Last weekend I was the lead instructor for a beginner to Autocross class. This isn't my first time teaching or giving driving pointers but it was for both of those together.
The morning started off with car tech - somehow everyone was prepared and no problems.
Then covered the basics with a short classroom session.
Up next was a course walk. During this was the first sign that I was beginning to exceed the limit of how much information some of the attendees could absorb in such a short amount of time so I reigned it in a little.
With 3 instructors and a course layout for only 1 car at a time we decided to hot lap 6 runs per student in groups of 3. This allowed us a little time to talk between runs and, at least for me, assess what style of teaching the student would benefit from the most. There were huge improvements over those first 6 runs with everyone but what I want to talk about is how my teaching adjusted over the first 6 runs, 12 runs, 18 runs. I have no idea what the day tally was but I'm sure I was in a car for over 40 runs.
First up was the local Sheriff who was back to learn after being the slowest of the day a few weeks prior. This time in her Audi TT and she responded very well to a lot going on. The more shouting, gesturing, and pointing I did the more FUN she was having and as a by-product was distracted from taking it too seriously and being nervous, going faster each time.
Next up was a different student in a Viper. Talking over the course between runs was the better option to start but I had to adjust on the fly to a little bit of talking during the run in order to help them figure out the timing of their inputs.
Third student had WRX and was pretty dang quick from the get go. I pretty much immediately pivoted into a more advanced discussion between runs and working on use of the brakes more than anything else with them.
At this point we had a lunch break. After talking over a few things with the other instructors I felt the need to have course walk 2.0 based on what I was noticing as pretty consistent struggles across the group.
As we got into the afternoon I was internally worried I had run out of things to say/contribute because the morning students were doing well by the end of their runs. Turns out I was wrong (about me).
Afternoon was run as a free-for-all. Everyone was encouraged to grab an instructor if they wanted one and that they should get a different one than they had in the morning. Simply for the possibility that something would be explained differently and it would click.
What surprised me was the students had crossed some kinda threshold of speed where I could suddenly see all kinds of places for improvement. Now that it was tenths to chase vs seconds, a whole new long list of concepts, driving style and inputs was on the table for discussion. And they all kept getting faster!
By the end of the day most had made over 20 runs with 34 runs being the most by a single driver. In my opinion at least 2 maybe 3 drivers reached the real limitations of their cars which was awesome to see. I had great fun instructing and literally had to go chug a water between switching cars from talking so much because I'd get out of one car and immediately into another.
My biggest take away from the day that is the epiphany moment I experienced. Seeing huge improvement and then feeling like I'm running out of things to contribute, only to get back at it after a small break and realize that oh, we're just getting started. Dangerous thoughts....could I actually know what I'm doing?
Funny side note: Before on course stuff started we got radios and stood around talking to each other. Mostly discussing how we had no idea what the plan was or what was going on. Coming to the conclusion that this must be what all the workers at track days do in the morning too. Are we here? Check. Do we know what we're doing? Nope? Check. Alright let's do this.
