All is good Argo. No practice at all on my part. My car really needed some tuning. It would go loose as time went on. Especially in the slow corners. Unless plans change I am out next week. Vacation up at the lake.
All is good Argo. No practice at all on my part. My car really needed some tuning. It would go loose as time went on. Especially in the slow corners. Unless plans change I am out next week. Vacation up at the lake.
My race started ok. After the first corner mayhem I found myself in 4th right behind Dean. I was faster but couldn’t find a way past, then Air’s tire softener started coming in and Dean pulled away as I struggled with grip. It when from annoying to “what the hell” over the next lap or so. I looped it in T2 and let basically everyone pass, saw Headshot coming and was planning on trying to rejoin right on his rear bumper. Apparently I’m a bad judge of how long my nose is because when I hit the gas I clipped his rear and threw him into a 180. Completely an avoidable mistake and bad judgment on my part. I waited for him to get righted and going before I continued. That left me dead last. I started coasting into corners and very slowly rolling into the throttle and taking a few seconds off my lap pace. I strung together a few ok laps and noticed that I was catching back up to Headshot again. I started to try and pick up my pace. I spun 4 times on that lap. I finally noticed tire screech under braking and thought I must be locking my rear tires and that was causing at least a part of my issues. I clicked my brake bias forward a few notches and my car settled down. I caught up to Headshot and we had a great fight for a couple laps. I could get by him but with my shifted brake bias my brake points were extended more than I thought so I would blow the braking and give the position right back. After a few laps Headshot got sideways and let me by.
Not my best race, but maybe I’ve found something to help me be more consistent for the last couple races.
I was hoping to put down consistent laps in the 1:32 or lower range for every lap save lap 1. I was mostly doing that except for a couple laps in the 1:33s and was at least keeping Sauce honest, but he was a good ways ahead of me. . He would pull ahead a bit more lap by lap. Lap 15 I spun and after that I just made sure to stay on the track and not have another off so I didn't fall into Argo's clutches.
Thanks Andrew for letting me by without a fight ( he pulled off the racing line and slowed on the front straight).
I didn't watch the replay yet, but T1 lap 1 looked interesting in my mirror. I was glad to have made it through unscathed.
Sauce left me a lot of room on the inside and still managed to get a better exit than I did.
Red Bull Ring is one of the few where I use the trackside braking markers into a few corners. Always a risk that they will still be there. After lap one the braking marker into 4 (the downhill left hander) was gone. I found myself braking too early and going way too slow through there. I started trying to use the overhead signs as reference and wound up going too deep and going off (twice). This prevented any chance of closing the gap to TJ.
In reply to Argo1 :
I switched to the overhead sign as the trackside 50m board seems to get taken out frequently.
I used one of those trackside markers at Imola and it was obliterated at the beginning of qualli and left me in a lurch trying to figure out where to brake.
Points and replay posted.
Air is putting a little distance in for 2nd, a reconnected Sauce is making a charge at Argo.
I watched turn 1 replay. I wanted to make sure I didn't take Sauce out, so I started braking a little early. I think that may have caught Argo out a bit as he pulled along side of me. We were essentially 3 wide - Air, Argo and me - just before the apex. I was going slowest of the 3 at that point and took a lot of curb, so I stayed out of the ensuing carnage. Argo's bumper met Air's door as Air turned in, spinning Air.
Looks like Argo was going to save his slide, but got hit from behind by the apparently false starting AI Norrby, spinning Argo.
With no where to go, Headshot collected the sideways Air, sending him into the air.
Dean and Brad went wide and made it through ok, coming out in P3 and P4.
Sauce had a 1 second gap at the next braking zone which he just kept extending.
Hmmm. In looking at the replay it was Argo that got me in T1. I think it might have been a bit of glitching though. From the replay, it looks like he does not turn at all for T1 (and I was going wide in the corner), which is unlikely. It would have been a better plan for me to go inline in front of him to take the inside, but I suspect the glitch may have gotten me rear ended.
I did amazingly well in the race with a lot of help from Dean spinning out / being taken out. Also a big boost when all the AI cars directly in front of me decided to pit 200 feet from the finish! The Brad plan worked out fine, except for the fact that his "tire softener" seemed to take effect right in front of me and I collected part of his right front fender.
I think the views in the game got me in trouble with Dean though. When I pulled back onto the track in front of Dean, I could not see he was coming because when I looked to the right to look up track I only get the 45 deg right, which is not enough (there is essentially a huge blind spot to the sides and side-rear). I also could not see him coming on the track map since it's pretty zoomed in. Looking in my rear view and attempting to swerve out of the way didn't help either of course.
Brad, it looks like your standing spreadsheet formula may be off or the fitst post needs to be updated.
It looks like 7th is good for 13 points but shouldn't it be 14 points? Also 16th should be 5 points, so 15th should be 6 points, but it is only 5.
Doesn't matter as long as it's consistent.
First of all, I was excited to actually be able to participate for once and see everyone. Unfortunately I changed the settings on my headset in Tuesday so I could hear TJ and I ended up slightly compromised for the race. Things were fine in the pits but when driving I could barely hear anyone.
