Q&A Part 2

Keep those questions coming and let me know what you'd like to learn about racing! This week, I'll be answering two more questions.

Question 1, from Clement Lee, “How do you contrast aero vs. mechanical grip? Can you "feel" when you are about to exceed aero grip or do you just "go off the cliff"?”

For me, this is all still a learning process but from what I have experienced, it seems as if the aero is not your limiting factor of grip in these cars in the high speed corners. They generate over 1000lbs of down force at 150mph. This means that if you are going through a high speed corner like turn 7 at Barber Motorsports Park (the reason I’m using this corner is because I went off here during testing) and you over step the limits of the aero, you are most likely going to “fall of the cliff.” Both figuratively and literally. It is incredibly hard to catch a big slide in these cars whereas say in the Mazda Miata, you can really get the car rotated, possibly overstep the limits of mechanical grip in the tires, and come back.

To recap, from what I’ve experienced in the USF2000 car is that you can anticipate a loss of grip and “falling off the cliff”, but there is not much you can do about it once it happens, whereas in a solely mechanical grip car, there is an opportunity to correct this.

This is how I made up 10 spots in 2 corners at St. Petersburg

Round 1 Race start of the 2016 Cooper Tires USF2000 Series powered by Mazda. Started 16th, ended up 6th out of the 2nd corner.

Question 2, from Darwin Felix, regarding the incident in the final laps of race two at the GP of St. Petersburg. “For the Sunday race, what would you change inside the helmet if you had that race to do over again?”

First and foremost, thank you very much Darwin and to anyone else out there that was watching the races. It is truly awesome that the fans are able to tune into our races and watch live stream, with commentary. I hope you all enjoyed the races.

There were a lot of different aspects to race 2 compared to race 1 on Saturday, mainly due to the fact that we had over 3 times the amount of green flag running. There were multiple things that I could have done better in that race.

It was a lot about learning the different aspects of racing wheel to wheel in this series. We started 16th, on the outside row. We managed to move up to I believe it was 10th place by lap 2. There were 1 or 2 opportunities for me to gain a position, but at the same time I didn’t want my race to end prematurely. Going through the race, it was mainly defense for me. I had to do a lot of defending during the green flag periods and there wasn’t much I would change about that. The field is extremely competitive in this field, which makes it hard to overtake. We had a full course caution with about 15 minutes remaining.

Where I feel like I really could have improved, not only for the 2nd race but for the weekend in general, were the restarts. If I could have improved my position on the restart, the end of the race might have been an entire different story. With about 5 minutes remaining, I continued to defend from 2 cars behind me. We were going into turn 4, I was defending down the inside, the car behind me moved left to the driving line, and the car two behind me went to the right in an attempt to overtake the both of us. I gave the inside car room but it wasn’t enough as his front left tire and my right rear tire connected.

This, in turn, ended my race as the right rear corner of my car was facing the sky. If I had to change something about that incident I would have possibly given the inside driver more room, but at the same time in no way do I have the intention of just giving up a position.

There were multiple things that could have prevented that accident, but sometimes racing is just racing. It happens. All in all, I think I can reflect on St. Pete, especially race 2, and come out of it with a lot more knowledge, and head into Rounds 3 and 4 at Barber Motorsports Park even stronger.

Take a look at the incident from my point-of-view.

A bit of contact going through turn 4 at the Streets of St. Petersburg, during the 2016 Cooper Tires USF2000 Series Powered by Mazda.

Stay tuned for more answers, and don't forget to send your questions!

Q&A Part 1

Thank you to all of those who sent in your questions last week. We will be doing more of these so if you have a question, post it in the comments! This will be the first of a multi-part series.

Question 1, from Tyler Swartz, “When can we swap seats for a day?"

Well, if we could pull off something as organized as the Tony Stewart/ Lewis Hamilton stunt I would be all for it. What would be interesting is if you stopped by for one of our races in Indianapolis this year.

We have the Indy GP and then an Oval race at Lucas Oil Raceway. Since it’ll be my first time on an oval in a formula car, I’m sure you could give me some great advice! In return, we always bring a 3rd car to the races. Now I’m not saying you can take it out on track, but there is a 3rd car…

 

Question 2 is from Aaron Meyer. He asked, “What kind of training regiment do you do to stay in shape through the year?"

A lot of the training I do to stay in shape is cardio. The minimum weight in these cars is 1,220 lbs. That means the drivers wet weight (weight with all his gear on) has to be anywhere between 165-175 lbs in order to not be too far over the minimum weight. As I mentioned in one of my previous blogs, I had to lose nearly 20 lbs in order to not only be in good condition to race, but to also not be a hindrance to the performance of the car.

