So, either I'm pathetically slow, or the car is....

...and it must be the car.

Autocross this weekend, and anything sporty (Miata, FRS, hell, even a Veloster - well, it's a turbo, but...) was at least 3 seconds faster than the old Focus. As a point of reference, the layout was a good "horsepower" design, and what appears to be a pretty darned competent NA Miata driver I met was always about 3-4 seconds faster a run.

Anybody else auto-x'ing a mk3 Focus and finding that IT is just slow comparatively speaking?

I know it can't be the nut behind the wheel...

What's your experience level? I've only done one and got trounced in my RX-8 by Javelin in his VW (914), and just barely beat a Nissan Leaf. The car isn't everything, especially in Auto-X

As a "performance driving enthusiast" many years; I learned car control and what not on a 26 miles of nothing but twists and turns mountain road(and rarely traffic), very "autocross" like. Can four wheel drift, heel & toe, kinda sorta a little bit drift, know my weight tranfer principles and can apply them well (though definitely less well in a FWD car...), understeer, oversteer, etc...

Autocross, 2nd one. I know for a fact I can wring MAYBE another second if I did everything PERFECT. On 10 runs (5 official, 5 timed fun) When I was turning 55.7s I knew I could get to 55.2, and did get there. When I got to 55.2, I figured I could wring maybe a 55 flat (close, 55.08).

I know on the course where time killed me, and was generally pretty accurate with my predictions. So if I got to 54 on this course, I'd still be about two to three seconds out. And the Miata guy had a passenger (what's that, about another second?).

So, as I think about it, that still puts me a second or two behind the veloster turbo - is that thing really that much faster?

How much difference would tires make? These are just cheap end Falken Ziex 612s, and the stock size at 215/50. I think the veloster guy had some decent rubber, but I figure if I could run same same as him (i.e. within half a second or so), I'd be cool with that.

And, it may be a bit optimistic to think that my 2900lb FWD pig could get within a second or 1.5 seconds of the Miata anyway.

The alternative is that I AM that much slower than I think...

Seat time and tires make a huge difference. Don't worry too much about it since this is only your second time. I find all seasons to be terrible for autocross if you want to be some what competitive--knife to a gun fight. On a course like that I will say extreme performance summer tires will be about 1 to 2 seconds faster. Add in seat time and you are pretty close to the other guys.

The 4 things that made autocross enjoyable for me were: tires, antiroll bar and alignment and finally seat time. Car also helps, but not as much as the others imho

Youre slower than you think.

We all are.

Are you absolutely certain that the two are mutually exclusive?

If you're asking if a well-driven Veloster Turbo or modified Miata will be much faster than a non-turbo Focus on 215-width falken 612s given the same level of driving, i believe the answer is a big YES.

My co driver this weekend PAXed fourth from the bottom with 130 drivers. He was not a happy man. Running an underpowered rallycross car with a prepared PAX will do that.
You can't know if the car is slow until you put a known driver in it. Get the Veloster driver to take a couple of runs and see what happens.

Time to hand it over to our tame racing driver.

EastCoastMojo wrote: Time to hand it over to our tame racing driver.

Some say he thinks a Hyundai requires surgery and that a Focus is faster in reverse...

2nd autocross, it's the nut behind the wheel. I've beat a Gallardo with a automatic FB RX-7 by more than 3 seconds before. The Gallardo driver couldn't believe it was possible. His first autocross and my 50th.

The last autocross, last year, I was beat by a gentlemen by 2.57 seconds, in my own car. Trust me, it's almost always the nut behind the wheel. Especially if you are driving it like a mountain road.

On-board video and a competent co-driver can be eye opening. I spent hours watching him beat me. First autocross this year I was .75 seconds out of FTD in raw time. Got beat by a 240 slicks with a LS1. Granted some of the big guns didn't show since it was a non points event, but still a good showing.

Seat time, seat time, seat time. It can't be said enough. Start there, then play with the car.

Ehhh, I auto crossed for 6-7 years off and on and was pretty much mid pack my whole auto-X career. Some weekends I was better than others but I was never really fast. Turns out it's all me, since I started doing track days I am still the rolling chicane in most run groups. 115whp will only get you so far. I'm fine with it because I have more smiles per mile than I can handle no matter how slow I am.

That's not a good tire.

Additionally, fast autocross lines are weird. The shortest line between two points, not the one that allows the fastest vehicle speed.

At my last (second) autocross, I got spanked by a Saturn Vue.
Knowing what you're doing helps.

If your local region offers a driving school, do that. You'll get tons of seat time and you can have the instructors drive your car to show you what it can do/see how far off the pace you are.

Don't get discouraged though, we all sucked our first season!

