techniques and skills (see below) is important.
5. State of mind training: The state of mind, or mindset, you have while driving is a learned and developed habit or mental program. Whether it’s practicing staying calm in the middle of a heated wheel-to-wheel battle, getting energized to go out and set your best qualifying lap, being assertive on the start of a race, or whatever you’ve found to be part of your performance state of mind, all of these should be developed on a simulator.
6. Triggers: These are words or phrases that help you focus on what you want, and “launch” a mental program that you have for some technique and/or way you’re going to approach a section of track. You can develop these through mental imagery, but reinforcing them, over and over again while driving your sim, will make a big difference to your consistency and speed.
7. Focus training: There are two things you can do with a sim regarding focus. First, you can practice keeping your focus on the task of driving for as long as possible. Time how long it takes before your mind begins to wander and think about things other than the act of driving, and practice stretching that time. Second, practice regaining focus. Instead of losing focus and staying that way for a while, trigger regaining it with a word or phrase that brings you back into the moment.
8. Cold tire practice: This depends on your sim software, but most often you can practice getting up to speed quicker on cold tires, which may just give you the edge you need over your real-world competition.
9. Fast-fast: Related to practicing getting heat into your tires and up to speed quickly is the mindset of “fast-fast.” If, each time you start a session on your sim, you say to yourself, “Fast-fast,” and really focus on getting up to speed quickly, you will improve this ability — and have the ability to trigger it just by saying this phrase. I especially like the practice of getting in a sim, doing just five laps with the third lap being as fast as ever, then getting out and walking around before doing it again and again. Being out of the sim, then in, out, then in, and so on, is as important as anything. The goal is to simulate what it’s like at the track when you’ve been out of the car, and then hop in and have to go right now.
10. In-out laps: If you race where there are pit stops, your in-lap and your out-lap(s) can make or break the result. If you’re racing another driver who matches your lap times, but you can gain just a second or two on your out-lap after a pit stop, you win.
11. Consistency: Most drivers, even very experienced sim racers will agree that being consistent on a sim is even harder than doing so on a real track. If you can drive error-free for 15 minutes on a sim, it’s very likely you’ll be able to drive for twice that on the real track.
12. Alternative lines: The sim is the perfect place to try different lines and approaches for how you’re going to drive a track, as the risk is nil. It’s also the best place to practice driving off-line, as if you’re passing or being passed.
13. Online racing: The amount of racecraft practice you can gain with online racing is hard to beat. Yes, there are some “questionable” driving practices used in online racing, but even that helps you learn to read other drivers, learn how to deal with the unexpected, and manage your state of mind.
14. AI racing: Most of the sim applications (iRacing, Assetto Corsa, Forsa, etc.), now have AI cars/drivers you can race against, so you don’t even need to be part of an online race. Again, the realism is not perfect, but I think that’s an advantage. What you learn from dealing with the odd things that AI does makes you more adaptable in real-world racing.
15. Alternative setups: Trying a wildly different setup on your car on the track comes with some risk, and yet there is none of that on a simulator. You can try various adjustments in a short period of time, learning as you go. Sure, the sim car may not respond exactly like your real car, but mostly the tendencies are the same.
16. Adapting to handling issues: I like to have a driver I’m coaching experience more extreme handling problems, which develops their car control, as well as the ability to read what the car is doing. For example, if I make a big change in the car’s setup to make it oversteer on corner entry, the driver can practice adapting their brake release and turn-in to minimize the problem. Over time, the degree of a handling problem is reduced, and in that process the driver becomes more sensitive to what the car is doing.
17. Race procedures: Practicing race starts and restarts, slow zones, full course cautions, pit closed, and all sorts of other procedures that rarely happen in your real-world racing can be super-valuable for when it does.
18. Breathing: Many drivers hold their breath and tense up in the fastest corners, heavy brake zones, when passing, and while in a near-crash situation. That’s not good. Practicing breathing and relaxing in stressful situations on the sim will make doing the same automatic in the real world.
19. Crashing: Yes, you can practice minimizing the effect of a spin or crash on the sim. A problem that many sim racers create for themselves is giving up in the midst of dropping a wheel off the edge of the track, or in a spin, and just hitting reset. They actually program themselves to tense up and give up. Instead, if you practice looking where you want to go, and continue to steer right up to the instant before an impact, you’re practicing — mentally programming — improving your chances of not crashing.

Finally, one of the main benefits of using a simulator to improve your real-world track driving/racing is the ability to see the way you perform various skills. If you’re practicing by yourself, I strongly recommend you set up a video camera or your phone so it’s recording your foot movement, and then your steering movement. After a session, review the video. See if you notice anything that surprises you, especially things that may be slowing you down (heel lifting off the floor when moving from one pedal to another; brake release not as smooth as you thought; easing off the gas pedal in a corner that you thought you were taking at full throttle; not unwinding the steering as smoothly and quickly as you could; using all the track through a corner; etc.). You may want to share this video with another driver or a coach to get another perspective on whether there’s an opportunity for improvement.

Managing the Negatives

Now, let me address the elephants in the room — the main and most commonly-voiced complaints about driving a simulator.

