ChampCar As Racing School?

There is much to like about ChampCar racing (and WRL and Lucky Dog as long as we're at it). There's the relatively low cost (at least if you split the financials and labor across your driver lineup). There's the camaraderie. There's the chance for Lady Luck to be on your side and give you a surprise win. There's the opportunity to invite inexperienced drivers and give them a gulp of the racing experience (there are downsides to this, too — you have to share the track with inexperienced drivers).

Those are pretty well know attributes, and they're great. We want to mention one less well-known element of Champ that we think makes it a great series for more experienced drivers: Champ provides a nearly ideal training ground for passing.

Here's the thing: in a typical club race, you get a few passing opportunities. You're probably in a spec class where cars are similar and qualifying spreads the field out so that cars of similar speeds are together. So you might have a few passing opportunities. Which is okay, and certainly teaches you to diagnose a driver's weaknesses or to defend.

Now consider ChampCar. You're in the car for 2 hours, not 25 minutes each day (well, at least if your car runs the whole race). So, your passing opportunities go up by a factor of four just through sheer time. On top of that, each class in Champ has a more diverse range of driver skills and car speeds. That makes for many more passing opportunities. In Champ, you are likely to have passing opportunities on every lap. Maybe multiple opportunities per lap. So, when you're in the car for 40 laps, and you need to do maybe 2 passes per lap, you get a lot of experience (80 times per day?) with judging closing speed, braking points and the impact of your line.

Winding Road Racing offers services for your ChampCar. We can install your roll cage, fire system, seats, harness, nets, kill switch, data system or build you an entire car. Contact our race and shop services for more information!