Day 1 of Radford Racing School's four-day Grand Prix course left me exhausted, both physically and mentally—and 100% ready for more. Click back to my previous story to learn more about the initial exercises Radford's instructors put my classmates and me through, and to watch our video footage of the process.

Walking into the facility the next chilly morning, I could feel my brain still processing everything we learned the day before, from true heel-toe braking and downshifting to turn-in points and finding the right apex point. Most of all, the vision practices that our main instructor, Will Parker, kept bringing up seemed like the main lesson that would best help me get into the flow of true track driving.

As we wrapped up the first full day, he cautioned us to take an easy evening, eat well, and drink plenty of water in preparation for the transition to the full-sized track, rather than just the Maricopa Oval. But before we made that massive leap, a few more drills fit into the plan to start Day 2.

Back For Another Round

Radford Racing School Day 2 3
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

We kicked off Tuesday at the same place we left off on Monday, out on Radford's large front lot pushing a trio of Dodge Challenger Widebody manuals to the limits of their brakes. As the teachers kept not-jokingly joking, ABS doesn't just stand for "Anti-lock Bracking System" but also "Ability to Brake while Steering" so we needed to get a feel for the very limits of the modern muscle car's brake bite and the factory-equipped Pirelli tires' traction at the absolute limit.

This time, we took turns standing on the brake pedal at increasing speeds. The first few runs at 35 miles per hour seemed just fine, as the chugging of ABS brought the Challengers to a stop quite quickly. But once we accelerated to 45 miles per hour and then over 60 before braking, that old feeling in the gut like at the top of a roller coaster drop started to appear. The drill quickly hammered home just how effectively ABS works and acquainted us with exactly how much distance an admittedly hefty 4,470-pound vehicle needs to come to a full stop—knowledge we needed to learn before graduating to the big-boy circuit.

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Skid Pad Oversteer Training

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via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

We definitely needed to learn how to stop in the case of emergency but Radford also teaches how to find the limits of traction and drive through them, rather than just stomping on the brakes. The four-door Chargers above provided one of the most valuable sessions of the entire week thanks to what looks like training wheels or received transplants from a shopping cart sticking off the sides. In fact, those outrigger wheels sit at the bottom of hydraulic jacks controllable via buttons inside the cabin, which allow for purposeful loss of traction that induces intentional oversteer. In short form, they teach drifting.

"There’s a science to driving straight," Radford General Manager Mike Kessler told me beforehand, "You want to stay in and keep it safe. But there are times when you do want to drift."

"First and foremost, our main thing is car control. That’s what we do. Car control, high-performance driving, and safety. The name can be misleading. We are a racing school, but we’re so much more than that."

A quick stint in the Chargers on the skid pad delivers more than just the ability to roast tires (though nobody complained about a bit of smoke), instead, yet another lesson in the importance of vision. After doing a series of ovals and figure-eights, Parker had us try to keep the nose of the Charger right outside a white circle on the asphalt. Then he'd tell us to raise our eyes and look further left or right, just to demonstrate how much of a difference vision makes on the accuracy of our driving. Illuminating, and a powerful lesson, to say the least.

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Focusing On The Full Track

Radford Racing School Day 1 7
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

Next, we strapped back into our Challengers and Parker led us out to the Maricopa Oval to put the braking and skid-pad lessons to work in the real world. All of a sudden, I could place the front wheels much more accurately while braking even more aggressively, shifting weight towards the front tires which would then compress, widen, and provide much more grip while turning. And I could feel an even wider field of vision developing.

Compared to the previous day, this oval session only lasted a moment before Parker pulled us into the classroom again to discuss the layout of Bob Bondurant's purposefully designed training racetrack that was recently resurfaced as the school transformed into the revived Radford and the Official High-Performance Driving School of Dodge SRT. He walked us through each turn, discussing where to place the car, where to begin braking, where to start turning, and where to wind up into full throttle. At 1.65 miles total, the track allows for a lot of technical turning, though at first, we'd actually be skipping the furthest west portion, since another group of students would be using the Maricopa Oval for their own class.

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Lead-Follow On (Almost) The Full Track

Radford Racing School Day 2 2
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

For the first few laps around the larger circuit, with turns in both directions for a change, Parker used a walkie-talkie to point out everything he covered on the whiteboard. He purposefully braked at the right points, despite driving only about 10 miles per hour, and began turning at the right points, only skipping full throttle in the straights to give the three students trailing him a chance to acclimate to the different environment.

Then, as the pace picked up, we got to accelerate a bit more, brake a bit harder, and turn in with more G forces. Eventually, Parker ramped up to our limits, staying a little ahead of us in the lead-follow format to appeal for more focused driving.

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Set Loose, With Supervision

Radford Racing School Speed
via Michael Van Runkle / HotCars

After probably about 10 laps, though it could have been more, we pulled into the pits to catch our breath and discuss. My impressions focused mostly on vision, weight transfer, and braking—as usual, the most important stuff emerged as my areas to work on. Only a few minutes later, Parker set us loose on the track once again.

We spent the rest of the afternoon going full-gas if we felt so inclined, able to take breaks in the pits as needed, and allowing our classmates to pass with a hand pointed out the window. The finer elements of the track's design began fitting into my mental image of racecar driving: how to negotiate a tight S-turn, where to stay wide and where to hug the curb, plus when to shift (yep, keep in mind we were dropping as low as second and occasionally popping up into fourth if we came into the straightaway with enough speed to redline third).

Every now and then, Parker would jump out onto the track to chase or lead us, reminding us that even if we felt fast, we still needed to learn a lot from the pros on hand. On my best laps, I'd get up to around 110 miles per hour on the straightaway, the only place where I felt safe stealing a glance down at the speedometer. Snatching up milliseconds through the corners and, at the very least, trying to keep a better line than my classmates became my main focus. Both the guys I spent the four-day class challenging myself against told stories of amateur racing for most of their lives and here I stood, a total newbie hoping to hone my skills.

And yet, few places can give both experienced drivers and amateurs a taste of their own weaknesses—and where they need to improve—quite like a few days at Radford Racing School. Click through to Day 3 at Radford and follow along in a Dodge Viper, Lotus Evora GT, and fitting for legit F4 racecars.

Sources: radfordracingschool.com, dodge.com, and radford.co.