I always found my quickest laps occur when I really push it during practice and try things to see what works and what doesn't. This preperation allows me to get into a rythym while racing where for the most part I don't even think about the actual car placement. When I'm in the middle of the race I'm more focused on the race craft part of it, such as figuring out what the pit strategy is and what the options are to gain as much advantage as possible.
Even when I'm karting and get out of the kart, people will ask where exactly I hit the brakes, or applied the throttle and I will reply; "I actually have no idea!" I honestly don't think to much about the actual driving part as soon as more than 3 laps are complete. You get into a rythym and just run lap after lap. Another great example of this occured a few weeks ago when I ran a 90 minute stint for a 4 hour karting enduro in Louisville. In the 90 minute stint I completed something like 220 laps, and I can remember having my brain start thinking about what I want to get my wife for her birthday, needing to mow the lawn, and so forth. This is while setting laps within .15 seconds of my personal best lap after lap.
Now as far as the preperation side of things that were being discussed a page or two back. I found that a quick 30-40 minute practice session followed by a day or two off really helped allow for the mental preperation of the laps. I make sure that I can visualize 3 complete laps in my head, that's truly doing all of the movements that you would expect to make in the game. This allows me to prepare for what may happen in the first few laps. My practice time back in the day when GT5 came out was enormous, but in my last few months of racing I would be qualifying with about 2 laps of practice lol.
