Any masters of going faster want to help ?

I'm starting to remember why sim racing always drove me nuts. AI cars aren't fun to race with because they behave like it's Deathrace 2000 no matter how you tweak their behaviour and online racers are too fast for me.

I've got this thing called the 'seven second rule' - given any circuit I can tell you how fast the quick guys will be lapping it. I just take the same car, practice for a couple of days and when I can't go any quicker - the 'pace' will be 7 seconds faster than I can manage.

I can't understand this. My equipment is OK ( Logitech G25, I'm not driving with the keyboard or a gamepad ) and I have read every book on circuit racing technique I can get my hands on. I used to ride motorcycles at fairly insane speeds in real life and I survived ( sort of, I'm held together by titanium screws and rods nowadays )
I even owned a string of V6 engined Ford Capri's - which have a reputation as being tail happy, lousy handling junk - and managed to drive them quickly without stuffing one into a ditch or a tree.
So why can't I drive a simulated car quickly ?

What the hell am I doing wrong ? any ideas ?

I'd like to get back into online racing but I'm not prepared to be circulating as a back marker while being lapped by a bunch of people who can drive rings around me while typing into a chat box at the same time...

What car, what sim. Different cars need to be driven differently. There's also huge chunks of time to gain after getting used to a car for weeks, so if you're jumping from car to car to track to track you'll never acclimatise yourself and maximize your potential.

Sometimes you just need to accept at some point that's your ceiling though. I've been doing iRacing almost every week for about a year now and my ceiling is usually 2 to 3 seconds of handicap to the pole/WR times in a normal length track. One day when I was really into the Ford GT after doing a full season with it I managed to just about squeeze a lap within 1 second of the pole time in Montreal, but that was an absolute freak lap where everything went right. Then I went straight back to my ceiling. It becomes frustrating and dangerous to try to go past it as I'll commit too many mistakes in a race. Much safer to be happy doing 2 seconds off the pace consistently and get good results, than push like an idiot trying to emulate WR times and never approaching those laptimes anyway.

If you're 7 secs off the pace you're doing something wrong in terms of technique though. Unless it's the Nordschleiffe. 

Thanks for the response. The sim I use is rFactor, but the cars can be anything at all...mostly historic. I don't switch from car to car and track to track, I pick something and stick with it.

Weirdly the only successes I ever had in online racing ( as in top ten ) was with the Nordschleiffe and Le Mans in endurance format. They were 24h races time compressed to two hours, and I found I could just keep plugging away with my slow lap times, not breaking the car and get a result. 

I am definitely doing something wrong with my technique. 

 

It's not quite Historx, but maybe iRacing is worth a try?  Every now and then they advertise some cut-price deals to encourage people to give it a try.  Some of the categories have very large online fields, so any "one" race is split into multiple races, grouping drivers of similar speed.  So you can have good races even if you're 7 seconds off the pace of the aliens in the fastest race split.

I wouldn't rule out iRacing completely, but I am a bit reluctant to pay to race. Not that I have a problem with iRacing as a service, I'm just mean

One thing I'd like to do is get some rFactor telemetry of quick laps, so I could overlay my own attempts on it and see where I'm going wrong.

I should also hurry up and get my cockpit built, braking technique is not improved when the plastic garden chair you are sitting in ( don't ask )  moves backwards every time you press the pedal...

Could you post a youtube clip of one of your faster laps? It's much easier to deduct where you can gain time by evaluating your lap.

I've helped quite a lot of players getting faster with Assetto Corsa. There are some pretty common 'mistakes' people make, but I don't want to sum them up before seeing you driving

Thanks a lot !

I don't know how to make a video, or upload it to YouTube, but I'll find out and get it done. Then the whole world can laugh at my driving

Edit :- figured out how to do it, I'll upload it overnight as it's going to take hours

Edited by Siddley, 14 April 2014 - 15:20.

Send a PM to forum user 100cc and beg him for driving tips.  I raced against him once or twice in iRacing a way back and he was blindingly quick.

Also Tenmantaylor and Exar Kun.

PM-ing someone I don't know for free advice seems a bit cheeky. Although that's probably me being weird

Here is the lap ( I don't know how to embed the video ) http://youtu.be/LsQfFDMJ7g8

I've managed to knock another second off the time, but I can't see where I can lose any more.

