A few things that helped me:
1. Up your front pressure to maximum and drop your rear pressure to 20 lbs or less. It helps a lot on traction. Just pump them back up before you take any major corners!
2. Next to the launch, slow shifts are the next big killer of ETs. A guy at the track gave me really good advice and although it sounds strange, it really works. He told me to pull on the shifter like you are trying to pull it out of gear while you are accelerating. It won't come out of gear because of the torque on it from the engine, but as soon as you get near the clutch it will fly into the next gear. It's a hard thing to remember if you don't do it already but it really works to improve shift times. Once you have fully launched and are still in first gear, start pulling the stick hard like you are trying to shift into second. Keep pulling and once you let off on the gas and just nudge the clutch it will pop into second very quickly. That's the key shift but you can do the same with going from second into third. It doesn't feel good mentally to be reefing on the shifter when its not yet time to shift but it will sure make your shifting quicker once you master it.
3. Keep on the gas well through the finish line. Lots of guys tend to let up to soon and probably lose a tenth of a second coasting through the last stretch.
4. Practice launches with easing the clutch out vs. dropping the clutch. I've seen some guys get better 60' times one way and other guys get better times the other way. If you are dropping the clutch, figure out the best rpm to do it at. Depending on track surface, temperature, etc. I have had days/tracks where 1500 rpm isn't too low and sticky tracks where 4000 isn't too high.
5. Consider getting heavy duty half shafts if you are dropping the clutch at high rpms on sticky tracks though!
My two cents on a previous post (and no flame intended) is that chirping the tires is not a good thing. It means that you didn't get a very smooth shift. Either the clutch came out when you were at too low of an rpm and the tires were actually braking for a split second or you had the clutch in too long, the rpms went up too high and the tires spun for a split second. You can chirp the tires in 5th gear if you hold the clutch in, rev the engine to 6000 and drop the clutch...but that doesn't mean you had a good shift.
, have maybe 5 runs on them. New they are $200 a tire, I let them go for $250 plus shipping. I sold my 96 and my 99 uses 18" BFG's.
