A questionable move in our league race tonights. Opinions wanted.

  • Thread starter Guffaluff
  • 118 comments
  • 4,303 views

Which car is at fault here?

  • Megane is at fault

    Votes: 59 56.2%
  • Audi is at fault

    Votes: 16 15.2%
  • Both equal, racing incident

    Votes: 30 28.6%

  • Total voters
    105
1,253
Iceland
Iceland
Guffaluff
Hello everyone!

EDIT: Link to the incident clip was missing.



We had a race tonight in GTS Iceland, a local GTS league in Iceland. Well, the only GTS league in Iceland :D

This incident has become a topic of discussion. The player in 2nd place in the Megane made a complaint post-race about this move by the leader in the Audi. He feels like he was unfairly forced to the left by the leader while they were side by side coming into the corner.

As the host and moderator of the league, I'm researching this incident to decide if any post-race penalty should be applied or not. This is the 2nd season of our league and so far has been super clean! This is actually the first ever official post-race complaint, so I want to make sure I'm fair in this matter.

Please vote, all input is greatly appreciated :)
 
Well yes. Isn't all defensive driving that?

He purposely made it as difficult for the Megane as possible, but everything was legal there. No sudden moves. No late moves. Still space given.
Seemed pretty late, to try doing that as it got closer to the turn, instead of from the get go. Agree to disagree.
 
Seemed pretty late, to try doing that as it got closer to the turn, instead of from the get go. Agree to disagree.

The Audi is driving diagonally across the straight before the Megane goes to the inside. The Audi doesn't change steering at all after originally starting going across the track, which was way before the Megane went to the inside.

If anything, it is early, not late
 
The Audi is driving diagonally across the straight before the Megane goes to the inside. The Audi doesn't change steering at all after originally starting going across the track, which was way before the Megane went to the inside.

If anything, it is early, not late
And it wasn’t until it was obvious to the Audi that the Megane had a faster exit speed and was coming up for a pass, that he decided to shift harder to the left than what his original line looked like. It was intentional to stop a pass on the straight, or to interrupt the player enough that he wouldn’t be able to pass before the turn.

You can see quiet coearly that the Audi was watching his moves to see which direction he was going to go.
 
That is exactly the point of defensive driving. Defending is the act of intentionally attempting to stop a pass. Doing so is not illegal lmao
So what is illegal or not for their league rules? If it wasn’t illegal than no one would be at fault for the incident, it would just be racing so the third option would fit your description. Not the first.

Even it wasn’t that’s just a dick move to do to someone especially in a league set up for like minded individuals that are trying to escape the usual online shenanigans. On a straightaway of all things.
 
So what is illegal or not for their league rules? If it wasn’t illegal than no one would be at fault for the incident, it would just be racing so the third option would fit your description. Not the first.

Well the Megane is at fault for its own demise by braking too late eventually. In terms of the actual incident...well there isn't an incident, so neither.
 
The way I see it, the Audi was already fading to the left when the Megane pulled out to pass. The Audi wasn't moving in reaction. And then the Megane broke too late. Audi didn't run the Megane into the wall. Gave him space to complete the pass, but made it difficult.
I don't see a reason for any penalty.
 
Well the Megane is at fault for its own demise by braking too late eventually. In terms of the actual incident...well there isn't an incident, so neither.
Surely is but he’s complaining about the action that caused it, not the result. The reaction likely would have been the same even if he didn’t crash, and still lost, because either way that’s not something you’d expect from participants of a unified league with like minded individuals. Race clean and if you’re too slow, either move or let them pass.
 
Considering how slow and deliberate the move to the inside was for the Audi, I feel weird calling it aggressive. But it was, considering how little space the Megane ended up with. Nonetheless, that was a mountain-sized telegraph of intention from the Audi, and the Megane (seemingly) ignored it, (seemingly) got nervous, and outbraked themselves.

I'd say no penalty. Standard rules tend to allow one change of line on a straight, and the Audi didn't even have that. :P
 
Audi didnt readjust once Megane was alongside, so the contact between the two is on the Audi. Does not look deliberate.

