Granted, I’m only B/S, but have had 100+ races at SR S, mostly middle of the packs. I wish it was nonsense.
I have 200 races in sport mode, all at SR S.
Under the old DR ranking system I was a high D up to a mid level C.
Under the new DR ranking system I am a low to mid B DR
.
I do not find it uncommon at all to be gridded from 8th to 16th position on the grid. I still have many more overall good races than overall bad races. It many times depends on luck of the draw with who the other racers are in the lobby not your grid position.
Another thing I have learned is you have to understand depending on the strength of the competition that some races advancing positions will be few and far between and you have to be happy running at your best pace and let the finishing position fall where it falls.
How you react to an incident regardless of whether it is accidental or intentional can also affect the overall positive or negative experience you take away from the race as a whole.
The system is setup so that you are racing with people who are the same level as you, by gaming the system you are only putting yourself with people who race cleaner than you and you are the one that is likely to be causing the angst for the others.
Why not race at your current level and focus on becoming cleaner at full race pace, rather than slowing down and inflating your rank without being able to do it consistently when at full speed.
I am going to go out on a limb here and interpret that the message to mean to be able to race at the pace of the race lobby and maintain control at the pace while not having clear optimal racing lines available and being mixed in with other cars allowing a racer to better be able to avoid unintended contact.
I think one of the biggest mistakes the game makes is by putting to much emphasis on a single hot lapping style of qualifying for both lobby matching and grid placement.
One observation I have made repeatably is the number of racers that are placed in a race and it is so obvious that they cannot maintain over more than the occasional perfect lap the pace required to even remain on course during the race much less race in a controlled manner within a pack of cars.
I usually try to turn in a qualifying time that's pace closely resembles the best laps to where I can turn consistently lap after lap. That way when I am placed in a race I feel confident that I can run the overall pace that will be within that races level.
At SR S people drive you of the road by slowly steering in to you until there is no more room for me to drive on the road
or using you as a wall slowly driving you of the track, they are smart indeed
Some racers just race where that seems to be their style of racing and all ranks will learn what the game will allow them to possibly get away with. Contact needs unfortunately to penalize both the aggressor and victim to eliminate the behavior described.
Same with drivers cutting corners early in a race to game a time advantage over their opponents, they know on some circuits they can scrub off the penalty over race distance without even slowing down.
Why I think all penalties should be assessed post race period.