How F1 Drivers Brake SO LATE

The sim footage really helps in understanding the concept - definitely worth using them for future videos!

Great idea of using iRacing to illustrate, but I'd make sure to show the footage at least at 30fps to observe the vehicle's movement properly. Great video as always!

Simulator shots are great, but the difference in FPS is jarring. If they could be recorded at 60fps in future vids that'd be great!

Changing the brake bias for each corner... that's some hardcore dedication to racing right there. Not sure if I'll ever have the level of skill to drive like that. Makes you appreciate these drivers even more. :)

It was Mario Andretti, who said "drivers still think the brakes are for slowing the car down”. Using the brakes to turn the car is a bewildering subject that Scott, only just touched on. I read an interview with Phil Keen, the sportscar racer. He said that drivers he coaches often brake later than him. However, the car is not as balanced through and out of the corner.

7:43 I think what a lot of beginners fail to realize is that you don’t just want to reach 100% grip at one point in the braking phase, mid corner, and through to the exit phase, but you want to be getting 100% of the grip that you can through all four tyres continuously through the corner. A lot of people can easily find the limit of grip in the initial braking phase, but won’t stay right on the edge of grip fully through the entire braking phase. The same goes for the mid corner and exit, it’s easy to get to 100% at one point but hard to maintain it through the entirety of the corner. Realizing that and having that mindset of: it’s not always about braking later, higher minimum speed, and getting up to full throttle earlier, it’s carrying just a little bit more speed through everything in between that I need to do to find the last couple tenths, has really helped me improve.

When i finally got out of the wrong mindset that i should brake always in a straight line and then turn, in the sim-racers i found that i really started pushing the brake bias further back, especially in the mid-engined GT3 and GTE cars. In real life i've been only once behind the wheel of a GT3 spec-ed car from 2015 (Audi R8 pre-Evo; best €3000 ever spent) and 2 things really surprised me - how much lighter the steering was compared to what i expected from all the sim-racing i've done and the way my rig was set up. And the other - how much easier trail braking in real life was when you can feel the car and the grip with your entire body through the seat and the pedals, not only through the wheel. Now i apply that technique everywhere which even allowed me for a short period of time to hold the lap record at one of the local carting tracks with their fastest carting class. However i also found out that when they switched to electric only carts, i can't drive nearly as fast as when i could hear the engine. Turns out, at least for me, the sound from the engine is just as important as everything else or i get a distorted or dialed down sense of speed.

despite the fps issues (which are v important) i think we’re all in agreement that the simulator footage is very helpful. thank you for the work scott, editors, etc. 😎

I've had a couple great instructors teach some of these methods on the race track. It's really amazing the difference it makes when someone properly explains it. Great video

Love the simulation shots, really helps with the explanation

Because their legs are strong. Saved you 9 minutes.

I love the sim stuff. I get to watch it done properly by the experts all the time, seeing it done wrong and how it actually effects you times is exceptionally helpful.

As a kid Hotwheels Acceleracers helped me learn a lot of the basics on driving skills and tactics that can be used for both racing and city driving. When it came to braking the quote I always remember from that series is “balance increases traction”. Have always kept that as a core fundamental for good driving

Fascinating explanation of what appears to be a simple process Scott. Really well illustrates the problem of not trailbraking on track which applies to any car as well as the differences between braking in a downforce grip dominated car versus a car with little no no downforce. My only minor quibble is I do recall being taught to trail-brake at Skip Barber Driving School back in the 90's but then I did a full 3-day class and not a driving experience so perhaps that is why I got better schooled. It is really obvious that is you are totally off the brakes then the car has less grip but also that you want to transition from brake to throttle quickly but smoothly ensuring you are trying to keep enough backend for the car to be stable as you come off the brake. How F1 drivers manage to do this braking and balancing so delicately given how compressed the time is for them and the sheer forces involved is something that never ceases to amaze me because I could barely do it in a lowish donforce race car. I really wish F1 would do more pedal camera coverage because as you so eloquently point out this is perhaps the most difficult skill and at traces of speed or even g forces doesnt show the subtleties involved. Great video!

the simulation shots definitely helps alot in understanding difficult concepts specially for people like me who have next to nothing real life experience, only technical knowledge. however, the footage is a bit choppy so you might want to look into that

You might get more grip on the front of you are breaking while turning, but also use that grip for braking, so you have less for turning. So it is absolutely not trivial how to break while cornering, but needs a lot of skill to balance it.

This was handy and something that I found interesting - I've had instruction from 4 different instructors and although all were racing drivers only the active one had me trail brake...this makes more sense now! I've actually decided to get a bit more into sims to understand practical line work better and this video certainly adds to the help.

You can often see drivers changing brake bias just before attempting an overtaking move aswell. That's really impresive to see as they have to do it in a very short amount of time

These videos are so informational! I would love to see more in this series

Great use of examples to illustrate your point. Because i have never raced, i don't have any reference of just how much finesse and timing goes into making "fast" corners. Thank you, you have taught me what i did not know AND increased my appreciation for the skill required to be a worldclass F1 driver.