An easy way is to study replays of faster drivers for their braking and turn in points (most time can be found in braking, entry and coming off the brakes) but the best way to find out is data analysis. I've never done it with iRacing but seeing overlays of lines being taken, steering, throttle and braking inputs of better drivers will not only teach you how to drive faster but will also let you see where your setup is preventing you from driving like they do. In adjustable aero cars look at top speed and revs to find out downforce levels faster drivers are using. Check apex speeds etc.

I remember studying Greger Huttu's GPLreplay analyser data and driving his setups and that really helped me. I actually ended up beating his Honda/Silverstone time by some margin with an edited version of his setup in the GPL World Championship qual/race there many years ago

Edit: Just looked at your Monza lap. Couple of observations.

- You don't attack the kerbs at first chicane (you do at second chicane)

- Hitting the kerb at Lesmo 2 is upsetting the car and delaying you getting on the power which probably cost you a lot of time all the way down to Ascari.

- Your setup looks understeery in parabolica where you miss the apex then also makes you hesitate getting on the throttle which again costs you a lot of time down the pit straight.

This is one of the best laps I've done at Monza. Faster car but braking late, attacking the kerbs and getting on the power as early and hard as possible are absolutely essential to be fast there.

Edited by Tenmantaylor, 15 April 2014 - 10:06.

Tenmantaylor, slightly off-topic (apologies Siddley!

I was never particularly fast, but I tried some of the Huttu/aliens-style setups* back in the GPL days.  I found a lot of them very unstable under braking, although I gather that also made for very sharp turn-in, helping corner speed.  The general comment was that you needed to keep some throttle on during braking to settle the rear end down, but (rightly or wrongly) I found the whole idea not realistic and tended to live with less-extreme setups and slower lap-times.  

Is that similar to your recollection of those setup styles?  Can you comment on what driving style you needed to drive them (e.g. throttle under braking etc)?

* I can't recall exactly, but they were set up as low as possible with harder springs, had wild diff power/coast setups, and were often asymmetric.

Edit: Just looked at your Monza lap. Couple of observations.

- You don't attack the kerbs at first chicane (you do at second chicane)

- Hitting the kerb at Lesmo 2 is upsetting the car and delaying you getting on the power which probably cost you a lot of time all the way down to Ascari.

- Your setup looks understeery in parabolica where you miss the apex then also makes you hesitate getting on the throttle which again costs you a lot of time down the pit straight.

 

Thanks

Staying off the kerbs at the first chicane is intentional, the JF3 cars have insanely low ride heights by default and the " Brianza " kerbs there are very tall. It's actually possible to hit them, spin and get stuck on the top with the wheels off the floor. I haven't messed with the ride heights yet, I'm a bit out of my depth with that.

OK, don't touch the kerb on Lesmo 2

I should get rid of the understeer then, more front wing ? 

I couldn't get your video to play for some reason....

Tenmantaylor, slightly off-topic (apologies Siddley!

 

No problem Roger, I'll be interested to read about GPL setups as well.

Exactly right Roger but it was often only those who struggled to drive them that claimed they were unrealistic. The fact was radial ply-tyred pre-downforce F1 cars did require big slip angles to reach optimum grip and the pointy setups that Huttu pioneered with a loose diff allowed that to be exploited and driven at optimum slip angle for more of the corner but they had to be driven in a certain way that got the car into that slide state as quickly as possible and maintained. Trailing the throttle helped stabilise the car (when desired) and allowed a bigger window of balance and therefore grip to be opened up. No they weren't easy to drive but it makes sense that better drivers drive more difficult setups to go faster, their talent making up for the lack of inherent stability  and putting the car closer to the edge than thought possible. All is fair in love and sim racing! That said it was obvious to most that the tyre model of GPL was basic and exploitable in ways that wouldn't happen in the real world, especially at lower speeds when the slip angles should have been smaller but that wasn't the reason Huttu was fast, he has transferred his dominance into multiple series including iRacing that have much more complex and realistic tyre models.

Thanks

Staying off the kerbs at the first chicane is intentional, the JF3 cars have insanely low ride heights by default and the " Brianza " kerbs there are very tall. It's actually possible to hit them, spin and get stuck on the top with the wheels off the floor. I haven't messed with the ride heights yet, I'm a bit out of my depth with that.

OK, don't touch the kerb on Lesmo 2

I should get rid of the understeer then, more front wing ? 

I couldn't get your video to play for some reason....

