Few people understand that, in a turn, the throttle is the most accurate and delicate steering control (and, from my point of view, the only one you should use). And, on a car with a bit of mass biased towards the rear it works opposite what people are used to with front-biased cars. Accelerating (or not decelerating) around a turn isn't "natural" until you understand why.
I've always found it enjoyable to understand the dynamics of these cars. If you can swing it, doing Nürburgring on anything with decent performance is an absolute blast.
> And, on a car with a bit of mass biased towards the rear it works opposite what people are used to with front-biased cars.
What do you mean? Why does the weight distribution result in "opposite" throttle/brake response when cornering? I don't think it does.
All cars behave the same when accelerating or decelerating in a corner. Throttle moves the weight to the rear wheels inducing understeer (until you overdo it and you get power oversteer) and brakes move weight to the front inducing oversteer (until you lock up and get understeer). It doesn't matter what the engine layout looks like or what the weight distribution is.
It's certainly true that the weight distribution in a rear/mid engine car feels different but only because the center of mass is in a different place. Once the rear gets sliding, it's feels really aggressive because there's more mass going (like driving a hammer, handle first) but with some finesse on the controls it can be balanced out. Most purpose built racing cars have engine behind the driver (and center of mass near the driver's ass) to allow extracting the most grip out of all four tyres, given enough driver skill.
You had it: Center of mass. Think about the forces on the front and rear tire patches as you navigate a turn with subtle throttle modulation.
I am not talking about gross control, only fine control.
It's like sailing without using the rudder to make fine course corrections. Not a perfect analogy but it is about balancing forces.
Another thinking tool: Imagine a dumbell where the weight of each disk isn't the same. One is 5lbs and the other 10lbs. It's a 15lbs dumbell but it is unevenly balanced.
Attach a cable to each disk. Now start spinning it with the heavier disk in front. Then do the same with the heavier disk in back. Think of acceleration and deceleration and the resultant torque about the cernter of mass.
"Few people understand that, in a turn, the throttle is the most accurate and delicate steering control (and, from my point of view, the only one you should use)."
His point is that by modulating the throttle you can move the weight of the chassis around. Doing so affects how the vehicle steers. The statement is a bit exaggerated but nonetheless based on facts. It all depends on the car you are driving. Sometimes the brakes do more than the throttle during a turn.
You enter the turn with the steering wheel. Once setup you control the turn with throttle (or braking) and how the car behaves is related to, among other factors, mass balance.
To be clear, people talk about "weight transfer". That is not what happens at all. Weight transfer would require masses within the vehicle to move. What does happen is that the resultant vector of all force vectors acting on the vehicle shifts to have a forward or rearward component depending on what the car might be doing. At a basic level it's about good-old F = ma. There is no weight transfer in the strictest sense (unless you have a super loose suspension with four feet of travel or a partially filled fuel tank).
So, in a very direct sense, driving is about manipulating force vector directions and magnitudes through acceleration (the physics kind, meaning in any direction).
Accelerating through a turn does not shift weigh to the rear. No significant mass transfer takes place while accelerating or braking. We say "weight shift" because that's the way it feels to the driver, but this is not what's happening.
When accelerating forward during a turn you are increasing the force vector at the point where the tire contacts the road. This results in increasing forward velocity around the path the car is travelling. Since centrifugal force is proportional to the SQUARE of tangential velocity a mass imbalance to the front or rear can have a very different effect on car dynamics.
A rear-biased Porsche 911, on deceleration around a curve will be subjected to a torque about the center of mass that has the rear end pulled towards the center of the travel arc. A car that is front-biased will do the opposite, the resultant torque will pull the front towards the center of the arc being negotiated.
Because of the square relationship to tangential velocity and the "unusual" dynamics of a rear-biased 911 people who do not understand the physics involved get into real trouble while negotiating turns at speed. If you decelerate quickly this square-of-the-velocity related torque about the center of mass will spin you in a microsecond.
Of course, there's a lot more to it, such as suspension geometry and tire patch dynamics, yet the fundamental physics are not that complex and can have major effects on what a car does during high performance driving.
The throttle is a major influence in turning because of it controls acceleration and it's relationship to dynamic forces is proportional to the square of velocity.
EDIT: Corrected friggin iPad-induced typos.
Also, to complete the story: When you exit the turn you exit with the throttle first and then the steering wheel. In other words, on a front-biased vehicle you can start to feed-in throttle somewhere past the apex to use the square-of-velocity torque relationship to start to carefully straighten your motion path while not really moving the wheel. At a certain point you start to release steering pressure to smoothly transition into a straight path. If all of this is done smoothly it feels amazing.
I've always found it enjoyable to understand the dynamics of these cars. If you can swing it, doing Nürburgring on anything with decent performance is an absolute blast.