That being said, I still have a bit of work to go. I usually run and bike on a daily basis. For me, it is definitely not the most fun thing to do, but at the same time I think of it as the more weight I lose, the faster I go in the car! Living 15 minutes from the beach also helps as it is always a nice view to run or swim at the beach. It is also key to make sure the I am strong enough to push the car to its limits for the entirety of the race.

Back at the end of 2015, I first tested in the USF2000 car with Afterburner Autosport and realized how much more physically demanding these cars were compared to say the Skip Barber Formula 2000 cars or the Mazda Spec Miata. I was really feeling sore in my shoulders, forearms, and neck. There are some good workouts that help muscle groups like these, so I followed specific training regimens until my test in February. I felt much better in the car and was able to run more consistent lap times. Jim Leo from PitFit Training works with a lot of top level racing professionals, and while I haven’t been able to work with him much, he would be my number one recommendation for any drivers wanting to up their physical game.

Stay tuned for more answers, and don't forget to send your questions!

Race Report - Rounds 1 & 2

St. Petersburg, Fl

It was a rough and bumpy first race weekend for us here in St. Petersburg… literally. The weekend kicked off Thursday morning with an hour long track walk. It was amazing seeing the differences in track surface from runway to street to asphalt. There was a lot of camber in the road due to the streets natural crowning, causing the car to often slide right out to the walls on corner exit. Then there were the walls themselves. If I had to describe them in one word, it would be “close.” They were always right there reminding you of the limit.

The rest of Thursday for me was an absolute blast off track. Immediately after the track walk I went to a luncheon where I was interviewed by news and radio stations up until the top guys showed up. To my surprise, Helio Castroneves, Will Power, Scott Dixon, and Spencer Pigot all joined me and the other Mazda Scholarship drivers for lunch and an interview in front of the Gran Prix partners and city officials. All of them were more than willing to give me advice and were very personable. I later went on to participate in a few media training sessions with all the drivers from the Mazda Road to Indy and an awesome Mazda photo shoot with the two other Scholarship drivers Nico Jamin and Santiago Urrutia. Then we wrapped up the day with the part I had been waiting for - getting on track.

The team strapped me in and I was out for the first time in my life on the Streets of St. Petersburg! It was exhilarating the first lap out. The walls were flying by me, there were cars all around; it was such an amazing first experience. We had about 3 laps until the session was red flagged due to a car hitting the wall. With about 10 minutes left in the session we got back on track and had a few more flying laps. All in all, we had about 10 laps around the course by the end of the session and were P6 of 27 cars. Not too shabby. We were definitely looking forward to the next couple of days.

Day Two started off early in the morning with a 7:30 a.m. practice and a 10:10 a.m. qualifying. I was extremely anxious to get back on track to try and improve our previous position but it was short-lived as the rear axle broke about 5 laps into the session cutting me short of throwing down a good lap. It was unfortunate especially because we needed as much track time as possible but the mechanics did an amazing job of getting the car fixed in the short amount of time between practice and qualifying. The boys finished up the car and we rolled onto grid for our qualifying session.

Qualifying up front at this track is extremely important as it is hard to pass and is usually littered with full course cautions. We got out for the first half of the session and were not where we wanted to be, around mid pack. We made some changes, threw on new tires, and went back out to try to throw down a faster lap which we did but it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough. We qualified 17th overall. This was a huge blow to our confidence but we knew it wasn’t over. We had the engine builder come over and check everything out just to make sure the motor was okay and they did find out a few different issues that could have prevented the engine from performing at its full potential. This gave us a ray of hope for our races the next day.

Races 1 & 2

Again, we were out on track in the morning and afternoon for races 1 and 2. We were starting p16 after a couple of drivers were moved around post qualifying. I started the race on the outside, 8 rows back. It was nearly impossible to see in front of me because of the rear wings on these cars but my spotter yelled “Green, Green, Green” and we were off for our first race. I was given some great advice from Mazda Factory driver, Joel Miller, telling me that there is usually someone who goes down the inside, makes contact and slides up the race track leaving an open lane on the inside corner apex. All 27 of us were barreling down into turn one. I moved to the outside racing line while the majority of the pack was along the inside wall. I broke slightly early anticipating a wreck and a moment later I saw one car in the air, and more cars hitting each other. I immediately darted to the inside then held my line around two more cars in turn 2. A full course caution was called not to long after turn 3 and it’s hard to express how happy I was when I only counted 5 cars in front of me. We were able to pass 10 cars in the first 2 corners of the race putting us in 6th. We cruised behind the pace car for about 5 laps which put us 1/3 of the way through the race length. Then onto my first restart. It wasn’t pretty, but after a wreck on the front straight which we avoided, I was now in 7th place. Again, we were behind the pace car for another 5 laps or so which only left us with 6 minutes of race time when we took the green for our second restart. It was a true battle with cars in front and behind always putting on pressure. All in all we took an 8th place finish in our first ever Cooper Tires USF2000 series powered by Mazda race.

