Defensive Driving - "Parking on the apex"

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Canada
Canada
Zero_to_oblivion
Hello racers!

I'd like some opinions on a racing incident. Last night I decided to throw down one last swing at the Daily B - GR3 at Sardegna. I'll be doing my best to be objective here, as I sincerely want opinions, regardless of whether I think I was right or not.

Lap 4, going through turns 7 and 8 there is a "owned" Supra on the outside and a "rented" Supra on the inside, racing side-by-side. Approaching turn 9 (hard left, feels like a hairpin) the rental matches the owned Supra for braking start, but the rental brakes longer and stops on the apex, taking a defensive line. Owned Supra takes the conventional line with a late turn in, aiming to undercut the rental Supra. Contact happens as the owned Supra turns in and accelerates, expecting the rental Supra to not be on the apex, resulting in driving straight into rental Supras rear. Owned Supra spins out.

Post race lobby has plenty of heated comments as Owned Supra feels "parking on the apex" is illegal, as the Rental Supra was going significantly slower to achieve this, Rental Supra feels this was a legit tactic as they knew the cut back was coming and stuck on the apex to prevent it.

Technical things to consider are that the rental/inside Supra has to take the corner slower, as the inside line means the corner is tighter. Owned Supra took the later turn in for a later apex, to avoid trying to go side-by-side through the corner, as that would have resulted in a slower exit.

So the question is - is defending aka "parking" on the apex legal?
 
Hello racers!

I'd like some opinions on a racing incident. Last night I decided to throw down one last swing at the Daily B - GR3 at Sardegna. I'll be doing my best to be objective here, as I sincerely want opinions, regardless of whether I think I was right or not.

Lap 4, going through turns 7 and 8 there is a "owned" Supra on the outside and a "rented" Supra on the inside, racing side-by-side. Approaching turn 9 (hard left, feels like a hairpin) the rental matches the owned Supra for braking start, but the rental brakes longer and stops on the apex, taking a defensive line. Owned Supra takes the conventional line with a late turn in, aiming to undercut the rental Supra. Contact happens as the owned Supra turns in and accelerates, expecting the rental Supra to not be on the apex, resulting in driving straight into rental Supras rear. Owned Supra spins out.

Post race lobby has plenty of heated comments as Owned Supra feels "parking on the apex" is illegal, as the Rental Supra was going significantly slower to achieve this, Rental Supra feels this was a legit tactic as they knew the cut back was coming and stuck on the apex to prevent it.

Technical things to consider are that the rental/inside Supra has to take the corner slower, as the inside line means the corner is tighter. Owned Supra took the later turn in for a later apex, to avoid trying to go side-by-side through the corner, as that would have resulted in a slower exit.

So the question is - is defending aka "parking" on the apex legal?
Firstly, everything's "legal" in GT unless you get a penalty for it.

In real racing terms, it's legal unless you are driving unnaturally slowly; that's a qualitative judgment rather than a quantitative one though.
 
Perfectly legal. The car on the inside, should the driver decide to do so, will have to go very slowly in order to take that turn at it's tightest radius throughout. The attacking driver is trying to avoid the "switch-a-roo" and that is a way to do so, so long as he is driving fluidly and doesn't brake check or something like that.

The driver on the outside has to make a decision, and often before seeing what the driver on the inside is doing. Does he go for the switch-a-roo or take the wide line throughout?

It's a cat and mouse game; that's how it works. If you try for the switch-a-roo and guess wrong then you lose. Sorrynotsorry. At that point, this driver is behind and is responsible for re-passing cleanly.
 
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In real racing terms, it's legal unless you are driving unnaturally slowly; that's a qualitative judgment rather than a quantitative one though.

That was part of the post race "debate", as Rental Supra was driving slower than Owned Supra thought was appropriate.

Looking at it objectively, the Owned Supra obviously wants to pass and is carrying more speed, the Rental Supra has to take a slower, tighter turn. That tighter turn limits the Rentals ability to accelerate quickly out of the turn, which Owned didn't appear to expect.
 
I would say it's probably the car behinds fault, the car in front has a right to take the inside line, which they would need to slow down more for. The car following behind should be aware of this and have observed the line being taken going into the corner and driven appropriately. Of course, slowing down more than you need to is considered dangerous in real life, but slowing down to the right speed to hold the inside line of a corner isn't slowing down too much.
 
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Only excessive weaving on the straights, changing direction on braking into corners more than once are offenses in real life.

And if your opponent's bumper is aligned with your rear tire in a corner, you have to give space for the sake of your race as they should technically be letting off but almost never happens..
 
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Only excessive weaving on the straights, changing direction on braking into corners more than once are offenses in real life.

And if your opponent's bumper is aligned with your rear tire in a corner, you have to give space for the sake of your race as they should technically be letting off but almost never happens..
And even then it depends entirely on the series in question as to whether or not weaving, changing direction under brakes are actually offenses.

Basically my understanding of the OP is that the "Rental" car navigated the corner at a speed appropriate for their approach and the "Owned" car misunderstood or didn't correctly anticipate what the leading car was going to do.

Without a video there's nothing really conclusive that we can say but from the written description it's an error on the trailing car for not reacting to the leading car appropriately.
 
Perfectly legal if utterly infuriating. Ignoring the result I had a similar issue in the TGR cup race Sunday. Guy got ahead by someone not braking for turn 1 as usual. I'm now on his rear bumper and a second a lap faster over the lap. But everywhere I catch him is corners where he has a chance to block the inside. And he takes a hard defensive line over most of the lap, for 5 laps. By blocking the only decent line out of a lot of corners I'm stuck for ages as him being centered with no room for me to gain speed beside means I'm so much slower and can't use my pace advantage in a lot of the track.

