Bad Kart Driving Habits and Dropping Them
Looking behind as an example of how to turn a weakness to a strength
I’m big on drivers relying on their instincts as much as possible and to avoid over-thinking, which is a massive performance killer and creates disastrous half-decisions.
Your instincts might argue with me now saying a quick look doesn’t affect anything! But I reckon if I recommend closing your eyes for a second at a time whenever you feel a kart is close you would think I’d lost the plot right?
Clarity and elimination of doubts are critical to being super decisive and effective in a race, so that you can drive on instinct.
BUT…
Equally dodgy as overthinking, is to pretend our instincts are already highly sharpened and perfectly honed for racing, and to just let them freely operate.
We need all of the instincts, but they have to be arranged to serve what we want - and when they operate without your higher purpose as master, they cause problems!
Looking Behind and Blowing it
The most obvious example of an instinct absolutely crippling performances is when drivers look behind.
You might not be guilty yourself, but I bet that if you read on you’ll recognise how other instincts try to sneak into your driving against your highest purpose, i.e. being indescribably quick and decisive. Looking behind is just the most obvious.
Looking behind is a normal human instinct
Instincts want to serve self-preservation and threat identification all the time. They are automatic, healthy and keep all the normies alive.
But as a racing driver you have a higher drive that wants to win races and be devastating, which requires jumping into danger constantly - you can’t be a normie.
This means you have to subordinate your normal instincts, constantly, to serve your higher purpose of winning and being an all round hero.
But your instincts are sneaky little shits! The instinct to look behind will lie and cheat to gain control, even though we know it is absolutely useless:
‘we need to know what’s going on behind now!… just let me look and I will never need to look again - They are going to take you out you know, I can help you with that - isn’t that reasonable damn it!’
When Looking Behind is from Strength
Yes it is reasonable if you are Max Verstappen leading a race, and you want to measure the gap you built and adjust accordingly…( this video on Youtube shows he does indeed look behind at PF whilst leading - A LOT!)
A look behind when leading, when you know the driver is so overfull with capacity for control they can afford it, and they use the look to measure a gap, not try to read the pursuer, to inform how much tyre they can save, or what line to take - that’s a sign of strength and excess of prowess.
When Looking Behind is from Weakness
But it’s not reasonable when:
You are running 12th and looking behind to decide if you want to defend. It is a bit pointless to me, who cares?!?
You know for sure there are no karts there, yet you still feel the urge to confirm it at the cost of missing the next apex for no gain
You know for sure there ARE karts there because it is lap one and you were on pole. You can only confirm what you know to be true, there are 30 karts chomping at the bit all over your rear bumper! You look and see what you know is already there, miss your braking and get freight-trained
Those are signs you look behind because you are anxious and unfocused, worried. It means you are prioritising the appeasing of discomfort over being consistently quick.
Your instincts might argue with me now saying a quick look doesn’t affect anything! But I reckon if I recommend closing your eyes for a second at a time whenever you feel a kart is close you would think I’d lost the plot right?