From practice I knew that TJ, Argo and I were all running similar lap times and that draft and mistakes would be the keys to the race. I was unsure of how the start was going to go being that TJ has a mid engine car and was on softs vs my FR on hards, but I knew I needed the best launch possible if I was going to be ahead after T1.
Fortunately I had a good launch and the straight line speed of the Merc gave me a car length or so at turn in for T1. I compromised my line slightly to give TJ some room if he needed it, but I saw him be courteous and brake early so I went 100%, which gave me a huge run out of the corner. That was enough to drop him from my draft and then it was just pushing hard to not let him catch it. As expected we were running very similar times but I was managing to pick up a tenth or two here and there. Until his spin he was well within striking distance had I made any significant error.
In reply to e30Matt :
I was on hards for the race, but I used softs for qualli. I could only go about two hot laps before they were spent.
In reply to T.J. :
Ah, ok. I rode with you for a lap or so in practice and you (and everyone else) were on softs so I assumed that was race setup.
T.J. said:Brad, it looks like your standing spreadsheet formula may be off or the fitst post needs to be updated.
- 3rd - 18pts
- 4th through 16th will be -1pt per position with 16th getting 5pts
It looks like 7th is good for 13 points but shouldn't it be 14 points? Also 16th should be 5 points, so 15th should be 6 points, but it is only 5.
Doesn't matter as long as it's consistent.
You doubt my math? Actually that's a pretty reasonable thing to do...
I was on hards as well. In fact I could only run softs on the right side for Qual as the left's would overheat in 3 laps.
There must be something with my setup or the Bentley as soft tires were running at 25-26 psi and right at 190 deg.
My car was similar Dean. I was 3 seconds a lap faster on slightly toasted softs than perfect hards. Although I’m not sure my race was an example of a good setup.
You guys just need to drive faster and get some heat in the tires.....
My lap times were nearly identical between hards and softs. I only used the softs for qualli because they let me brake a tiny bit later in two of the braking zones and I could hook up better on corner exits. They were a little easier to get a decent lap time out of them, but they only were better than hards for a couple laps then hards were better for me.
Watched the replay. Sorry Air. And Dean. And.... That glitching was pretty bad. I was teleporting back a forth across the track. Even managed a levitation into the hairpin. If my connection is that bad in the future, I'm out.
T.J. said:You guys just need to drive faster and get some heat in the tires.....
My lap times were nearly identical between hards and softs. I only used the softs for qualli because they let me brake a tiny bit later in two of the braking zones and I could hook up better on corner exits. They were a little easier to get a decent lap time out of them, but they only were better than hards for a couple laps then hards were better for me.
Same, with the exception that potential lap times for the softs were better, at least early on. I could make softs last and keep them from overheating running similar pace, but had to be much more careful and cognizant of the temps. Pushing too hard for more than a lap or so once up to temp would send them over and it takes time to get them back down. With hards I could push as hard as I wanted and never overheat them.
FYI, there are a couple spots where puddles will form in the last 5-7 minutes of the race. At least in my car they must be avoided unless I want to spin uncontrollably off track or into a wall.
I recommend doing enough laps in the rain to figure out the danger spots and how to avoid them.
Ok, so knowing I would miss Spa I didn't do any testing in the rain, but is it normal to have your rain tires wear incredibly quickly? I ran some laps with the weather set to just rain to get a feel for it and was using them at like 5% per lap.
Once they are half gone there performance in the wet falls off fast
I don't see too much wear over 30 minutes. Not sure what percentage, but maybe like 75% remaining I'd guess. If you drive the wets on a dry track, they will wear fairly quickly.
The randomization of the weather makes this race interesting. I've done multiple practice races. The earliest rain I've seen is sprinkles on lap 1 and needing wets on lap 2 all the way up to not needing wets until lap 5. Looks like a 14 lap race, so that leaves anywhere from 9-12 laps in the wet to deal with. The wets should last that long no problem. If you are considering a no stopper, then the trick is not overheat the wets on the dry track and not get punted by the AIs that are on softs that want by. Math tells me the no stopper is the way to go, but 2-5 dry laps on wets is tough for me to not lose it and spin somewhere, so it is safer for me to start on softs and switch to wets when needed.
I'll have to do some more practicing between the two strategies to figure out which one I will use during the race. Also, it does not appear that the race weather follows the practice weather exactly, meaning that whatever randomizer they use to determine the weather slot transitions, runs for practice and then runs again for the race. I was hoping the practice weather would give a clue as to the race weather (ie - knowing if it will be dry for 2 laps or 5 laps, may alter my strategy), but I can't see any corelation between the two.
Did some testing last night, hadn't tried the wets on a dry track yet so I loaded my last saved wet setup and went with it. The car was really loose until a little heat got into the tires, but amazingly I was running faster than the bots set at 90 on slicks and the tires were wearing surprisingly well. I was feeling really good, and then the rain started and the car was undrivable. It was at that point I realized that my tire choice hadn't saved and I was also on slicks...
Overall I think this will be a very interesting race with both options being very risk vs reward.
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