I love this board. If I could quote everybody I would. I love the Stig references. Well, pretty unanimous, it's the nut behind the wheel, with the possibilities that tires will help.

I'll have to see about having somebody else drive the car and doing the driver school, I think that will be eye opening.

And, hah, discouraged? No, this is WAY too much fun. Encouraged to try and be a bit more competitive is more like it, but don't worry, never so much that it takes the fun out.

Unless your name is Jackie Stewart, its you. I know it feels fast because its your second event but you can improve a lot more than you think you can.

You need more seat time. I wasn't winning my class with my Focus in my first season. The more seat time I got the better I did. After a few seasons I won the local ST class championship, then did it again the following year. (This was before STF) And I'm in a major metro area where events routinely get 140+ cars. Eventually, I could consistently embarrass people driving Corvettes, STIs, and 350Zs on raw time, not index. I lost count of how many times people told me a Focus couldn't be that fast.

You have to work at being really fast. Get "Secrets of Solo racing" or other high performance driving books and read them. Then hit an event, use what you learned, and read them again afterwards. Watch the Dick Turner videos on Youtube. If your region has a driving school, go to that. Have a faster driver ride with you to give you pointers. Ride with a fast driver to see where they are taking a different line. Walk the course with a notebook. Learn to read tire pressures.

Then get out there and dominate. In a Focus.

In reply to OldGray320i:

Better than my approach. I came home from sucking it up my first time and stared building a 1600 lb 250hp weapon.

Get to as many events as you can afford. in as many different types of vehicles as possible. There's no replacement for seat time.Then get some ultra high performance summer tires. Trying to assume you would be good at autocross because you have lots of practice on the street is not realistic. you will learn more about driving fast in one season of autocross, than many years of spirited driving on the street. Good luck on your quest for more speed.

I have told this story before but years ago, like the late 80s, we had a national level autocross champion ( can't remember his name anymore) stop by our local autocross. I was in a stock RX7 in C class if I recall correctly. Other cars in that class were MR2s, Starion/Conquests, Z cars etc........you know, other sporty cars which were built for handling. As a joke and a bit of a bet the autocross guy drove someone's Olds Toronado that was in the parking lot. I am talking the giant front wheel drive GM luxo barge. And to make matters even worse the Olds had some luxury package on it like chrome targa band/vinyl roof, chrome doo dads...........full on squishy pimping ride. That dude bested the entire C class and half of B class which were Corvettes, Porsches etc. Very humbling. Driver and experience make the most difference. Hey, that rhymes!

tires, alignment and tire pressure can make a 3 second difference on some courses. I'd still see if the region or group offers an autocross school. My first season I ran mid pack in class the first 3 events, about 4 seconds off the pace of the leaders in AS, by event 4 I was in the upper third but not sniffing the podium. I did 3 schools (4 total days) over 2 weekends and was suddenly podiuming in a bone stock car with just alignment and 615's (note that others in class were running 710's at the time)

OldGray320i wrote: I love this board. If I could quote everybody I would. I love the Stig references. Well, pretty unanimous, it's the nut behind the wheel, with the possibilities that tires will help. I'll have to see about having somebody else drive the car and doing the driver school, I think that will be eye opening. And, hah, discouraged? No, this is WAY too much fun. Encouraged to try and be a bit more competitive is more like it, but don't worry, never so much that it takes the fun out.

keep in mind that this is just my opinion

in order of mods to improve your a-x fun/times

seat time seat time seat time seat time (see a pattern here ?) and the best way to get the most bang for you buck, is to go to any (even all) schools you can .. be they local or Evolution Driving Schools

then

tires, followed by more seat time

then,

in whatever order you chose, springs/shocks, sway bar(s), alignment

then

seat time … have fun

Great quote from The Magazine a year or two ago from a pro driver asked about the "most common rookie mistake?" The answer: "Underestimating your ability to improve."

In reply to wbjones: To late, I did springs straight away - and added some neat wheels when I hit a rock that bent the drivers side steelie a little, and the ds rear a lot. It was a great excuse to use on the wife that the Ford dealer price of a replacement steelie was $250 each, vs a whole new set of cool looking wheels for ONLY $450 (well, tires too, but the old ones never got touched by the rock so we put them on her car. She swears I hit the rock on purpose - I wish I were that good...). I was thinking about a bar for the rear, but I think I'll actually apply the wisdom here and hit the schools and lots of seat time.

In reply to chuckles: I like that line, going to tuck that away in the recesses of the mind.

To make you feel better, when I started autocrossing I was driving the 1997 Mustang Cobra in my avitar, and Gimp on here would wax me with his Hyundai Accent (with suspension, but 87 raging horsepower)

Yeah, that happened.