Race Car Vehicle Dynamics - Fundamental Theory

About the "Race Track Setup / Race Car Vehicle Dynamics" series of courses:

Part 1) Race Car Vehicle Dynamics - Fundamental Theory (This course)

Part 2) Race Car Vehicle Dynamics - Advanced Theory and Application

Part 3) Race Track Setup - High Downforce Race Car

All 3 parts added together as a bundle deal: Race Track Setup Masterclass - From Theory to Solutions

Race car setup to achieve the best lap times without resorting to tedious trial and error involves understanding both vehicle dynamics as well as aerodynamics, and being able to put it all together to make quick but accurate setup changes.

Tires, springs, anti roll bars, aero, dampers, tire pressure, wheel alignment, gearing, limited slip differential settings... all have an influence on your ability to achieve a faster lap time. Typical online setup guides or software offer multiple solutions for each individual handling problem, leaving racers having to resort to trial and error, and traditional text books are too long and theory dense to be of help to the typical racer or even race engineer, who just wants to solve a handling problem and go faster.

This series of courses is the filtered and condensed summary of how to get to the fastest setup, the result of having spent 19 years on vehicle dynamics being a sim racer, setting up my own cars for track days at Spa, Zandvoort, Nurburgring, and working for the past 9 years in automotive chassis development (currently active suspension controls).

The course offers a filtered/condensed view on vehicle dynamics, aerodynamics, before focusing on a holistic view on achieving the best race car setup up to and including a high downforce race car:

- the correct and logical order to tackle all the setup variables

- how each of these setup variables influence handling and how each one is optimized

- how to tackle handling problems in an existing car setup

- only as much theory as needed for each component to help you achieve the perfect setup