Sucks, painful and can drive you nuts, but it's racing. I did get by in the end and pulled over 2 seconds that first lap as there was a crash behind he was now holding up, but it's definitely legal as long as you aren't doing brake checking or refusing to accelerate at all.
 
Perfectly legal if utterly infuriating. Ignoring the result I had a similar issue in the TGR cup race Sunday. Guy got ahead by someone not braking for turn 1 as usual. I'm now on his rear bumper and a second a lap faster over the lap. But everywhere I catch him is corners where he has a chance to block the inside. And he takes a hard defensive line over most of the lap, for 5 laps. By blocking the only decent line out of a lot of corners I'm stuck for ages as him being centered with no room for me to gain speed beside means I'm so much slower and can't use my pace advantage in a lot of the track.

Sucks, painful and can drive you nuts, but it's racing. I did get by in the end and pulled over 2 seconds that first lap as there was a crash behind he was now holding up, but it's definitely legal as long as you aren't doing brake checking or refusing to accelerate at all.
I had the same thing in a race against a Viper on the Nordschleife. He was over 7 seconds slower than my pace, but had the higher top speed and my Lexus could not draft pass him on the straights. All race long he defended hard and put his car where I needed space for a better launch out the corner to be able to get alongside. The funny thing, he was 13th, I was in 14th. Defending 13th place with all he got lol. (I started 15th out of 15, 1 quit, I never got by the Viper who started in 13th)

It's legal, just not part of sportmanship in my opinion. In another race I had a faster GT-R behind me. Instead of blocking him all lap I made room to let him by, then used his slipstream to keep up with his higher top speed on the straights. This way I kept ahead of the other GT-R drivers coming from behind.

If that Viper had left some room, he could have drafted me during the lap then easily pass me on the straight and we would have caught up to cars ahead. But I guess 13th is where he wanted to be :lol:

Also a lot of times a hard defender like that creates a traffic jam in the race. The more cars get stuck behind a slower blocker, the higher the chance of incidents happening. Often it ends in a pile up as the people further back lose their patience or don't pay attention to the extra braking when the front defender closes the door again.
 
Instead of blocking him all lap I made room to let him by, then used his slipstream
Which is literally the smartest thing you can do on the Nordschleife; if a faster car is applying pressure let them through and either try to follow them and learn a bit or wait for them to meet Barry R a few corners later and pass them again :D
 
The comedy of the whole exchange for me, aside from the other racer accusing me of an illegal move, was he decided to follow-up the post-race lobby "debate" by directly messaging me with abuse and commands that I delete the game. Not being one for unsolicited abuse and seeing no need for it, he's started his week with a PSN ban from Sony, cherry on top is minimum ban for profanity and abuse is apparently 1 week, and we just started a nice week of daily races.
 
Taking non-standard lines is valid defensive driving. There's nothing that says you have to put your car exactly where your opponent wants it to be. One might even suggest that where your opponent wants your car to be is exactly the last place you should put it.

There's always some consideration about how much you want to fight against an opposing driver - you may be doing both of you a disservice by extending the battle. But if you've decided that it's in your favour to not let them past, this is a valid and clever way to do it that sees a lot of use in real racing. Make them go the long way around.
 
Rental may also have incorrectly guessed Owner was going to try and hold the outside so made sure to leave room by holding a slower, tighter line to not put him in the wall.

But he was probably just defending against the over under. 😄
 
As stated above, so long as the inside car still accelerates as soon as he can, it's perfectly legal. Taking the defensive, inside line is a legit racing move solong and you pick and stick to your line, make your apex and don't wash wide (like russell did this weekend).

From what the OP is saying, sounds like the man on the outside expected the inside guy to out brake himself so he could cut back under him, but he never did.
 
If this happens one or now and then, it's annoying but not illegal.
If someone does this in every turn, he's a jerk, but it's not illegal.
If someone does this consistently, you'd have to imagine you'd be able to drive around the outside of him. If you know the line someone is going to take through a corner and you still can't get past, that's on you.
 
If someone does this consistently, you'd have to imagine you'd be able to drive around the outside of him. If you know the line someone is going to take through a corner and you still can't get past, that's on you.
This circles back to the inside man having to make the apex, if he does, you have an outside line to use to your advantage if he is taking a tight inside line regularly.
 
There’s a time to follow, a time to let people by, and a time to crowd the plate. All depends on what you’re trying to accomplish.

Bogarting the inside line is something that I’ve done many times in real life racing dirt bikes for a variety of reasons. But I also keep in mind that the person behind me will only be patient for so long, and sooner or later they’re going move me, if I choose not to move for them....been on both sides of that coin. Admittedly motorcycle racing is more of a contact sport than auto racing allows though.

As far as driving defensively in GT, I’ve actually have found it to work well in high ranked FIA lobbies when you qualify in the front; and multiple tire compounds are used. Everyone behind you will be expecting you to be on the softer compound to take advantage of the clean air. But sometimes you can bunch up the pack behind you just enough to where guys will get inpatient and start taking each other out and/or you'll totally ruin some players strategies two fold by them wasting their soft stint trying to get around you.... all the while the middle of the pack (whom are usually on the harder compound tire) catch up to the front. Then when you feel like the tension is at the braking point, you let them through while ducking into the pits for the massive undercut and clean air.
 
I tend to brake early a bit and hug the inside corner at a slower speed and therefore i get slammed, hit and bullied for being slow whereas MY driving style is mine and i do well with it
 
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