I will be taking my first full track drivers ed this year and I have been debating with a "seasoned driver" about whether I should run street tires vs full race slicks.

The experienced driver is adamant that I go straight to the racing tires and learn that way.

I have a differing opinion where I believe that learning on the street tires would have numerous advantages such as:
The car will be a little more loose presenting sliding and brake lockup sooner so that the "excursions" will be less extreme.

The street tires will give more feedback as they begin to loose grip than the track tires (street tires will begin to make noise before the track tires)

The street tires will loose grip more gradually giving the new driver more time to compensate for loss of traction.

The street tires will loose grip at slower speeds giving the feel of recovering from loss of control at safer speeds.

I feel that learning to drive the car on street tires and progressing to stickier tires is not only safer, but cheaper in the long run.

Opinions?

I can see benefits to both arguements
and obviously you are both right

What I have noticed about driving on street tires and even slower race tires, like victoracers or toyo's

when compaired to faster tires... the street tires teach you to do some things differently. Yes they may give you earlier warning but this teaches your reflexes to expect different things than the other tires teach you. Race tires give plenty of notice too.... and when they let you know you are near a limit, you have to learn how to handle and work with that limit in a much different way than with street tires

so every time that I learn on a toyo or learn on a street tire
I'm actually slower when I go back to a hoosier and have to re-teach my body to work with the hoosier

the safer arguement can go either way
I've had more near misses accidents on slippery and worn out tires than I have on good rubber.

I've nearly totaled my car because I was trying to use up something beyond its life expectancy... one time I slid into a gravel trap at high speed and stopped 12 inches away from a concrete wall in 12 inches of sand....

another time the car rotated 180 and I was still traveling at 60mph looking in my rear view mirror heading directly to another concrete wall... I turned the wheel enough to rotate another 90 degree's and was only a couple of feet away/parallel from the wall when the car came under control.

so 150$ cheaper in the tire price... but not cheaper if you have an accident.

but street tires are teaching you some things differently than you need to learn them... teaching your muscle reflexes the wrong lesson slightly

brant

I do all DEs on Street Tires (& I've done hundreds of DE's). It's a Driving Event not a Race!

Stu is building a race car to transition into wheel to wheel racing with the car in a local vintage club

I'm assuming the DE is a stepping stone... possibly one time activity

the truth is... I've never known anyone that goes wheel to wheel to go back to DE on a regular basis. you might be that person... or someone else is.. but that is a rare trait.

the wheel to wheel racing really is that much better.

Brant,

The "DE" I am talking about is the RMVR driver's school.

So I guess I'll do the test & tune on Friday on the street tires and switch to the Hoosiers for the school.

I am sure that I saw a professional drivers school where they actually had the students learn on a wet track so that they could feel what it's like to recover from loss of control at lower speeds at first.

Stu

I think you will be fine on street tires for even 1 or 2 events
lots of other things to learn first...

but I would steer you away from spending $600 on street tires and then another 800 on Toyo's...

once you are a couple of weekends into it... you won't go back to the street tires... really even for rain...

so if you can borrow, or find street tires for 2 events great
but if your buying everything brand new... use the toyo's for a whole season and skip the street tires

I unfortunatelty don't have any 205 stock.. or I'd loan it to you
since you sound like you are going to end up on hoosiers.. its a slightly tougher call...

their life cycle is shorter..
but I'd hate to see you buy 2 sets of tires up front
any chance you can find 15inch street tires to borrow for 2 events?
it would be worth the mounting and balancing probably versus buying them brand new

if it was down to buying 2 sets of tires up front... I'd skip the street
I'd go toyo and hoosiers

I run unshaved toyo's for rains.
(actually I run hoosiers for rains until it gets really deep... then switch to RA1's)

and we have very very few rain races. Most of the rain driving I've done has been in CVAR, where the humidity is higher

brant

I already have a brand new set of street tires and two sets of used Hoosiers.
Its a huge benefit that my brothers tr4 takes the same size tires so I can use his "old" tires since he doesn't use them till they are useless.

I'm one of those guys! Don't get me wrong, I still love Wheel to Wheel (I'm in a 1 Hour Kart Race tomorrow). But Wheel to Wheel guys have gotten out of hand in a lot of cases - not as much fun between Drivers as there used to be.

A Good Tire is Toyo Proxe's R888 - Street Legal R Compound Track Tire

Click to view attachment

T.C.

do you ever race W2W in vintage
I've really had good experiences with HMSA, RMVR, and CVAR

I left PCA club racing after about 8 years for exactly the reason you describe. It sounds like you need to find a better club.

I never jumped from the RA1's to the 888's
I had heard that the 888's didn't end up as strong as the RA1's

still... I haven't found anything that compares with the A6 yet
they are pretty amazing

Yes to Vintage and I'm building my Spyder to get back to HSR. There have been some Major Changes to HSR - New Ownership (someone I know, new Tracks, New Events, they will be running a 24 Hour Race @ Daytona next fall, Dorsey Schroeder & Ken Fengler are the new Competition Chairman, etc).

I haven't run the R888s yet, but they are legal for HSR - I need to get the car finished

I would never recommend going straight to R comp tires your first time out, although some folks may never push hard enough to overdrive them. After a few DEs learning the car I wouldn't have a problem with going to RA1s. My opinion with the RA1 vs the 888s is that the RA1s work better and heat up faster on a lighter car. I am running 888s for the occasional track days and find that they take a couple laps to reach temp. The RA1s I used to run seemed to come in much faster. The Hoosiers are in a different class than the toyos and I don't think its a fair comparison.