Quote:
Originally Posted by Equilibrandt
I've heard "maintenance throttle" used in different contexts, but I'll assume you mean enough 'throttle' to maintain speed and not have regen kick in.
It's a bit of a doozy, honestly, since the moment you let off the throttle, you have a user-adjustable level of regen/engine braking. For me, that demands two foot track driving, because it's not perfectly simple to tell if the regen braking will be enough for your desired corner-entrance speed.
For me, I had regen set to max, which can seriously drag the car if you don't use a maintenance-level of throttle; then, my left foot is hovering over the brake in case I need more. To me, the brake feel pushing into corners is very similar to standard brakes; the handoff between regen braking and friction braking isn't sharp if you have good left-foot modulation. It's not intuitive at all unless you're used to manual driving or two foot feather-braking in a paddle shift car like our Miata.
The only reason I'd like to see this new M3P on a track instead of the old one is because it supposedly has a slider that allows the driver to "set" oversteer or understeer preferences and that's quite intriguing, along with "drift" modes. I wonder if they're similar to the Ford Focus RS's AWD power distribution in drift mode where it powers the modulates power to the rear wheels to kick the rear out.
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Alternatively, as you accelerate, weight transfers to the rear. Maintenance throttle balances the car, so its weight is evenly distributed front to rear. There are times, like in the middle of a corner, where having the car balanced will help it generate more cornering grip.
Maintenance throttle is where you are applying enough throttle to get a slight acceleration to keep the car neutral front/rear which will help you corner a hair faster. You aren't quite decelerating in a corner (you should of already done your braking before the corner) but you are wanting to keep the car settled where you put it when you set up the turn, so you apply a touch of throttle.
I drive 3 pedal cars on the track mainly so I wonder how hard it'd be. One day.