Pacenotes

In rallying, Pacenotes are a way of describing in detail the rally route that a driver will go through. The notes usually include the features of the road that affect how it is driven fast, and also the types of corners. The features include the distance between each turn, camber (angle) of each corner, hills, jumps, and other instructions to the driver. 

For the notes to be useful to the driver, they are written with abbreviations and read out loud by a navigator, also called a co-driver. There is no standard for the pacenotes, but in practice, most of them are similar. Other variations include the language the driver and co-driver prefer to speak, if the distances are in meters or yards, and others. The pacenotes for a World Rally Championship stage may be many pages long, and the whole notebook for the whole rally may be various thick volumes.

On some rally competitions, the people in charge give the co-drivers the pacenotes and they can't take themselves on the reconnaissance laps before the race. 

Common notes
Here are some common pacenotes that are often found on the notebooks of rally co-drivers:

-Corners - Corners, the turns on the rally course, are described with a number from 1-6 and if they are to the left or right. The number indicates a different thing whether the British or American system is being used. For the British, the bigger the number, the tighter the corner. For the Americans it is reversed.

-"Hairpin" - This describes a U-turn on the course.

-"Square" - This describes a 90 degree (hence square) corner.

-"Into" - Describes that two corners flow one after the other, with no straight between the two.

-Numbers - These say the distance to the next note, in either yards or meters.

-"!" - Read as "caution". Indicates the feature ahead is dangerous.

-"!!" - Read as "double caution"

-"!!!"- Read as "triple caution"

-"Jump" - A small hill on the road that makes the car jump a bit on the air. Rally Finland, for example, is famous for its jumps.

-"Crest" - An upwards hill.

-"Off-camber" - Means that the corner is tilted towards the opposite direction than it goes.

-"Slippery"  - Means that the terrain is slippery.

-"Grip" - Means that the terrain coming will grip well to the tyres of the car.

-"Cut" / "Don't cut" - Indicates that the driver can either go a bit off the road on the inside of the corner or shouldn't do it (because there might be trees or rocks on the outside of the road)

-"Tightens/Opens" - Describes that the corner becomes tighter or more open.

-"Widens/Narrows" - Describes a change on the corner's width.

The co-driver will read the notes in a rhythm so the driver will have enough time to react (a bit before the corners), but not so before that the driver forgets the note before arriving at the corner. This rhythm is something that the co-driver has to get with time because it's different for each driver. Sometimes the co-driver can repeat notes that they think the driver might forget, or to give more emphasis to them.