This is where you start to learn to go fast. You need to at least get two wheels on the kerb at the first chicane as you are driving too long a route there and it's compromising your 2nd apex speed, getting back on the throttle, exit speed and ultimately top speed before the next chicane. If your setup is stopping you hitting the kerbs try tweaking it. If you can't raise the ride height try increasing the bump stops, bump damping or spring rates to prevent bottoming and allow you to attack them. It's all a compromise.

In terms of reducing understeer at para yes adding front wing will help but adding drag at Monza is probably a last resort fix as you'll be guaranteeing time loss on the 4 long straights that will offset the gain. If anything try reducing the rear wing and seeing if you can still drive it! Or try changing the mechanical setup that allows a better balance here. Stiffen the rear suspension for example. Another great trick on high speed tracks is playing with rear toe in. You want it to be as close to 0 as possible as it will increase your top speed due to less tyre drag and will speed up the turn in. It will reduce the stability a bit but if wanna be fast you gotta get loose!

Brilliant, plenty of stuff to experiment with then. I'll see where it gets me. My time is now down to 1:52.5 mainly from trying to drive more smoothly I think. I do have the MoteC plugin installed so I can look at telemetry, but so far only the basics are useful to me, as I don't have the knowledge to interpret much of the data I am seeing.
 
I've got the aero pretty low, something like wing settings of 5 out of a maximum of maybe 30. The car comes with high and medium downforce options as a baseline, and I have the medium installed. 

A few years ago I'm sure I saw a video of Gregor Huttu getting to drive a real world open wheel ( ? ) race car and he turned out to be pretty quick. 

Exactly right Roger but it was often only those who struggled to drive them that claimed they were unrealistic. The fact was radial ply-tyred pre-downforce F1 cars did require big slip angles to reach optimum grip and the pointy setups that Huttu pioneered with a loose diff allowed that to be exploited and driven at optimum slip angle for more of the corner but they had to be driven in a certain way that got the car into that slide state as quickly as possible and maintained. Trailing the throttle helped stabilise the car (when desired) and allowed a bigger window of balance and therefore grip to be opened up. No they weren't easy to drive but it makes sense that better drivers drive more difficult setups to go faster, their talent making up for the lack of inherent stability  and putting the car closer to the edge than thought possible. All is fair in love and sim racing! That said it was obvious to most that the tyre model of GPL was basic and exploitable in ways that wouldn't happen in the real world, especially at lower speeds when the slip angles should have been smaller but that wasn't the reason Huttu was fast, he has transferred his dominance into multiple series including iRacing that have much more complex and realistic tyre models.

Thanks for that!  

The references to the setups and driving style being "unrealistic" were, we thought at the time, just factual observations that real cars wouldn't have been set up like that (near-zero ride height, wild diffs etc).  But that's not in any way a criticism of the guys who were able to take advantage of it!  I had no problem with Greger/Wolfgang and the other aliens exploiting the sim to drive so fast, and it's true that those guys would be fast in any sim.  I used spend ages marvelling at their replays and telemetry, and then go out and spin my car trying to emulate them     He was a nice guy too, happy to talk on the chat program whose name I forget.

(I just checked, and GPL Rank is still up and running!)

VROC!

Well, I made a few changes and the driver came back into the pits, walked up to me and said " This thing handles like a piece of **** - FIX IT !!! " - then threw his helmet on the ground and stormed off to his motorhome

It's riding the kerbs OK but the understeer is a lot worse and it won't turn in unless I'm so aggressive with the wheel that I'm losing the front. How I managed to get it into that configuration I don't know....actually, I do - incompetence.

I have decided I'm doing this all wrong. I'm going to pick a track which doesn't have the extreme aero requirements of Monza and start over.

Plus I made a change to the pedal spacing and angles which hasn't worked out and has left my right leg aching something awful. Years ago I broke it very very badly ( partially severed might be a better term ) in a bike crash and it never recovered properly. Doesn't help that my pedals are mounted on two ammo boxes stuffed under a desk...got to get that cockpit built.

 

Siddley, are there websites that share setups and replays etc?

Siddley,

To quote Bill Clinton: I feel your pain. I am also roughly seven seconds slower in any racing game than the top-online racers. The only way I win things sometimes is that I don't crash often. That has handed me some nice results in Moto Gp online (still the best online game I ever tried, everyone was so polite!)

It also depends on the game or mod. In rFactor I am usually much to slow to beat the AI on 100 percent. Except in the 1979 mod, strangely enough, there I could hang with the AI at 95 percent and even beat my virtual teammates now and then.

