Do race car drivers use assists in real life?

  • Thread starter Thread starter iPr0kka
  • 85 comments
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Do race car drivers use assists?

  • Yes they do

    Votes: 101 71.1%

  • Nope, they're simply pros

    Votes: 41 28.9%
  • Total voters
    142
With modern driver aids, the driver becomes irrelevent as a computer will always be able to make better decisions.

Motor sport relies on both technology and personality. Driver aids makes it purely a technology race.
 
A lot of people here are confusing assists with regulation.

Anything can be deemed a "driver assist" with the wrong logic, from fancier shoes, to a driver being really light, to power steering. If something like, what's commonly referred to as a "driver assist", traction control is mandated to be run on each car in the rules of a series it's not longer an optional assist but simply another part of the car/formula.

It gets confusing when people discuss the spirit of racing and such. Because most dedicated racing fans are purists in that they want the ability of the drivers to shine during a race and not who has the best car package. A lot of racing drivers would tell you that they would rather not use assists, to a point - if it's unsafe then most won't be too comfortable but still go out, this is the true spirit of racing.

Using assists makes driving easier so it really depends on the series. Series regulators will change what aids are allowed or dis-allowed season to season.
Racing drivers and teams want to go faster and they'll always use whatever they can to do so. So the answer is: whatever's faster.
 
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Some race series permit traction control & do use it while others don't.
Since some do, the vote is clearly yes.
 
A professional racing drivers will use everything he can (within regulation even sometimes outside of regulation) to win. That's it. It can be what you want, but if it makes the car goes faster, a racing driver will use it if he can.

And it doesnt make them worst, it makes them world champion.
 
McClarenDesign
Tc was brought back 2001-07. See the other post for the link.

I know F1, people.
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Yup, you do.

Shame people just love to grab a line you spoke where their eyes caught fire on and forget to read the rest of the post(s)... Happens alot here these day ;)

Tc was the time M. Schumacher ruled the F1 in his second part of his career.
Since it's gone and he's back, it's not so easy anymore. ;)
 
I think the OP needs to think a bit more about why professional race drivers are so good. Its not because they are using assists or aids. Its because they have practiced many times and have built up an experience and a skill at controlling a race car.

The same applies to GT5 or any racing game - if you want to get better at it, practice. And not only that, but keep practicing without assists. Driving with assists might be easier to keep the car on the road, but it makes it harder to be faster. The assists like TCS and ASM take away control of the car from you in situations where the car is unstable or carrying too much speed or putting down too much power.
Hence, having these assists on means you don't learn about how to control the car in these situations and you learn less about how the car drives and reacts. Not to mention that ASM especially slows the car down, especially in high speed corners.

Some real race series allow TCS and other assists. But the race drivers themselves have nearly always come from a background racing cars with no assists at all. Many professional race drivers have come up from junior open-wheel or touring car series which do not use any aids. This means they learn about car control and driving fast without assists..so that when they are given a car that does have an assist like TCS, they can use it but still drive the car fast knowing exactly how the car is behaving.

Or something like that anyway.

Point is, if you want to become a better driver in the game, its all down to practice regardless of whether you use assists or not. But if you want to vastly improve your driving ability in the game, its better to keep practicing without the assists as you will learn more about how to drive cars on the limit.
 
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Exactly, this is another thread where people tend to compare GT with real life. Gamers tend to think that if they are good at GT5 they are good at real racing. That''s just not true. Even GT Academy basicly tests for basic raw talent. Not racingskills after a lot of training and developing.

It is a game people!. In real live race car drivers will use driving aids if they are alowed. If not, they won't use is. That's it. Any comparising between them and GT5 gamers is just plain pointless.

Stop trying to create your own illussion of your racingcapabilities. Join an professional karting-club and see how you compare to the local champion. Your view on this subject will never be the same again.
 
I agree that TCS and ASM slows you down, but it's not the same for SRF and ABS. ABS bring me security and lap stability, it doesnt make me faster tho just more close time. I dont use SRF but I know that if I use it I'll be 2 seconds per lap faster at least. If it's online and allowed I'll use it.

But a part of what you said is right. A good racing driver (in real) will be fast if he have assists or not, but it's not the fact that he use assists that will make him go fast (even if there was some speculation that Schumi cheated in his benetton and had traction control even tho it was forbidden, part of why he was so fast and world champion at that time).