1. It doesn’t feel like a real car: Yup, and my ‘69 Lotus Elan doesn’t feel the same as your 2021 Porsche GT3 RS; a Formula Ford doesn’t feel the same as a Spec Miata; a Honda Civic Type R Time Attack car doesn’t feel the same as a Mustang GT350R. And that’s the point. Every time you get into a different car, it takes time to adapt. That’s a good thing, because the more you learn to adapt, the better a driver you’ll be. If the only car you can drive consistently fast is your car, then you’re not as complete a driver as you could be. Turn the thought of the sim not feeling like your real car around and look at it from a learning perspective. Accept that it’s difficult to drive at first. Hey, if it was easy, everyone would be doing it! Accept the challenge. Embrace it. It doesn’t matter how much you like or dislike driving a simulator, it will make you a better real- world track driver/racer.
2. I can drive a real car fast, but when I try to drive the sim that way, I crash all the time: First, simulation software and hardware has come a long way, even in the last five years, so if it’s been a while since you last drove a sim (because you gave up on the whole thing after trying a sim, and deciding you hated them), give it a try again. Take your time, and focus on learning. Second, one of the biggest challenges at first is sensing speed, and that can fool you into driving too fast, too soon. If you jumped into a real F1, Indy, GTP, or NASCAR Cup car for the first time, you would likely ease yourself up to speed. But I’ve seen many racers and experienced track drivers try out a sim for the first time with one of those fast cars, and struggle to keep it on the track. They tried to drive it nearly flat-out from the very beginning. If you’re about to try a sim for the first (or first time, again), ease your way into it. Take your time, get a feel for the controls, test out the limits, and gradually build up your speed (even if that means having a 12-year-old kick your butt for a while!).
3. There are no g-forces: This is a bad thing, but can also be a good thing. There’s no point in focusing on the bad side of this, so what’s the good in it? If you learn to sense the sim car without g-loads, relying almost solely on your visual and auditory senses, just think how much better you’ll be when you get in your real car and have all the kinesthetic sensory information?! It’s a bit like if you lost your eyesight, you would learn to understand the world with your other senses better. Spending time with restricted sensory information for a period of time sharpens your other senses, so if you think about using your time in a simulator as a learning process, you can see how the lack of g-forces is actually a benefit.
4. The brake pedal has no feel: First, this is similar to the case I just made above about it being a good thing to spend time with less-than-ideal feedback. Second, this is an area where the quality of your hardware is super-important. Using a pressure-sensitive brake pedal, instead of a position-sensitive one will make a big difference. Sure, they cost more, but I believe that it’s well worth the investment. And, spending time to experiment with different bump rubbers behind the pedal can make the feel more realistic.
5. I get motion sickness: This is a tough one, because simulators affect different people in different ways. I have noticed that if you take time to gradually build up a tolerance, you will get to the point where you can spend practically as much time as you want without any motion sickness. Start by driving for just five minutes, and then taking a long break; then seven minutes and a long break; ten minutes and a long break; and so on. If, at any time, you begin to feel lightheaded or dizzy, stop immediately. Wait until the next day (motion sickness can take a long time to fully go away), and start again. Over time, you will build up a tolerance. Another factor to consider is where you are positioned in relation to the monitor(s). There doesn’t seem to be a magic formula (that I’m aware of) for the exact distance you should be from them, so experiment with moving the monitors further away or closer. Finally, VR glasses tend to trigger motion sickness even more for many people. Again, you have to build up a tolerance in a gradual way.
6. It’s hard to look far enough ahead: Absolutely, the monitors and software can restrict how far ahead you seem to be able to look, but I like to think about “looking through the monitor.” It’s a deliberate act, one that will help you even more when you get on the real track. Sometimes this feeling of not being able to see far enough ahead is caused by restricted peripheral vision, and side monitors (a triple-screen setup) in the right position and angle will make a big difference.
7. Over-confidence: It’s this one that many sim disbelievers point out as a problem. They say, “Sim racers don’t know the real consequences of over-driving — they just hit reset and start over again.” Sure, that’s possible. But the serious sim racers I know definitely understand the consequences, and are disciplined to not consistently over-drive. They know that over-driving is unrealistic, and can’t be used to win. In fact, some of the best sim racers-turned-real-racers are the most disciplined drivers I’ve seen. I think there’s a big difference between sim racers and gamers. Perhaps gamers enjoy over-driving and don’t understand the consequences. But they’re unlikely to spend much time on a real track.
8. Sim rig cost: Compared to the cost of real track time, this is a tiny fraction. However, I get it: real-world driving is more fun, and the cost of a basic sim setup could pay for three or four days on the track. Still, the trade-off, considering how many days you can spend driving your sim, is worthwhile.

NOTE: I am very far from an expert in sim equipment — hardware or software. In fact, don’t even ask me what you should buy, because I’ll shrug and say, “I don’t know!” I’m a driver, coach and trainer, and it seems that every week some new piece of sim equipment comes out, so unless I was able to stay on top of that scene all the time (which I’m not), what I suggest might be out of date by the time you got it. And it depends on your budget, the amount of room you have, how often you’re going to use it, and many other factors. A friend of mine in the UK, Samir Abid, wrote an article about how to compare your goals to budget, and then to what you should look for in a sim setup. It was written a few years ago, so the specifics of what’s available may not be up to date, but the thinking behind what you should aim for will always be. You can read it here: https://www.yourdatadriven.com/beginners-sim-racing-kit-list/

As you can see, how you look at the use of a simulator is critical. And one thing that can’t be argued is that with some initial effort to learn, sim practice will make you a better track driver and/or racer.

I’m not saying that you have to go out today and invest a lot of money in a sim and begin spending hours each day. Well, not unless you really want to improve your driving/racing performance. If you’re not currently using a simulator, you may get left behind.