My idea about myself is: I am not fast online because I am not fast offline. I was never good at karting, the couple of track days I did were horrible, although my instructors always said they liked my lines. 'Endurance-racing would be just fine for you. Sprints... not so much.'

I just don't have that sense of balance that enables me to drive same lines with other breaking and apex points.

One would say that on a computerscreen the sense of balance wouldn't count as much. But that is not true. Research has shown that even in virtual surroundings the human brain and nervous systems 'works' as if it is in a real space. So I am sad to say, for myself as for you: some brains are just not wired for racing.

Gosh, now I really depressed myself...

Many are called but few are chosen 

I was pretty quick on a bike in the real world ( until I got splatted ) so my brain is at least half wired up to ride\drive fast. There is a pretty good kart circuit about 15 minutes drive from our place, I've been to watch but haven't driven yet. I should do that - being beaten by a 6 year old kid might help me prepare mentally for sim racing

I'm not going to give up just yet.

 

Many are called but few are chosen 

 

I was pretty quick on a bike in the real world ( until I got splatted ) so my brain is at least half wired up to ride\drive fast. There is a pretty good kart circuit about 15 minutes drive from our place, I've been to watch but haven't driven yet. I should do that - being beaten by a 6 year old kid might help me prepare mentally for sim racing

I'm not going to give up just yet.

 

Well, come to think of it: I've done a couple of fun races on dirt bikes - and I did not totally suck at that. I could feel the circle, if you catch my drift (He! Catch my drift!) In GP Legends I could handle the Eagle pretty well (for my standards!) because it was a long car and had a long inertia, (do I say that right?) which meant that when it started to slide, I could correct it. Same applies for the rFactor 1979 mod. While other mods, with short inertia, I am just too slow to catch it.

The problem with karting, Siddley, is that it's not going to give you a decent estimation of your driving, because 6 year olds weigh so little. The power to weight ratio of karts is idiotically small, so someone who is just 10 pounds lighter but who is just as quick (or slow) will kill you. Furthermore, they are very short which means the balances and inbalances are very finely tuned.

Huub Rothengatter once told me he often went karting with Jos Verstappen, who weighed roughly the same. Huub said he just could not understand how Jos was so fast.

What would be an idea if you had an instructor who weighed just the same as you and show you around. I mean: that is what Fangio did with Moss? And Clark did with Jacky Oliver. Or perhaps... we could start a sticky thread here! Called: Post your laps here and get help from the Go Fast Masters!'

PM-ing someone I don't know for free advice seems a bit cheeky. Although that's probably me being weird

 

Here is the lap ( I don't know how to embed the video ) http://youtu.be/LsQfFDMJ7g8

I've managed to knock another second off the time, but I can't see where I can lose any more.

You are a funny case . Usually people overdrive cars with bad lines, but you underdrive the car with good lines (apart from Parabolica). 

The basics are there imo, you just need to push the car a bit more. I don't know if it's because of the replay, or rFactor, but your steering movements seem very slow. I have the feeling you can take more speed into the lesmo's, and also into the chicanes without compromising your exit. 

But Monza is a rather specific circuit. Do you have another clip from another track? Imola or something?

For reference, this is a small video of mine on Imola with Assetto Corsa in the Ferrar 312T, currently #4 on the world ranking, albeit 5 tenths of the WR:

Thanks a lot, this is all excellent input.

I reckon it's time to leave Monza for a while, I agree that it is a very specific case. I just got a little fixated on the track after seeing a Youtube video of the CTDP F1 2006 mod in split screen with real onboard footage from Schumachers Ferrari on one side and an rFactor replay on the other. The way they matched up was uncanny.

I think the slowness of my steering inputs in the video is down to a number of reasons :-

1 They are slow    I'm deliberately trying to be smooth and overdoing it.

2 The car doesn't have a good balance due to my lack of skill in setting it up and it's easy to spin if I try to turn quickly at lower speeds

3 I suspect the rFactor replay isn't reproducing the wheel position 100% accurately

Parabolica is the most difficult corner for me. It's not that I don't have a plan to deal with it, I have too many plans and can never make my mind up which is the best one to use.

I'll try Imola next, I can learn from your video that way...

Well, come to think of it: I've done a couple of fun races on dirt bikes - and I did not totally suck at that. I could feel the circle, if you catch my drift (He! Catch my drift!)

