Training on your own
Just like Lewis Hamilton, the more you practice the better you become. Slot car racing is more than just eye to hand co-ordination, it’s the ability to judge exactly the right time to accelerate, brake, give way, put your competitor under pressure, and make your opponent make the mistakes. Stay on, and you have a better chance of winning.
Practice at home or at the club alone, practice to find the optimum moment to accelerate or slow down on a particular straight or bend. Memorise points of reference (just like Montoya) it could be a prop, or a marker point. In real racing, drivers put down markers as reference points, but other drivers move their competitor’s markers in the middle of the night so as to confuse their competitors? You can mark the track with chalk or put a pit babe on a bend to remind you where to slow down. If you change car, don’t forget to change the reference point.
Pursuit training
Its all about pressure, try using the Olympic sport of Pursuit cycling. Mark the exact half way distance around your track, and place your friend (or enemy) there to start from, and you begin from the start. You should use a red car, believe me when I tell you your eye responds and reacts better when following a red car (it’s a cave man thing). Go get him and see how you can handle the pressure. Get your family and friends to give you guidance as to his where a bouts so that your focus in on your car.
The Start
In a Race, don’t be fooled into thinking that if you get away first you stand a better chance of winning. The risk of racers falling off on the first corner is HIGH. It’s not a sprint it’s a marathon. Your opponent’s adrenaline is high, so whilst waiting to take up your trigger, fake your anxiety, pretend to be pent up, then when you get hold of the trigger hunch down and stare at the car and the starter. Don’t chat to any one, you don’t see Kimi Raikkonen talking to Martin Brundle, David Coulthard does though. There was a programme on TV once, which proved that screaming wheelspins off the line was as effective as a controlled take up start. At the end of the day it’s all down to your personnel choice, but the car and the set up is important, adapt the style of start to the car.
Bends
There are 3 ingredients to a corner. The entry, the curvature and the exit, but there are many types to contend with.
Scalextric Radius 1 (inner Curve)
This is by far the most difficult but the most rewarding. Ask yourself, do you have a car with a good magnet? Do you have a car that drifts well? Do you have a car with a self-righting guide blade? Does the corner have run offs? Does the corner have standard crash barriers? So many questions?
The car with the self-righting guide blade and a strong magnet has a better chance of staying on in the inside lane, however a car that drifts well can use the outside lane as effectively if there are standard crash barriers on the outside. But a Formula 1 style car will suffer on the outside if standard crash barriers are used, as the tyres hit the holding nodules of the barriers. The radius 1 bend doesn’t give you much time to think about it, it is unforgiving, so make your mind up about it at the beginning of the race, not 2 seconds before you reach it. You need to hit it at a speed that the magnet will hold all the way round, because if you go outside the range of the magnet, you’re off.
Scalextric Radius 2 (Standard Curve)
The cross over (C8203)
Wow, what a curve to deal with. For a micro second, your magnet has got an extra rail to hang onto, then nothing but a piece of plastic at the point of the cross over. Before you know it, your car is drifting wide as the magnet has nothing to hold onto, and the tyres slip on the metal rails. Mini’s “eat these corners for breakfast”, so do the F1’s with the button magnet placed behind the guide. You can get cars to drift beautifully around this corner, so enjoy.
The Standard (C8296)
Just take this one on, the old and trusted (C154), smooth in and fast out.
The Standard Hair Pin (C179)
This one gives you the two rails to grip to so go for it, but be careful on the exit, you will have to ease off a little on the exit or you’ll end up like the Top Gear Stig testing the Konigsberg with out the rear wing.
Scalextric Radius 3
Now we are getting faster
Scalextric Radius 4
And faster and faster
So, once again it’s not just about you, it’s about the car as well, try taking a 70’s Scalextric Ford Escort round a Radius 1 and see if you can control it around the bend. Practice using different cars with a different length chassis, with and without magnets, to understand the dynamics of the track. Lewis Hamilton didn’t go straight into a million pound Formula 1 car; he learnt the dynamics of racing in a £250.00 cart. So get yourself down to a local swap meet, or join a club Great Site Your doorway to the world of slot cars. Pick up some secondhand cars to practice, push them to the limits of the corners and chicanes. If you lose them on a bend, it’s not an issue.
All of the classic corners and chicanes will convert to “Sport Track” using the converter (C8222 £6.99), and you will find loads of classic tracks on eBay Seller: irismorada:
Try this shop called “Irismorada” you will find all sorts of Scalextric from times past.
Acceleration.
It’s all again about control; it’s about gradually increasing and decreasing the power to the car. But be mindful about the tyres, the magnet and the car itself.
Some cars, you will be able to go almost flat out all the way around, depending on the age and condition of the car. If the car has the old RX motor, and you are using the modern transformer, then it’s an uphill battle to get speed on most occasions, but with an EV2 from Fly, or a Slot.it SIMN04 powerful motor, you could be heading for casualty with a spectator. I am sure the hospitals have seen scalextric related accidents before?
Overtaking
Sometimes, making a mad dash for a X over before your opponent’s car ends up in disaster, as you are likely to carry too much speed into the next corner. Sometimes being valiant at a X over is safer. “Going for gold” on the outside of a radius 2, 3, and 4 is a safe option (especially if there is a good run off), but the Radius 1 overtaking manoeuvre on the inside is a great way of dispatching your rival. You can use them as a crash barrier allowing them to control the drift as you slip by.
Conclusion
Whether it’s Scalextric, Ninco, Fly, Carrera, Slot.it or SCX you drive, remember to have fun, enjoy the thrill and excitement and leave your play stations and X boxes in their boxes.
If you agree or disagree, just send me an e mail. Let’s discuss it.
Yours
Slot City
http://www.slotcity.co.uk/