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Misti,
I have just been rereading many of the posts from all the helpful people and I believe you found my issue in your reply quoted in this post. Your story of riding Daytona and learning a new track. At Road Atlanta, I had to learn the track and bike while riding at mid group pace. I had to find multiple reference points just to prevent being a rolling road block for many faster, more experienced riders. With the blind entry to the chicane in the Esses and over the mountain, you better be going slow or on the right line at pace or things can go very wrong very fast--following a young lady that went straight thru chicane and onto the grass!!!!! I made the turn but she did not. I reread the quote from you below and realized what really was causing my issue.
QUOTE that made me think:
I went out for each practice session with a specific exercise to work on. First was Reference Points, in finding them and in drawing the track. I called Keith Code himself between sessions to talk through areas that I was struggling. Each session out I drew the track and added more RP's and before the final practice session of the day we compared may split times with everyone else's times (I was way off the pace) and chose the two corners where I was losing the most time.
Those two corners also happened to be the corners I had the fewest reference points in. For the last session I worked on finding more and better RP's and in putting my vision together so I flowed from one point to the other. The next day was qualifying and I didn't have much practice time to step up and find several seconds of improvement. I did the same thing, systematically working on putting my visuals together until the qualifying session came and Keith Code said "ok, you've done your work, now just RIDE, relax and have fun." I let go of everything and focussed on being smooth, relaxed and in having fun. I kept shouting in my helmet, "I'm riding DAYTONA!!!!" and sure enough when I came in, I had managed to find the time needed to qualify for the race!
My mind lit up reading this again as I realized that I dont/did not have any reference points between my corner exit and my brake marker for the turn at the end of the straight. I exit the corner at or near full throttle then point the bike down track and there is nothing until I get close to my brake marker!! With the longest straight having a kink(taken at full throttle over 100mph) I need to have a few more markers to keep me in the proper line to make the kink and then be in the proper track position to hit my brake marker. Just running this exercise in my mind brain, I can see that it will(and has at Road Atlanta) help me with this issue. I also realized that I have the same issue with rolling off over the hill at turn 6 at Palmer for the same reason. I do not have a good reference for cresting the hill and diving down to turn 7! Cant wait to get back to Palmer in 2 weeks to put this to the test. I have listed my current goals in the last 2 posts and this will make reaching my goal even easier!
Thank you again
Anthony