I think you can allow yourself a rather large pat on the back for that. I was OK on a dirtbike, but only in the sense that I could get from point A to point B without falling off too much.
I didn't even attempt to go fast - a man has got to know his limitations, as Dirty Harry said...
I still ride a DR350, but just to explore the miles and miles of tracks in the countryside and the mountains around here, I don't take it to the offroad courses.

The kart track just seems a good idea because it's close and very cheap. I don't know if I'll enjoy it or not to be honest.

If anyone else reading the thread wants to post their videos and ask for help then that's fine by me

I just watched your lap at Monza. One question: how much weight do you have on the front and the rear rollbar?

I've discovered recently that my input in the car was so slow compared to other drivers (online), because I had always used a soft front anti-rollbar. Thinking: the softer, the more grip. But there is a catch. If the front ARB is soft, direction changes will be slow and the grip will only come when you are already in the corner. Turning in is another matter. So, in my very limited (!) experience, you have to set the front ARB so that the car reacts quickly to your steering, while not that hard that you understeer in corners that are long and have a constant radius.

Lesson 1; don't touch the setup until you have a reasonably fast pace on a (good) default setup. 

Siddley mentioned in his first post that he usually is 7 seconds of the pace. Get that within 3-4 seconds, and then start thinking about tinkering with the setup. 

Lesson 1; don't touch the setup until you have a reasonably fast pace on a (good) default setup. 

 

Siddley mentioned in his first post that he usually is 7 seconds of the pace. Get that within 3-4 seconds, and then start thinking about tinkering with the setup. 

That is some good advice... but I would rephrase: don't tinker with the setup untill you have exhausted your progress on the default setup. So, start fiddling only when you think: I've practiced my ears off. I just could not go faster with this set-up.

I would not connect a specific time-difference ('get within 3-4 seconds') to that moment, because sometimes the default setup is so unfit for the track you are driving, that you are making life impossible for yourself. I've had that with the 1979 mod at Monaco. I was so desperately slow I asked one of the developers of the mod for a good Monaco setup. I was not only faster immediately, but the driving itself became fun again.

Edited by Nemo1965, 16 April 2014 - 16:09.

I'll pick gearing, maybe adjust the brake bias, but that's usually about it until I have driven a lot of laps. But yes, some mods come with setups I can't get along with either and I'll mess around with them until I can get something I like or throw my helmet on the floor in a tantrum and go to sulk in the motorhome

I have joined an endurance racing league who have an event on Saturday - 90 minutes at the Zolder 79 track using the Enduracers mod. I'm familiar with the P1's and P2's and find them OK to drive ( oh boy, do they hate kerbs though ) but haven't tried out the GT cars yet.
I've got the option of entering P2, GT1 or GT2 - I'm not sure what to do yet. Apart from try to get quick at Zolder of course...

I agree totally with Requiem.

I remember when F1-91 first came out I was messing about online for ages in the same servers, and you get to know the really quick guys pretty well.

I could usually get within 1-2 seconds of them, which in a server with 20 people say, would mean you would be top 6.

They would invariably use default settings with personal foibles like massive steering lock, or hardly any, or hardly any castor or loads.  but most of it was the same. Setups are only worth sharing if there are a few things wildly different, sugesting a bug or tweak you havent found, this is usually the case in smaller mods or oval mods. Well developed mods like Endu, F!SR, Makcorp, are usually pretty solid default.

What you tend to find with hotlappers though is they can lap fast, but not keep it on the road, somewhere like 1990 Imola for instance, i was always able to do well as my pace was consistently easy to do and not fall off over kerbs. I could go faster but couldn't do it consistently. They will also do thing like run radiators closed, alwyas run qually tyres, low wings etc to make unrealistic gains.

Obviously there are freaks of nature like Huttu who can lap insanely fast and never make mistakes, but they are fairly rare, most people are either hotlappers or aliens. Aliens are the ones that are only a few tenths down, but can do that all day!!

I would recommend Iracing as above all it teaches you to be clean, error free and stay within limits, Only downside is as you say the pay factor.  And being American the basic packages are fairly oval specific which is a shame.

As for mods to try, Historix is awesome for someone like you I would think the cars have a nice safety angle at most levels, are easy to slide about, and it doesn't cost you much time.

Only issue with Rfactor now is there is little or no online racing other than crashfest F1 and Megane mods, so are likely playing on yer own.

