Yea.... no doubt. We fell quickly outside the 'hobby' stage of this. An instructor at the track pulled me to the side and gave me some advice some time ago. He said, you are not 'hobbyists' any longer just going out and turning laps on a weekend. You are driving race cars and at race speeds. You need to up your safety equipment. I went out the next week and got fitted for actual FIA rated fire suits and gloves. We wear have 6 point harnesses in both cars...etc. Both cars have FIA approved race seats.

To tell you how far the safety thing goes for me, "Santa" brought my son a race car for Christmas. The deal was he had to build it with me. We bought a car with a blown motor so our goal was to build a motor and build the track car back. We spent the last months building a motor and putting everything together. Many hours with he and I in the garage teaching him about how to work on cars.

We were 90% done, when 4 week ago, I saw a car come for sale in Tampa (9 hours away). It was a fully built 100% race car. Full roll cage, full FIA approved fire suppression systems with external and internal activator...etc. I had been trying to find a roll cage for the car we were building, but no options in the US. I could order one from the UK but it would take 3 months min and cost with shipping was almost 9k.

So I called the guy up with the car for sale and bought it. Drove to florida the next day and brought it back. SO we had to take the motor and trans we built for the first car, and put it into his 'new' car. So now, we have an 'extra' track car. After we get his new one dialed in and needs full repaint, I will finish building the 3rd car and it will get sold.

Below was orig one we were building him. And second pic is his first car we were building up on lift, and the one we just got out on track Mon in the foreground. We had just dropped the motor in. We got it all done, swapped and out on track in 3 weeks!





You can see the cage in this short vid




You gotta get the lawn cut first
I dont even think for a minute that will happen. Racing is fueled by money. At top levels of Karting, it costs 100k a year to run. F4 is more than double that and it keeps going. Sergio Perez brought 33 mil in sponsorship deals to Red Bull (probably the only reason they have kept him around). Lance Stoll only has a seat at Aston because his dad bought the team. The greatest drivers are still the greatest, but there are 20 seats in the world at the top. A couple are arguably filled by check book in some ways rather than talent. (and those that pay to be there are still champions in lower levels of the sport, F3, F2 etc.

This will just be an awesome experience for him. IF IF something were to come of his test. I was talking to my wife. If they really said he had the potential to do well, I would in a second sell my toys. The 720s, the 3 race cars...etc. I would let him persue his dream. Even KNOWING almost 100% chance there is zero chance of getting to the higher levels.

You dont keep your kid from playing little league because you dont think they will make the "big leagues". You go out and watch them do THEIR best. To win, and to lose. They get to experience their life. I have done everything I ever wanted to do and after having my kids, I realized my joy comes from watching them do their things. (no matter what it is they love).That is my sons car we are building. Lotus Elise. Fully race prepped. Cage, all custom race suspension (totally different everything). All rose joints, custom arms, billet uprights, 3-way adjustable coil overs...etc. We built a motor for it should be good for about 425hp. Mated to a 6 speed close ratio sequential trans. (no synchros). You clutchless shift them. Not something you can street drive. Just a brutal experience that HAS to be driven flat out to run properly. Race car stuff.

The trans was a unicorn. Probably less than 10 in the US. I bought the car just for the transmission (which was the first car we bought for my son). Finding a sequential made me pull the trigger immediately. They are not an 'off the shelf' product and made for racing only. The company that makes this one is out of the UK. Finding it was awesome as having one made is pretty expensive. All in if you had to buy one, you would probably be about 20k into it for the trans and shifting mech. They never come up for sale used, so it is the main reason I bought the first car for him. It is so much fun and I cant wait till we can really push the car.

That vid on track is the first time that motor has been run. It was a ground up build for the motor. From bare block. I built the motor and head. Was nervous it would all work well, but first shake down went GREAT! Cant wait to run it 100%!

that thing is sweet, the lotus is cool too, but nothing like the older one, the cool one, turbo v8 one

That video of him hitting the lock stops saving it... fuk. Very impressive instincts in a new car. These threads are so much better than ones where you post a row of brightly coloured supercars in front of a restaurant.

I'm sure Lotus life would be easier if you were over here in the UK. There is a guy I see on my way to work who seems to daily his exige, it was 10C this morning and he had the roof off.

Wow that is so awesome for your son! Congrats to him!

120 on the stretch is not that remarkable, or am I missing something?

Btw what is an F4 car. Over here it means

1300lbs with 300hp must be lightning quick.

3500lbs with 180hp for a daily driver already feels quick.

The Esprit v8 turbo is a timless car for sure. BUT it is not as good a track car as the Elise/Exige. The design of the Elise/Exige was meant to be as analog, minimalist as you could accomplish. You could never build a car like this today and go into production. Too many required systems and that all leads to weight. The elise is built like a pre-carbon fiber f1 car. Fully monocoque tub. The chassis weighs just 150lbs and is all bonded aluminum extrusions and panels. It is a work of art. The can and will out handle about any other road car. Stock, they are short on power. 180hp in a 2000lb car. But in race prepped form this car is AMAZING!

