School me on braking in 206 .

So I admittedly brake very late and I always have, and when I do that it tends to upset the kart and I scrub speed on exit. I was recently watching a P-1 guy turn laps and he is extremely SMOOTH. I was trying to determine when he was braking and couldn’t determine when he was braking.

Do you brake early instead of late, and how do you do that without loosing speed?

I’m by no means a driver coach, but my son was always trying to be the “last of the late brakers” in his cadet class, and he could usually out brake everyone handily. Then they’d promptly blow him away on corner exit. So our last practice day, we spent all night working on earlier braking and rolling speed into the corner, and the next day in the race, he finally beat a kid that has had his number all year. Consistency on his lap times improved and his average lap time improved as well.

It’s 206, you barely ever need to brake at all. Smoothness and upkeep of momentum are far more important than stretching the braking zone 1 foot later in a 206. You should be able to drive a 206 with your fingertips and be fast. It’s all finesse and minuscule inputs.

At my home track there are two places you brake in a 206, the rest of the track is either flat-out, or a quick lift or drag of the brakes.

It’s not about braking late or early per se; you always want to brake late. The more important thing is where you’re getting to throttle. You want to be on throttle in a 206 well-before the apex for most corners. So brake as late as you can, while still maintaining control and not upsetting the kart, at a point where you still can get to the throttle early, where you need to. Work backwards. Find out how early you can be back to full throttle without driving off the track on the exit. Then adjust your braking point so that you can get the kart slowed down, in control, before you get to that throttle point.

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And thats what I’m finding too Jim. I traditionally brake very deep into the turn, but I feel like 9HP isn’t enough and I scrub speed coming off the corner. The guy I was watching looked smooth, and he didn’t look fast. But then you see his track times and you like “Holly molly."

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In my first two years I lost a lot of time chasing later braking points. It’s such an easy/direct thing to try, and at first thought it seems like it would make up time, but it will in fact make you slower.
It’s all about getting on the throttle early and keeping up momentum by staying smooth
@tjkoyen said it better but you get the point

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Dean, I notice some of the guys just let off and roll through the corner to the apex and then back on the gas.