But this just reads like the Megane driver trying to blame someone else for their inability to brake properly.

We've all acted like a pork chop at some point reacting to racing incidents before watching replays, I suspect this is one of those times.
 
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The Megane driver was silly trying to force his way on the inside and then stuffed that up too by not braking.
 
From a stewards perspective:

From “fair racing perspective” of course the Audi is 100% to blame. You stick to your line and never push somebody off the track which is in fact what happened.

The fact the Megane was braking to late is irrelevant since you cannot be punished for braking to late unless you hit somebody whilst braking to late. So that is complete nonsense in this discussion.

From a drivers perspective:

Not everybody understands the fair play in racing. People look at it as illegal or not. Which should be totally irrelevant in a fair play environment. Most hosts would want to have fair and clean racing. Based on this it should never be relevant what individual drivers think. This is one of the reasons why sportmode is not fair. People follow the penalty rules instead of the FairPlay rules.

As a host you are responsible for a nice and fair racing room environment so you should always advocate clean and fair driving and not striving for legal or illegal actions. A host is responsible for good behaviour even if the drivers do not agree. This is better for the clean long term atmosfere.

So even when something is not considered illegal it still would be totally unfair and unsportive what the Audi did. As a host you should set out the rules that unfair driving is illegal. If you fix this then you would never have issues again.

Conclusion from me as host/steward:

If you want to be a good host and steward you will warn the Audi for acting unfair and not sportive by trying to block the Megane. Do not look at the outcome of the pole ! This is not meant to be arrogant but these questions should better be asked in the online thread and not here. Also the GTP online racing rules advocate fair driving.

If you have FairPlay rules already you can punish him if you want. But that is up to you. I personally first give warnings but its depending on your pre race info on this subject.

Hope this helps you from a fellow host.
 
IMO, the Audi driver practiced some pretty poor race craft here. They seemed to purposely never pick a line to both disrupt the Megane drivers ability to draft AND to prevent them from passing at the end of the straight. You simply need to pick a line. Either start at the outside and make your move to the inside or do it the other way around, but don’t drive gradually across the track. That isn’t predictable driving at all. If I’m coming up alongside someone, I’m going to expect them to hold a line and NOT drive diagonally. Once the Megane came up alongside the Audi, the Audi no longer as the right to that inside line and thus has no right to close the gap like they did.

Penalties are handed out based on league rules so it’s up to you guys but to me, the Audi driver was aggressive and careless and tried to be nonchalant and subtle about an attempt at blocking a pass which they knew they shouldn’t do.
 
I vote racing incident out of the options given, but I don't think the Audi is in the wrong there. I suspect the Renault guy is just salty because he out braked himself.

The Audi just gave him the squeeze. Sure it's aggressive defending, but the desperation from the Renault in getting that inside line is no better imho. People who do this almost always out brake themselves.
 
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Yeah this is an interesting one. While the Audi didn't make any sudden movements his slow drift across the width of the track (not picking a single line) wasn't conductive to good sportsmanship. That said I don't think it contributed to the Megane crashing, who simply braked far too late.

The Audi wasn't 'very' dirty as there was always space for the Megane, but it wasn't good sportsmanship IMO. I guess I largely agree with what Macboyilija and soundtiger95 said.

Warn the Audi driver to be more courteous. The Megane driver can't be too salty about it though. The crash was down to their own late braking.

Good luck and a good idea to get a range of opinions here before making your decision.
 
Megane drivers ambition clearly exceeded his ability in this case.
If you're not good enough to deal with a defensive driver then you shouldn't try to pass because it will only end in a mess, for you, the other guy, or possibly other innocent bystanders.

Edit: actually I've changed my vote to "racing incident ", but only because Megane didn't wreck anyone else.
If they had wrecked anyone then I would have blamed them for basically an "unintentional or reckless" divebomb.
 