I'll pick gearing, maybe adjust the brake bias, but that's usually about it until I have driven a lot of laps. But yes, some mods come with setups I can't get along with either and I'll mess around with them until I can get something I like or throw my helmet on the floor in a tantrum and go to sulk in the motorhome

 

I have joined an endurance racing league who have an event on Saturday - 90 minutes at the Zolder 79 track using the Enduracers mod. I'm familiar with the P1's and P2's and find them OK to drive ( oh boy, do they hate kerbs though ) but haven't tried out the GT cars yet.
I've got the option of entering P2, GT1 or GT2 - I'm not sure what to do yet. Apart from try to get quick at Zolder of course...

I'm gonna have to say what we used to say to anyone joining the Proto/GT series on iRacing - if you're new to this type of racing (multiclass), start by the GTs, preferentially the slowest car, and be aware that all you need to do is stick to your line and let the prototypes work their way around way, don't move out of your racing line to accomodate them. Multiclass traffic interaction needs a bit of experience, and it's very easy to unintentionally ruin someone's race trying to lap them with a quicker car. It's therefore easier to start learning the multiclass etiquette from the slowest car in which you don't have to do as much work.

I was gonna say this earlier too, but really cannot recommend iRacing enough. There's no hiding it that it's expensive (specially at first) and that it has some glaring issues such as lack of tyre wear, which a premium sim like that shouldn't have. However the online experience is just something else and after trying it there's no way I could go back to rFactor racing the AI or anything like that. These days I'm racing the Ruf Cup (Porsche Supercup with modern GT 911s but they don't have the Porsche licensing) and the experience of knowing there's 500 other guys competing in that same track same car same week, posting setups and replays on the forums, and guaranteeing you can virtually get a competitive clean-ish race 24/7 every day whenever you like, is excellent. Doesn't matter how many seconds off the pace you are, there's always someone else slower than you that you can beat on track and race close against, and you *will* get quicker simply by being on that competitive environment where you can analyse your laps and compare what you're doing to so many people.

One thing that can put you off and that I understand why you're at rFactor is the availability of historical cars if that's your thing - there's just so many historical mods for rFactor, it's great, but iRacing definitely lacks historical cars. You could aim at one day racing their Lotus 79 or Lotus 49 though (be warned, the 49 has a reputation for being silly difficult).

Another thing, you say you don't jump from car to car but you've talked historical cars, posted a lap of a modern Formula 3 car, and are now talking about joining an endurance race in either a prototype or a GT. See my point?  That's 4 completely different types of cars that all need to be driven differently nevermind the particular behaviours and tricks of the particular models. I totally understand the urge to try everything, I used to be just like that in rFactor and I do the same when I load up Assetto Corsa these days, absolutely cannot focus on just one car when there's so many great ones to choose from. iRacing teaches you to stick with one because you have to pay for the others ( ), and you get so much better by driving that same car every week in a full championship season, the improvement over time is very noticeable.

iRacing also made me find my niche - it took me a bit of wasted money in open-wheelers and prototypes to realize the thing I really enjoy driving the most is GT cars, and started to specialize myself on that. Despite the fact I don't watch GT racing in real life but watch everything open-wheeler, go figure, just can't bloody drive finnicky light things with downforce.

Edited by noikeee, 16 April 2014 - 22:40.

Nuts. I typed out a long reply and then the browser crashed

Appreciate the input anyway, thanks. I'll reply all over again tomorrow if I can get out of going to a barbecue with a bunch of boring hippies my wife knows that will waste my entire day   

Well, I did get forced to go to the barbecue, I did get a whole day wasted and best of all I now have the weirdest " racing driver excuse " ever to prevent me from entering tomorrows race.

I was sitting on a wooden bench, slid forwards to get comfortable and an inch and a half long splinter of hardwood embedded itself in my left buttock. It went in so deep that when I tried to pull it out the splinter broke off in the wound. So it was time to seek proper medical attention - i.e. my wife, who used to breed horses and did some of her own veterinary work. She had to cut the thing out with a razor blade. So I won't be sitting down for 90 minutes at a stretch for a little while.

DNQ - Buttocks

Another thing, you say you don't jump from car to car but you've talked historical cars, posted a lap of a modern Formula 3 car, and are now talking about joining an endurance race in either a prototype or a GT. See my point? 

I do. But I haven't really explained myself properly.

