That was an eventful week again on the Nürburgring. While it felt worse again, after comparing my stats, objectively it was better than GR.3 in November. Left N24 last week, right N24 in November. I did not play in between.
All without qualifying of course. Finally on Sunday afternoon track behavior improved enough to get back to SR.S
I can fully see why people not qualifying have a bad reputation nowadays. I've seen so many last week (even on Saturday 2/3rds of the grid did not qualify in the lower SR lobbies) that simply push people out of the way. Plenty don't even care about getting penalties, bump the car ahead off to build up plenty of a gap never to see them again at the penalty zone. It was pretty disgusting to watch. I've chased a couple down to force them back through the field by blocking their way while letting the rest pass. Fun game in itself, terrible for SR, yet when you're at SR.C after a recent DR reset, what is there to lose...
SR.B lobbies are the worst. Mostly because of the terrible mix of skill combined with bad driving. Fast non qualifiers starting behind slower still learning drivers. I guess those slower drivers don't end up with too many penalties thus don't sink further down the SR ladder. Below SR.B the back field is much faster over all, much less chances for accidents (yet plenty dirty moves going on) SR.A has the really careful driver problem. Again fast impatient drivers, now behind people afraid of their own shadow, fearing penalties so much they cause problems for the pack behind. SR.S has the bad mix problem (but with better drivers), terribly slow in the back, literally a lot of people that only got to SR.S by being behind everyone else.
So far non qualifying, the only place to 'thrive' is below SR.B, which is where I managed 8 victories, plenty fastest laps and also clean race bonuses. The clean race bonus was possible as well in SR.S yet no victory chances from the back. Lap one is simply too slow, 24 sec behind at the start of lap 2. Fastest lap is still possible, severe lack of aliens in dailies nowadays. My best lap last week was 8:59.8 but I've seen people do 8:56. On average the pace was only around 9:05 for lap 2.
Sunday late afternoon delivered the racing I was looking for. Clean, fast, respectful, side by side action without problems. Mostly blue SR at the end of the race, simply a joy. This time I quit on a high, before the late evening crowd could show up to mess up the party. What helped was more people online resulting in better matchmaking. Plus I got a couple 20th place starts, my favorite starting position!
After coming this '' close to saying eff it, burn this 🤬 down, the game made a comeback in the final hours. Not sure if I'm willing to take a look at Tokyo or Monza now, maybe on Sunday

Great racing is still possible!