Race two began mid day with the sun shining down on us and a slight breeze blowing. Our grid position for race two is determined by the 2nd fastest qualifying time or the fastest race lap, whichever is faster. This left us again in the back of the pack, position 17, for the start of race 2. As the green flag flew, I darted to the outside and managed to grab a few positions in the first corner. By the end of the 2nd lap we made it up to 10th position before a brief full course caution came out. We knew it was going to be a battle after the caution. We had a lot of very talented drivers behind us and passing was also going to be difficult. After some very hard racing, we had an incident with another driver going into turn 4 that took us out of the race with 2 laps to go. Our right rear corner of the car was pretty torn up and I had no option but to say hi to the safety crew at the corner exit of turn 5. It was unfortunate but ultimately a result of very hard racing and was a great learning experience for our first race weekend.

We were definitely hoping to get our Soul Red car closer to the front of the pack but we are going to be doing a lot of work between now and rounds 3&4 at Barber Motorsports Park in order to ensure this. Thank you to everyone who supported us during this race and followed all of our updates on our social media handles this past week. I hope everyone enjoyed the live video stream of the race, interviews, and insights courtesy of the “Road to Indy TV” app and the guys on the Mazda Road to Indy TV.

All the best,

Dakota

Goodbye to the Off-season

Turns 3, 4 and 5 at Circuit of the Americas

San Diego, CA

Off-season? Nope!  It has been a long, quiet, and busy few months for us here at Dickerson Racing. The end of 2015 was the start of something great for us. Winning the Skip Barber Championship left us with a big choice on our hands. Straight after flying home from the Championship shootout, I was back on a plane to Circuit of the Americas where nearly all of the Mazda Road to Indy teams were testing. I had the opportunity to talk to many teams, drivers, and officials, gathering as much information as possible. It was awesome seeing the level of professionalism and competitiveness everyone was displaying. About a month goes by as I continued to try and gather information, references, and ultimately make one of the biggest decisions of my career. After doing all of this and participating in a couple of test days at Buttonwillow Raceway Park, I finally made my decision.

Great testing with Afterburner Autosport

As I’m sure many of you have heard, we recently signed with Afterburner Autosport for the 2016 Cooper Tires USF2000 Championship powered by Mazda. We will be running the Soul Red colors identifying myself as Mazda’s scholarship driver. We have run a total of 4 test days at Buttonwillow Raceway Park. The first day was a “learning experience” to say the least. Downforce, better tires, more tires, and effective brakes - all of these were things I had to get used to in a short amount of time. The team did a great job of getting me acclimated to the car though. As I was getting more and more comfortable with the car, our speed continued to get better. It was extremely fun getting to work with my own engineer, giving feedback on the car, feeling the changes made, and seeing the results. By the end of day 2 I had made significant progress with my driving but there was definitely room for improvement. I was physically drained after the 2 days and knew I needed to improve my stamina for the upcoming season. That led me to running, biking, and swimming for about 40 miles a week, helping me lose 15 pounds in 2 months. Perfect timing for our second round of testing at Buttonwillow! We continued to improve and were getting very close to competitive race pace.

We are now only 2 days away from getting on track for the first official series test days at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Alabama. I can’t wait to finally hop in the car and see how we stack up against a very competitive field of over 20 cars!

I can’t thank all of those enough who have made this opportunity possible. A super big thank you to Mazda Motorsports, Team USA Scholarship, SafeisFast, Sparco, Molecule Sports, and Crow Enterprizes, and all of our friends and family who continue to ride this awesome train with us. This is going to be one great year.

All the best,

Dakota

Team Announcement

The time has finally come! We are extremely proud to announce that we will be running with Afterburner Autosport for our rookie year in the Cooper Tires USF2000 series powered by Mazda. Hot off of a top 5 finish in the Formula Ford Festival while representing the United States for the Team USA Scholarship courtesy of Jeremy Shaw, I was awarded a $200,000 scholarship to compete in the 2016 USF2000 championship as a Mazda scholarship driver after winning the Skip Barber Championship Shootout in November of 2015. This is an extreme honor as I will be the only driver in the field sporting the classic Soul Red Mazda paint scheme.

The series will take us across the country and into Canada for a 16 race, 8 weekend schedule. We will be competing against some of the finest talent in the nation, but we strongly believe that with support of Mazda Motorsports, Afterburner Autosport, Molecule Sports, Cooper Tires, Team USA Scholarship, and all of our friends and family, that this will be a year to remember. Be sure to read our official driver announcement to get insight on the team’s and our thoughts for this upcoming year.

Read more here.

All the best,

Dakota