I am kind of focused on historic cars, especially the HistorX mod. Of the cars in that mod the only one I have really tried to seriously master is the Porsche 906.

Endurance racing is something that captures my interest whether ancient or modern and I have been a big fan of the Enduracer mod. Basically I saw the movie 'Le Mans' one too many times

The JF3 car I thought would be a good subject for critique of my lap time because they are gutless in terms of horsepower and would show up what I was doing wrong a lot more easily.
 

Well atleast the basics are there I think, But from what I seee, you coast too much, you try to drive smoother then Button I think.

I think it is moslty down to little details and pushing to the edge more. 

The first corner you steered in too late, I can see why you would do good in endurance, you almost nurse the car around the track, most mechanics would have it easy with you as a driver.

Lesmo's you seem to be steering in too early (not much but it means coasting to the exit too much/long)

Ascari is a corner where you should be acceleration straight affter the breaking before the turn in.

My advice, from self study, except during certain combinations of corners you should either be braking or hitting the throttle. if you see yourself coasting, then you arre most likely doing something wrong.
You probably take in a bit too much speed in the corner, meaning you need to keep it steady for too long before really hitting the throttle to power out. 

Personally I don't know your setup so don't know where you lose the most on. But i think your steering could be sharper, sometimes moving the brakee balance a bit more to the rear helps enough already. 

Personally I always raced against a friend where we could boost our times together, if I would think I would have gone as fast as I could go, he would try and break my time by a little, then I would go and break it again.
We pushed ourselfs too the top limit no mather what race game, either if it was sim or arcade we would drive to the limit (he moslty won with arcade style racing, while I dominated sim racing). 
My advice is to stay at Monza to master first, as it is easier to learn if you can focus on just a few (hard) corners and then use the learning on new tracks..

Well atleast the basics are there I think, But from what I seee, you coast too much, you try to drive smoother then Button I think.

I think it is moslty down to little details and pushing to the edge more. 

 

The first corner you steered in too late, I can see why you would do good in endurance, you almost nurse the car around the track, most mechanics would have it easy with you as a driver.

Lesmo's you seem to be steering in too early (not much but it means coasting to the exit too much/long)

Ascari is a corner where you should be acceleration straight affter the breaking before the turn in.

My advice, from self study, except during certain combinations of corners you should either be braking or hitting the throttle. if you see yourself coasting, then you arre most likely doing something wrong.
You probably take in a bit too much speed in the corner, meaning you need to keep it steady for too long before really hitting the throttle to power out. 

Personally I don't know your setup so don't know where you lose the most on. But i think your steering could be sharper, sometimes moving the brakee balance a bit more to the rear helps enough already. 

 

Personally I always raced against a friend where we could boost our times together, if I would think I would have gone as fast as I could go, he would try and break my time by a little, then I would go and break it again.
We pushed ourselfs too the top limit no mather what race game, either if it was sim or arcade we would drive to the limit (he moslty won with arcade style racing, while I dominated sim racing). 
My advice is to stay at Monza to master first, as it is easier to learn if you can focus on just a few (hard) corners and then use the learning on new tracks..

That last part is good advice. One of the great things on Moto Gp 3 on the Xbox (apart from the polite racers online) was the ability to download ghost-times. What I did: I did not download drivers that wery MUCH faster than I was, but drivers who were either 1 second SLOWER than me or just 1 second FASTER than me.

Then I would upload the 'ghost' and try to follow them around. What I always found - and what I keep finding - is that the sections of the track on which I think I am doing badly, I am doing rather well. While at the sections I think that are easy, I usually lose a lot of time!

Anywas, Siddley and others: tracking 'ghost-laps' (have I explained that properly?) of drivers that are just THAT LITTLE BIT faster or slower than you is a better way to improve than blindly trying to emulate the superfastest.

Edited by Nemo1965, 18 April 2014 - 17:18.

Rfactor doesn't have a ghost lap option, which is a real shame.

I'm not going to try and 'drive' for a few days due to the incident with the huge splinter having to be cut out from my backside by an amateur horse doctor

Zanquis, thanks for your input as well. I showed your post to my wife and she laughed about me being kind to the car because I was a mechanic in real life and she knows my brain is wired up to be nice to machinery.

I did do some practice with the Zolder 79 track and an Enduracers LMP-2  and I got down to about 1:21, I expect the race which I'm not going to enter will see the leaders lapping at about 1:14



 

Good luck with your race-related injury.

