Took the Corolla to it’s first autocross event today. Had lots of fun, it boiled it’s own brake fluid.
SCCV had the second day of their two day event at Canaan Motor Club today. This car is so much quicker than the Mini, has a crazy amount of turn in, and generally handles great. The stock tires are garbage which makes for some fun 4 wheel drifty moments but generally aren’t fast.
Now to the bummer moment of the day. The Corolla has what Toyota calls “Active Cornering Assist” which basically means it drags the brake on the inside front wheel to help you turn. This resulted in a noticeably hot and smelly brake on one front wheel after each run. With a lot of high speed left handers most runs left me with a warm right front brake and a very hot left front brake. As an experiment I used 2 runs to back off through the left handers while pushing extra hard in the right handers and sure enough both runs were finished with a very hot right front brake and a warm left front. I called it a day after 1/4 of my afternoon runs and left with a softer brake pedal than I arrived with. I’m going to give it a few weeks for the evidence of my activities to be buried under a bunch of daily commutes and then schedule an appointment with the dealer to have them bled.
Long story short: The Corolla autocrosses great however it cooks it’s own brakes in long sweepers.