Earwood and his team spend as much time as needed working with each student on skid recovery, then we head over to the autocross course for the basics of line, apexing, and eye placement. An exercise in heel-and-toe shifting is also part of the basic curriculum.
“No matter whether you’re staying for three days or not, you need that first day,” Earwood insists. “You need the skid pad, you need the autocross, you need the heel and toe, you need the lead-follow around the racetrack.”
The afternoon session included driving both the rear-wheel-drive 124 and the front-wheel-drive 500 on the Ridge’s 2.47-mile, 16-corner circuit. The format is lead-follow with sessions of about 10 laps, so the instructors can observe each driver’s line and technique individually and offer coaching. After several sessions, speeds come up and each driver works on personal details.
The benefits of a one-day refresher school are real, even for licensed racing drivers. Many in our class had never experienced a skid pad before, while the autocross exercise forced students to focus on precision and planning. Likewise, driving the two dissimilar Fiats on the racetrack forced every driver to adapt to each car’s unique performance characteristics and driving requirements.
“What we have for the advanced driver, someone who’s SCCA-licensed and has been racing for at least a year or so, is our two-day advanced racing school,” Earwood says. “We still kick off with the skid pad and autocross, but then we go straight to a lead-follow session and a stop box session where we stop every lap and get feedback. The next day we go out as instructors in other racecars and we spoon feed you traffic. They’ll pass us in one turn. We’ll pass them in the next; we stay out all morning working on traffic.”
Earwood also emphasizes the value of a school day to learn a new track. “If you just need to knock the rust off, a one-day school is a good answer,” he notes. “For guys who know what they’re doing but just need a little more coaching, maybe the next step is to come and learn a new track, like Sebring, for instance. We offer that at every track where we operate, so you could go to New Jersey or Road Atlanta or Sebring or Laguna Seca.”
Whether you choose a Skip Barber school with Earwood (and you should meet this guy – he’s great) or a school near you, receiving coaching with planned exercises is one more tool to help you perform at your best come race day.