For racing enthusiasts

[Cosmacelf]

This might be of interest for those who follow racing enough to be interested in a rookie on the bottom rung of the IndyCar ladder.

Due to a series of injuries, my 17 year old daughter Alex had to give up horseback riding (jumping) after 13 years. But you can't keep this girl down. She took up auto racing last year, and is starting her progression up the IndyCar ladder. If you like this video, subscribe to her YouTube channel to follow a rookie on her progression. She's doing amateur races and test days this winter until her pro season starts in May at Mt. Tremblant.

 

[Santa Claws]

Very cool. Subscribed / Liked. Solid passing skills!

I highly recommend you get her this.

 

[Cosmacelf]

Very cool. Subscribed / Liked. Solid passing skills!

I highly recommend you get her this.

Yeah, I didn't like the video stability either. We're using a GoPro session 5 right now, but obviously it doesn't have enough image stabilization. While the Hero7 would be better just due to the anti-shake, it too suffers from the rolling shutter problem all GoPros have. Rolling shutter means that the image is written to memory line by line, but in a fast moving environment, or one with lots of vibration, it results in a jello effect. You need a camera with a frame buffer that captures and records an entire frame at the same time. There is a race camera that I'm looking at (AiM SmartyCam GP HD Rev.2.2), but I need to figure out how to integrate it with the car.

Thanks for the compliments! She does indeed have great passing skills, she has loads of competitive fire. What she doesn't have yet is knowledge and experience to get fast laps. With any luck, the test days we'll be doing and the two other race weekends will improve her skills to the point of being competitive for the summer series.

 

[swaltner]

VibeX and their FlightFlix offshoot makes camera mounts for aircraft to dampen out the jello effect. It should be a lot cheaper to get a new camera mount instead of replacing the whole camera system. I should try one of their mounts to remove the jello effect of a GoPro on the rollbar of the Ariel Atom.

 

[CUBldr97]

WOW that's amazing... Would love to hear how you get into something like this. Congrats to you and your daughter... I will pass this to my 13 year old daughter!

As a side note, way back in 2001 My wife was a grand marshal for the Indy race at the Atlanta motor speedway, and we met Sarah Fisher, and spent a day with her team. I got to say the famous words in racing, Lady and Gentleman start your engines! We got to meet all the drivers at the time, and AJ Foyt and took a pace lap with Johnny Ruthoford.

 

[Cosmacelf]

WOW that's amazing... Would love to hear how you get into something like this. Congrats to you and your daughter... I will pass this to my 13 year old daughter!

As a side note, way back in 2001 My wife was a grand marshal for the Indy race at the Atlanta motor speedway, and we met Sarah Fisher, and spent a day with her team. I got to say the famous words in racing, Lady and Gentleman start your engines! We got to meet all the drivers at the time, and AJ Foyt and took a pace lap with Johnny Ruthoford.

That's way cool!

To get into auto racing, the standard way is get into serious karting. The guys who are climbing up the indy ladder have almost all done 5+ years of competitive karting in their youth and early teen years. Word of warning - auto racing is very, very expensive.

My daughter did not do competitive karting, so she's playing catch up. Were you asking for yourself or your daughter?

 

[MountainPass]

My girlfriend has been a horse girl all her life, competing in show jumping. She was a very fast learner when it comes to heel-toe downshifting and driving fast. It makes me wonder if there is a relationship there.

 

[CUBldr97]

That's way cool!

To get into auto racing, the standard way is get into serious karting. The guys who are climbing up the indy ladder have almost all done 5+ years of competitive karting in their youth and early teen years. Word of warning - auto racing is very, very expensive.

My daughter did not do competitive karting, so she's playing catch up. Were you asking for yourself or your daughter?

thanks for the info, for my daughter, im too old at this point hah.

Good luck!

 

[Cosmacelf]

My girlfriend has been a horse girl all her life, competing in show jumping. She was a very fast learner when it comes to heel-toe downshifting and driving fast. It makes me wonder if there is a relationship there.

My daughter picked up heel toe downshifting very fast too. You can immediately tell if a person riding a horse is experienced or not. If their heel is lower than their toes on the stirrup, they’re experienced, if not, they’re new. That’s one of the first things an instructor will teach and it takes a long while (like years) to train the muscles to do that correctly. Obviously, your ankles muscles get a workout doing it, so using your ankles and feet in a car is much easier with those strong ankles.

The other things that horseback riding strengthens is your core, upper body, and legs. All things you need for driving. Driving, or rather racing, is an amazingly athletic sport. Even at her level now, my daughter is going through a strength and conditioning program. At the top level, those guys are true athletes.

Alex’s racecraft is very strong. She memorizes courses and their lines very quickly, and is picking out the turn to pass someone like 6 turns in advance. I’m sure that comes from the mental experience of show jumping and those complex courses.

Finally, show jumpers like your girlfriend are very brave. Not only is jumping dangerous on its own with small mistakes the rider makes at speed perhaps resulting in a crash, but the horse itself makes mistakes and/or doesn’t perform as expected. Tough sport.

 

[Cosmacelf]

thanks for the info, for my daughter, im too old at this point hah.

Good luck!

See if she gets interested in following INDYCAR, Formula One or Nascar...