Since they were all hand built, they are very easy to work on as well!


Yep, I order lots of stuff from the UK. All the race parts are from there. My Lotus 211 is one of only 28 brought into the US for Lotus Cup series. (The car I own, won two seasons of lotus cup and had over 20 podiums). In the UK they make a street legal version. But this car could never meet us safety standards so they only brought the "race" version into us. In the UK, they came with headlights and turn signals...etc.

You obviously have never driven a road course. It is not drag racing. No 1/4 mile stretches of road. The track we were at is 2.2 miles long. WITH 14 TURNS! Most road courses do not reach crazy high speeds, certainly not anywhere near the ultimate top speed of the car. In 'RACE' cars they gear the transmission to be as close ratio as possible. I think the new car I built with the sequential may run out gear at road courses with very long straits. VIR is an example. We hit 147 on the back strait at that in our old Lotus. This new one has more power and closer gears, I think we will be bouncing off rev limiter at just over 150. If you are racing track to track competitively, you swap transmissions or gear sets for each track. For us, I am not going to buy 60k worth of transmissions for the car and pull motor/trans between events so we will go with best compromise for long and short tracks.

Here is a track map. Dont forget you have to have room to slow for the corners. You could go faster with the given lengths (if you did not have to worry about slowing down for the 90 deg corners)

Same world wide. They are homologated by the FIA to exact standards for each division. He will be driving a Ligier. They are renting the track for the day. Here is what they look like coming from the factory. The entire structure of the car is carbon fiber. Really awesome stuff. It is raced all over the world and is the beginning of the middle point for many that go on to race pro. Most start in karts local, then regional and national, then global....then they may get the opportunity to get into a F4 car. My son has never karted, so this is a huge opportunity for him. One that just dropped out of the sky in the way that life does that.

I doubt it will be anything other than an awesome experience for him. One he will never forget his entire life. He is getting to do something not many people get the chance to try. I am very excited and happy for him. If it needs to go further we will have to decide that as a family down the road. But just happy with watching him get to experience something awesome.


The red 211 is 1500lbs. 1760 on scales w/ 200lb driver and 1/2 tank of fuel. Yea, really good power to weight. It is a momentum car though and not a 'drag' car. Not made to win acceleration contests. It is made to corner at speed. I am running heat cycled slicks on the car. They still have good rubber, but when running for max performance and cornering, you only use a tire for about 15 times. Each time you go out on track is a 'heat cycle'. The rubber wont wear, but the heat changes it's composition and makes it hard and less grippy. On fresh rubber, the 211 will pull 1.7g in a corner. Most modern performance cars barely exceed 1g. With this rubber we max out about 1.4 1.5. It is still safe to run, but you just know you dont have the full grip of the car.

The guy who we got the car from used to spend 100k/year on tires alone. We are still learning the car. That was our second day out in it. A new set of rubber will last you 2 days on the car so saving our good rubber for when we are more settled in the car. We have 3 sets of wheels and tires for the car and I have one brand new set of rubber I am waiting to use when we want to be 'heros'

Update on this. Yesterday was his test day. Really awesome day and weather was great. It was in the 50's in the am, so had to wait for the sun to warm the track up a bit so you can get heat in the tires, but from 11am on it was perfect weather hitting 68 for the day.

Such a cool experience for him. His coach was awesome and really incrementally introduced him to the car and it's limits. Each session setting areas to work on. The brakes of these cars and their ability to carry speed through corners is where you make time in these cars. The braking curve and how you manipulate it, is huge. There is no abs etc so you have to be careful not to 'flat spot' tires. The way you brake in these cars is initially you go right to peak brake force while you still have downforce and then you back off incrementally as momentum slows and grip drops. It is quite a thing and the data tells all in these.

He did 10 sessions in all. (quite a long day). By his 3rd session he had peak force dialed in and then he was tasked with finding cornering limits and carrying max speed through corners. He built up the confidence in the car. Found the limit with one spin early on, but after that was really getting the feel. By 4th session, he was holding wide open flat for a turn called the 'kink'. It is one of the fastest parts of the track and a turn you have to lift and brake for in a 'normal' car. The downforce produced by the formula car means you can take the turn wide-open without lifting because of the downforce and grip being generated. The shop owner said this is the hardest part to get people to do. Many people just cant get their brain to allow them past this point. Everything is telling you the car wont make it, but you just trust in the grip of the car.

