THE PIT BOARD
Modern Race Cars performance is increasingly dependent on the continuous and rapid collection, interpretation and analysis of very large amounts of data. Car racing today is about outperforming your competitors on very small details. Chassis and engines are similar and 1/100 and 1/1000 of seconds are chased in the detailed tuning of tire pressures, angles, suspension and aerodynamic details. When you mention data acquisition, many racers' eyes glaze over and they instantly make the assumption that you are talking about racks of computers and very complex on-board dataloggers, armies of engineers, computer technicians, miles of cables and wires, and other complicated equipment. I would agree with them if we were talking about rocket science, but we are not-we are talking about race cars.
"If you do not measure, you can't improve."
Not my words. Something I found on stockcarracing.com It was a good intro to something that needs more P.R. I am not sure how many of our member are aware of just how much behind the scenes work that goes into running a league like this. I have always been aware of the more noticeable day to day operations. League night, Practice Wednesdays, the Results Post, the Stewards Update. We have all paced around the room, constantly hitting refresh, waiting for the next weeks lineup to be official.
Over the past few weeks, I have made some amazing discoveries. As the Division 4 Data Specialist, I have had the the rare chance to see the inner workings of the S.N.A.I.L. machine. To put it in words we can all relate to: What we see is the shape. The smooth flowing lines. Flawless paint and finish. We are vaguely aware of the sheer horsepower but know it is there. Very few have actually lifted the hood to see what makes it all come to life.
Back to the intro. While some of what it states, doesn't exactly apply to SNAIL since we don't tune and telemetry values are irrelevant, it is still a numbers game. There is a document that is just labelled:
S.N.A.I.L. Results. The depth of information covered in this "document" is staggering. I have it open on a regular basis and there is still new information that I am just finding. Some of what can be found are the weekly race results. Some of the many things that are logged are, where you started and where you finished in every race. Your fast lap time for each race and gap times for all finishes. Some divisions are even recording pole position times and who earned them. (hint hint!) Are you interested in where your lap times stand with the other divisions?
THIS is where you can find it.
Again, this isn't even close to the surface. The idea of The Pit Board is to bring about the awareness of said document for two reasons. First, the information and data contained in this document has the very real potential to help improve your lap times and several other aspects of your driving. When I say YOUR driving, I really mean Y-O-U-R driving. The League keeps extensive race data on
every single driver. This leads to my second reason. The tremendous level of commitment it takes from a [very] small group of SNAILs. Once you have the chance to look over the page, you will see just how much work goes into putting it together. I guess my point today is to take advantage of all the information that is available for each driver but to also make sure all the hard work isn't being wasted.
It is my goal to preview a few parts of the Results page once a week to put some much needed light on all those who keep the records but also educate all of us on what it has to offer and how it can help us be better and faster racers. If you missed the
RED LINKS leading to our SNAIL Results, I will list it below.
I think that is enough for this week. Next week I would like to start digging into some of the numbers and a few of the other unique info that we have available to us like The Driver Count Pivot and what it means. Thanks for putting up with me and see you all on Sunday.
Maybe next time I will shoot for a top of the page post!!
Race clean, race hard, race S.N.A.I.L.!!