Driving On The Edge: The Art and Science of Race Driving Hardcover – November 1, 2015

Well, maybe not all of them, but I have most of the biggest ones: the Skip Barber School's "Going Faster", Ross Bentley's "Speed Secrets", and Carroll Smith's "Drive to Win". The crown jewel in my collection is Ayrton Senna's "Principles of Race Driving", which is a pricey but intriguing look into the mind of the great driver.This book, however, tops them all. Krumm covers every aspect of performance driving, from weight transfer to setup, and does it in a way that's clear and easy to understand. Even better, he backs up his instruction with specific examples, citing moments in Formula 1 races that illustrate his teaching points. This allows the reader to see in video what he's talking about in the book.He also covers techniques I hadn't heard of before. One example is how to induce understeer to help deal with a car with severe oversteer. After explaining the technique, he cites a race where Fernando Alonso used that very technique to keep his car under control in a particular corner.This book has gone to the top of my racecar instruction library, and it's hard to think anything else will top it. I wish it was available on Kindle so I could have it as a pocket reference; that's how good it is. If you're trying to learn how to drive a race car better, this book is a must-buy.

I'm just a car guy who loves to drive. I've driven on track a couple of times, and like to go on fun drives when I can find roads that aren't busy with slow drivers. I've done the Mid-Ohio High Performance and Advanced High Performance school days, as well as HPDE and one or two other high-performance driving books, but this one still taught me plenty of new things, which I even put to use in my racing simulator/rig (mainly Gran Turismo Sport). Even if you don't drive on-track, it's still an interesting read if you're a driving enthusiast.

Great insight provided by Michael Krumm on what he has learned behind the wheel of a race car. Well written and understandable. While I'm sure this would be beneficial to actual track racers, I wanted to get a better understanding of driving lines and techniques for sim racing. This book definitely improved my knowledge in that regard and has improved my sim techniques and times. For anyone looking to educate themselves on the art of driving a race car, I would highly recommend this book.

A good read. Plenty of technical information and teaching points. Establishes a good base for technique building. Would recommend it to individuals interested in maximizing there driving skill. Does not replace practice.

I have read many books on driving techniques, and put much of the info from those to good use on the track. And out comes a new, up to date book on driving. I found Michael Krumm's book on the subject to be one of the best. It is thoroughly modern, relates performance to both technique and data acquisition, and is very well written. Highly recommended, and it should be on the shelf of any serious racer or track driver. His success on the track in various cars, including winning the FIA GT1 championship in a racing GT-R, gives him true credentials.

This text contains many hints and techniques not found in other books on race driving techniques. I've read many other books on racing techniques and I am a graduate of a very well known racing school and I still found this to be a worthy read. I found the discussion of the different techniques required by rear, front, and all-wheel drive cars to be very enlightening. The author's discussion of racing in the rain was good, too.

Very nice read I take my braking much more seriously now as well as being more aware of the weight transfer and tire loads in performance driving situations.

I'm very impressed with this books layout and information. Michael does a great job introducing a concept and giving the beginner a series of things to work on, while moving deeper and giving the more advanced driver a new technique that is used by the top professionals. There is nothing groundbreaking in this book, but it is a solid addition to anyone's driving library.

Great book!

That's a proper racing book!

My S.O does lapping for fun in a Scion FR-S and this book helped him a lot to reduce the lap time by seeing where to take the best line. The book came quickly and in good shape. Has better understanding of concepts than other so acclaimed ‘driving books’. Still reading it slowly and trying to apply them on a racing sim.

Was recommended by a friend of the author. And is a very interesting and good in depth book

Just like a nicely balanced car is more pleasant to handle than one with a bad setup, a pleasantly styled book with select, well balanced and presented content beats more verbose or less picturesque competitors. Micheal Krumm's introduction to the art of driving on the edge is such a perfectly balanced book, where content and its presentation, writing style and choice of pictures and graphs, and a sense for the use of real life stories as opposed to dry theory only, blend together to form a highly readable and informative book. A book you might want to turn to if you are a novice or a near novice to the craft of motor-racing.Michael Krumm's concise account encompasses the material which is present in all comparable introductions such as Skip Barber's magisterial  Going Faster!: Mastering the Art of Race Driving: The Skip Barber Racing School  or the more handy  Speed Secrets: Professional Race Driving Techniques  by Ross Bentley. Where Krumm's book shines is in the conciseness of the presentation and the graphical quality of the book, which perhaps betrays some of his acquired taste for Japanese understatement and orderliness. Added values lies in small details like the inclusion of (fairly simple) graphs from telemetry software which try to prove his points of view (and at the same time serve as introduction to the reading of such graphs which today are indispensable tools just as screwdrivers). Or the helpful comparison of tires in different states of wear.The author makes much of his own theory how turns should be driven fast. Perhaps, his claims ('the latest advanced techniques for driving') are somewhat overstated as the discussion of the ideal line through a turn in the literature is not quite as one-sided as he makes it out to be. Yet, again the presentation of the discussion is well handled and deserves praise.What might make readers feel uncomfortable with this book is the fact that the author puts himself very much in the focus. Apart form the career summary at the end of the book, 15 out of 17 pictures which show recognizable faces show Michael Krumm. Many of the cars shown have him as a driver. The text is brimful with the author's own experience. Whether one finds this focus of the author on himself helpful (well, it's real experience, isn't it!) or arrogant a reader must decide for himself. Personally, I would have regretted such attitude with lesser books and drivers, the quality of the present book and the proven expertise of the driver makes me accept the attitude.Here is a book which can well be placed in all hands which itch to touch the steering wheel of a race car (even if it is only the Playstation). The basic theory is all there, and it is presented in a well written entertaining style which states the important points clearly and concisely. And don't be distracted by the somewhat flashy cover, the interior, just like the interior of a racing car, is presented in a much more barren way. Carbon style, I would say. Going Faster!: Mastering the Art of Race Driving: The Skip Barber Racing SchoolSpeed Secrets: Professional Race Driving Techniques