It was a really cool day. The vice pres in charge of Ligier USA was there which I was not expecting. Kind of upped the pressure but he was very nice. There was one other driver testing. She has 5+ years full race experience and is a co driver for Randy Pobst in some of his cars. If you know cars, you have seen Randy Pobst. One of the most prolific road course drivers around. Nether my son or her had ever been in a formula car before. They ran sessions and for the last 2, after they had feel for the cars, they put on new tires and were told to go out for some push laps.

The insane thing, my son beat her by best times by 3/10. His theoretical best, (taking the best parts of all his laps) put him on a competitive pace for the series. Which is totally insane for first time ever driving a downforce car.

A lot left to process and not really sure where to go from this point. He really does have something and a skill which is innate, yet totally coachable. With the coaches guidance, he just got in the car and made the adjustments and was right there. The combination of many things make success in this sport. Talent is one, but coachability is another. Unfortunately, also very big on this, is a price tag and money to fuel this pursuit.

Not in any huge rush, but really going to have to re-evaluate what options there are. I have told my wife. I will sell all my toys and let him pursue a dream, but we are not quite at that point yet. The team owner said he wanted to go over some more data and was going to follow up with me but he had interest in possibly developing him.

Before all the haters jump in and say, he will never be in F1. Of course. That is not the point. Under that logic you never let your son play a sport because they probably wont be in the major leagues. Life and pursuit of competition and growth is not only about one singular goal. So much comes out of doing what we love and being one's best.

Short little vid of him learning to take the braking late and deep. To give you an idea difference in the braking ability of these, in our track car, we need to start braking 100+ feet earlier to make the first corner.

I've seen a couple gnarly bike wrecks in that kink. Good for your son.

LOTS of wrecks on the kink. You have to commit 100% and many a high powered, rwd drive car will lose it if you dare lift going through. In our 211, we have a slight lift on turn-in and then maint throttle all the way through.

In the F4, coming out of turn 8 it is throttle pinned 100% hitting 5th between 8 and 9 (still 100%) hitting the kink (turn 10) still wide open, and he was getting into 6th just before the huge left which is 11. Really cool to watch how different the Formula cars run. The F4 is underpowered and over tired. So all your gains are in braking and not slowing down, keeping speed through the corners with grip.

Small "life is unpredictable" update.

We have had a few more track sessions, and last one we were at with 3 pro drivers and I again was told that my son had very good potential and he should pursue racing. No motives on their part, and they stood to gain no money or anything from the advice they gave.

So I got some advice and that was if you want to race at the pro level, you take the most direct path you can. You can burn hundreds of thousands of dollars going out and just racing. But, to get somewhere, you have to get a full Competition License (the highest license you get before turning pro). Normally you come to this over a few years and in several stages of schooling and sign-offs. But we are not approaching this in the conventional way. There exists exceptions to these rules if you get a 'sign off', that you can skip certain parts of the 'normal' stages to getting a top racing license.

I sent out his driving vids and data to the accredited schools along with the request that we would like (if possible) to go right to full Competition race license. This is important so he can begin racing nationally next year. I heard back from 3 of the top schools that all said, after reviewing his data and driving, they would bring him directly to the full comp and bypass the lower levels.

So when opportunity strikes you pounce. In 2 days we take a road trip for 3 days for him to attended advanced racing school in hopes of earning his sign-off.

Never in a 1,000,000 years did I have this intention for him. This is something we just did for fun. But when so many people(who really know) tell you that your son has true potential, I have to give him that option.

This vid was our last track day 2 weeks ago. He was a full 6 seconds a lap faster than me! This is on OLD tires, and he is pushing 1.7g and as much as 2.0 peak in the corners. Most of the corners at this track are 'off camber' so it does not look on vid like you are going fast, but look at the 'g' meter. Even the best sports cars on the road have a hard time exceeding 1g. Really amazing to watch your kids just take off and go right before your eyes. Very proud of him and we will take our shot of him going 'pro'.

Wish us luck! Life is so freaking unpredictable truly. I am 50 years old and I still can never predict what will happen next!

Mirin hard!

Cool experience OP. A lot of the best F1 drivers in the world come from a karting background so interesting that the instructor would claim the guys from a karting background have bad habits.

I've done track days on my bike and some of those G's in the turns that were sharper turns and downhill literally made me feel light headed. Are the G forces different from cars to bikes or is it something you just get used to?