Don't feel too ashamed. I know someone (luckily not related, so he is not in my gene pool) who got a real-life concussion because of simming, he fell out of his Play-Seat.

Now he wears a helmet when he is simracing!

Rfactor doesn't have a ghost lap option, which is a real shame.

There's a program that can merge rFactor replay files, which might be useful:

https://www.rfactorc...m?ID=rfVCRmerge

There's a program that can merge rFactor replay files, which might be useful:

https://www.rfactorc...m?ID=rfVCRmerge

Thanks a lot - I reckon that will actually be more useful than a ghost lap feature.

I did enter that endurance event after all, my amateur surgeon obviously did a good job and I felt comfortable enough.

Turned out that the leaders were lapping about 4 seconds faster than my offline personal best, but disaster struck of course. I crashed into another P2 which spun in front of me and the pitstop to repair the front wing put me back among the GT cars. While I was trying to get into a position to pass the leading GT1 the guy who had spun earlier tried to overtake both of us and punted me. And that was the end of my race...

 

Usually, the first and, probably worst, mistake is trying to drive fast. Too soon. It often leads to braking too late, then braking too hard, too much, and it leaves you with a low apex speed. Keeping the car going is the key, you need to lose just enough speed going into the corner. It is also very easy to concentrate very hard on the initial phase of the braking, but the way you come off the brakes are equally important because that will decide how you car turns in.  Smooth off usually pays and allows you to carry more speed in, and eventually out. On the exit, it is easy to be impatient but try to remember that the important thing is not that you get on the throttkle early, the important thing is to get on full throttle early. If you start feeding it in too early, you might have to pay by waiting with flooring it. This situation is typical when you do not get the right entry speed, you feel you can go faster and start increasing the speed but all you get is push.

Drive slower, brake earlier, get a feel for what speed you can carry through the corner. Make sure you stay on track without incidents. Pick up the speed from where you can easily drive 5 laps without any drama.

Oh, and study the track maps - often corners might look as a sharp right from inside your car but when you study the map you find it is almost a hairpin. Watch replays from outside view, "blimp" if available, it might reveal strange lines that are the result of misreading the radius of the corner.

Last - I saw some post about "unrealistic" trail-throttling when braking. That is not unrealistic at all. It smoothing the transition which means maintaining grip. The reason why it is "unrealistic" is because GPL (and iRacing (to my knowledge)) did/does not simulate brake wear and brake temperatures. In a real car you need to be careful. At all kart renting places they always say "never use both pedals at the same time". I do, of course.

...another thing - do not start looking at the times until you feel you have the "flow", until you know what gear works in each corner and so on. Turn off the sector times reporting, they never help you to go fast until you reach the point where you lap consistently at +- 0.3 seconds

Last - I saw some post about "unrealistic" trail-throttling when braking. That is not unrealistic at all. It smoothing the transition which means maintaining grip. The reason why it is "unrealistic" is because GPL (and iRacing (to my knowledge)) did/does not simulate brake wear and brake temperatures. In a real car you need to be careful. At all kart renting places they always say "never use both pedals at the same time". I do, of course.

Is (or was) this technique used in real formula cars, or GT or touring cars?  

I honestly don't know, I've just always heard it referred to as "unrealistic" for these types of cars.

To a certain extent, yes. It is a trade off between absolute braking distance, balance and turn in. The further back you put the brake balance the more you have to care for the rears not locking but the reward is better control of corner entry.

Cheers. Do you have any links to any drivers (or whoever) talking about using this technique?  Is it common?  Was it used more by certain drivers and their setup preferences, or with certain cars, or...?

Edited by RogerGraham, 21 April 2014 - 17:04.

...another thing - do not start looking at the times until you feel you have the "flow", until you know what gear works in each corner and so on. Turn off the sector times reporting, they never help you to go fast until you reach the point where you lap consistently at +- 0.3 seconds

Thanks for that and your other advice. I have found that watching the sector times always wrecks my concentration. I use a telemetry plugin and get my sector times from that, off track.

I use the completely opposite approach - got used to not only having sector times all the time but also a delta display constantly on all the time. At the beginning it distracted me and made me overdrive, but after a while I stopped feeling the pressure to perform and started using it intelligently to immediately recognise when I'm losing time and when I don't.

It's got to a point I'm a bit overly dependent on the delta timing now! Wouldn't know how to pick up the pace without it!