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Megane most at fault (not that the Audi doesn't share some of it) and suffers the most from this so no need for any penalties, the sort of incident you'll get from time to time. Maybe a word with both drivers to be more aware and respectful of others may be a good idea but that's as far as I'd go.

That corner is totally the wrong place for a late braking move too, chance of no contact is minimal and you are on the outside for the next corner so not even likely to keep the position if the other driver fights it, even if it was the last lap it would be dumb and it wasn't even close to the end of the race, not sure why anyone would try this in this instance at all. Going to the outside as soon as the Audi started to drift across would have worked out better for the Megane and they may have even had a shot at getting past too. Not that this part is relevant to the punishment (if there is any) of course.
 
@Guffaluff - As someone who has hosted many race events during the past 10 years, here are my observations.

Generally speaking, you only have one move to pick your line into the next corner, then you stick to it. The Audi driver didn't do this, & he continued turning in slowly all the way down the straight. Did he do this intentionally in an attempt to squeeze the other driver to the inside (or off the track), or did he not realise he was going to be overtaken by a faster car? I find it very rude to do this to another, & in past race series I've run squeezing has been against the rules (see rule 2:B). What are the rules in your series?

However, did the Megane driver have sufficient overlap before the contact occurred? What's considered sufficient overlap differs between race series; some say it's half a car length, & others say that you have to be alongside to expect to be given room. He did have half a car length on him; so, what is considered sufficient overlap in your series?

Also, the Megane driver was ahead of the Audi driver before the natural turn in point, so, the corner rights were his. He broke too late because he was being unexpectedly squeezed to the inside/or off track which probably put him off his normal braking point. It was a forced error, but, was it a legal one according to your race series rules?

Other peoples opinions aside (mine included), how you handle it all depends on what rules & regs you have, or want to implement, for your own race series...


EDIT: See also The Good Racecraft Guide.

"...when coming onto the straight, he may continue turning past the track out point & take a different line down it. From then on, however, manners dictate that he only has 1 move either left or right to choose his line into the next turn, this should be done early & slowly enough to give other drivers following behind a fair chance to react, lest there be an otherwise avoidable incident."



👍
 
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I don't know which race incident we are referring to, the Audi is at fault for the tap and the Megane is at fault for hitting the wall. The Audi still left room on the track for the Megane who was so intent on late braking on a crap line that they threw themselves off of the track.

If the Megane would have braked when appropriate and stayed on the track, what would the penalty have been for the Audi? Maybe a warning for making light contact and almost running the Megane off of the track? Whatever that penalty is in your series, that's the only penalty that I see is relevant here.

From this camera angle the Megane appears to have exited the track due to their own actions. Even if the Audi would have left 2 car widths on the inside, the Megane still would have ran wide and off of the course. I'd have to watch their footage to verify that sentiment but that's what it seems like from what's provided.
 
Staggered anyone is defending the Audi. it's not defending, it's blocking, there's a difference. He had 4 options in this instance as he clearly saw the Megane coming;

1) Take the racing line (outside), wait for Megane to brake too heavily, TT brakes early and cuts back to re-take the spot

2) Take the racing line (outside), brake very late, take entire corner on the outside (leaving space on the apex) and taking the inside line through the upcoming right hander.

3) Take the inside line and defend, braking in time to make the apex

4) Pick the middle of the road, dedicated to the line but force the Megane to choose the inside or outside

Instead he refuses to choose a line, slowly serving across damn near the entire track and pushes the Megane to the point where there's basically contact.

That isn't racing guys, it's just not, that's blocking and will just lead to contact even if they manage to sort out that corner.
 
I say racing incident.

Of course the Audi is going to defend. He's trying to intimidate the Renault into backing out, The Renault was WAAAAY to tight to make that corner and too deep into the corner.

Personally, this is a situation that would call for either a faint to the inside by the Renault, to get the Audi to move and then allow the Renault to take the better line, or the Renault should have just leaned on the Audi rather than allow the Audi to keep squeezing.

We all know the quote from the great one.

 
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