Super happy and as a dad it is really fun to watch your kids go out and do their 'thing'.Karting teaches many good things, but very little of it is driving. Mostly race craft. The way a kart drives and the way a car drives differ quite a bit, so lots of 'bad' habits to break coming into actual cars with suspension, more weight transfer, differentials....etc. Not all of it is bad though. Learning to dive 'momentum' cars has a good bit of carry over...etc. Karting is just the logical way to get into the world of driving since no one is going to put a 6 year old in a 3000lb car. Karting probably makes the most sense and hence why it is the most common path, but it is not without some downsides. From a purely driving dynamic side, my son never picked up skills that would help in karting that he would have to unlearn to drive cars effectively. That is all he meant.
So at my age, my 'butt g-meter' is tuned to just over 1g. To me that feels 'edgy' as most cars have trouble holding that and that is the point where you start to be able to 'lose' a car. Moving into more capable cars, you have to train yourself to trust the car. AND at the same time feel and react to the changes in grip that come very fast at those levels of forces in turns. I have had a hard time and still cant drive at the limit. My son just all of a sudden made huge leaps and he drives like someone who has been doing this for a long time.

Here is a vid of him saving our car in a 1.2g constant corner at 70mph where the car let completely go. His reaction was almost instantaneous and precise. SO easy to over react and opposite spin. When I watched this, I was amazed.

Seeing this a few weeks back made me realize his skills have come on very rapidly and I started asking for advice from people I trust and ended up where we are now.

It is the second one 10 sec in.




One other thing that is different in cars is the G force it mostly forward / back and lateral. In bikes, because of the lean, you get a lot more vertical. But approaching 2g it is quite a neck workout in the car. We have a 'halo' seat in one of our cars but your neck is still sore the next day. We have 6 point harnesses and good fitting seats. You have to be secure in the seat to drive at these levels. You cant be stiff armed trying to hold your body in the seat. That is why you have 'racing seats' and harnesses...etc. So the translation from bikes to cars is a bit different. I dont get sick driving, but it is hard to ride passenger at 1+g for extended periods of time.

My son scared the crap of out me last time I rode with him. This was also last week in the car I just built for him. 430hp approx and 1900lbs w/ sequential trans. This car is a little monster. Not quite as finesse as the red car, but this will be a beast when we get it dialed in!

Props for giving your son the opportunity. At least he won't have to wonder "what if" when he gets older. Cool dad is cool.

Does he love racing?

Yes, of course! He is the reason I got back into cars. I really did not give much care for cars as I had focused so much on flying. I was into cars when I was younger, but as an adult, I really did not have any interest. When he was born, from the time he could crawl, anything with 4 wheels fascinated him. I was not a dad that pushed any toys on him. He liked what he like. It started out with monster trucks and then he wanted to go see drag races, then anything motor sports.

I decided to get a sports car, then we did 'cars and coffee' and other car events. Our cars got a little crazier each step. BMW, R8, Gallardo, Huracan, 720s. We started track driving, we went through 5 cars and now have 3 lotus track cars. We kinda went nuts. A recognition that as our youngest, these next few years we will never have again. Admittedly I have gone way over board. The goal..... Just have fun and make great memories.

Somewhere along the way about 3 months ago a switch flipped in him and his confidence in his own abilities just turned on like a switch. We went from him just lagging behind where I was in a car, to literally making me look like a grandmother driving out there. He is comfortable driving on the absolute limit of performance, and has the skill to do it. Braking is what makes you fast on a road course. His abilities are almost robotic. We drive ANALOG cars. NO driver aids. No ABS...full pure race cars and he just started to demonstrate a level of growth that was/is unreal. I had more and one pro driver pull me to the side and tell me it appears that he has the gift.

Now all I can do as a parent is find a way to give him his shot. The goal is only one thing. Pro driver. Otherwise you are burning hundreds of thousands every year to go out and have fun. We already do that and on a much smaller budget. So no point in racing unless you can prove yourself to where other people start paying the bills. Even low levels of the sport are 6 figures plus a year. Mid level are 350+. I cant justify spending that kind of money and I also wont go into debt to do this, so we will give it an honest shot.

Worst that comes out of it, he figures out he is really good, but maybe not 'great' and we go back to just having fun. Kind of like no one is disappointed that they went to a D1 school for sports but perhaps never went pro. You still achieve something very few do and you get to test yourself against the .1%. You just may not be in the .001%. That is racing and we will at least take out shot!

That is cool. Been to a bunch of NASCAR events as we live in NASCAR country in the south.

If you like that, you will LOVE this. At our last track day , we had 15 cars and the track all to ourselves for 2 days. RV's brought in, full catered food (great food like steaks and barbeque). Track hot at 730 and cold at 6pm. Racing all day, hanging out all night.

3 of the 15 cars had pro driver support giving instruction. 2 Squadra Corsa Lambo GT3 cars and one of the new Ginetta GT4 cars. (only like 5 in the US right now). Two of the pro drivers decided to have a private race off for us. So that ran out and did a 5 lap sprint race. No crowd in attendance, just a bunch of friends cheering them on.

Never stopped to think it might not be the greatest idea of safety to stand next to a 4' concrete wall with no fence while a car passed me a few feet away at 170! The cool thing is these were the only guys running quicker laps than my son at the event. And he was pulling more g's in the corners than these could run!