PletdeKoe : Karting is something else. To be honest karting is made for very short and thin people. The more weight you have the slower you'll be in karting, no matter if you drives good or not.
 
RX-7_FD3S
PletdeKoe : Karting is something else. To be honest karting is made for very short and thin people. The more weight you have the slower you'll be in karting, no matter if you drives good or not.
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Hahahahahahah

Instead of all the tall, fat people that are gamers? Hahahahah I just reminded the south park epidode of World of Warcraft. I can imagina them playing GT5 and than take on the local kartclub and then complain they are to fat, but still are great racingdrivers.

Illussions, mankinds greaters accomplishments
 
They use Aids when available, i think SUPERGT forbids aids, but DTM allows them. You gotta look up exactly what race series you want to know about.
 
They all use skid recovery force
 
Driving aids are developed in Racing. Without racing we wouldn't have traction control, abs and things like that. They are all developed in the racing world and then made more pactical and less expensive....then they trickle down to production vehicles.

I think someone mentioned this too, but aids are used if they can get away with it. The reason they usually stop them from being used is when speeds increase, or one team has developes a serious advantage. I know if Motorcycle racing, MotoGP bikes now are all electronics....traction control, wheel control, sat gps to monitor every parameter on the bike...its 80% bike and 20% rider now (im exagerating, but you get the point).
 
Yes MotoGP uses aids but many 4-wheeled series(and probably some 2-wheeled as well) do not. And some do. Manufacturers tend to like them for development of course. Drivers' opinions vary, just like fans. I think you'll find more Gentlemen(rich guys-turned racers) will tend to like them more than the pros. Some series only allow some aids if one of the drivers is pro-am.

Grand Am(who does the Daytona 24 the OP asked about) I believe does not run ABS or TC in its main series, but I'm not 100% certain. Last I knew the DPs had "auto-clutch" for upshifts only. I suspect the GTs don't. Last year the DPs that had Gentlemen drivers were given the chance to use flappy-paddle semi-auto shifting. I haven't heard if theres been any change to that.
 
Is Active Steering an equivilent of something in real life? like power steering ect i dont have a clue..
 
But really I think when it comes down to it, I think most race drivers would prefer to sacrifice their skill, for their own safety, just because you can drive a car at 200+ MPH doesn't mean you are invincible.
 
If you watched the DP cars last weekend, you see that about 50% of the time the cars are sliding out of the corners. You have to look very closely, but there is rotation there. The drivers are on the edge of grip, even if it doesnt look like it from a camera 50m away relaying the pictures to your TV. If you were riding shotgun, it would change your mind I bet.
 
I know the Grand-Am GT class cars don't use traction control.
 
Usually LMP's will tend to have TCS as it's needed for the sheer amounts of wheel-spin the cars produce. Cars like GT Cars usually don't need it, as the drivers tend to not dump the throttle after corners.
 
On PC sims I don't use any assists. But in GT5 I use only ABS1 and very rarely TCS1 if the car is undrivable without.
 
No i dont think so , assist thingy hold you from pushing the car and your skills to the limits , i mean you cant drift with tc is on .
 
THEPUNISHER
No i dont think so , assist thingy hold you from pushing the car and your skills to the limits , i mean you cant drift with tc is on .
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Drifting is rarely the fastest way around a corner. In fact, the only way drifting may be faster is on a downhill track, like a touge, due to gravity. Otherwise, drifting is just for showing off.
 
McClarenDesign
Drifting is rarely the fastest way around a corner. In fact, the only way drifting may be faster is on a downhill track, like a touge, due to gravity. Otherwise, drifting is just for showing off.
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i know its showing off , but you can't show off with tc or other assist .

i like them for normal driving but in track , oh no .
 
ENTERSANDMAN13
Is Active Steering an equivilent of something in real life? like power steering ect i dont have a clue..
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saidur_ali
http://www.bmw.com/com/en/insights/technology/technology_guide/articles/mm_active_steering.html
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I remember Clarkson making a strong case against it. Saying something to the effect of forgetting about the system, and crashing any time you drove. Kind of mucking up on how much to turn the steering wheel. Also finding yourself driving in the wrong direction quite often. I can see what he means, and I've always wondered what would happen if it suddenly failed. As in changing lanes doing 80.... signal on, mirror, turn the wheel, and ditch?
 
It's unfortnate that drivers now aren't men like they used to be :( Too much driver assist crap. Especially in F1.
 
nitrorocks
It's unfortnate that drivers now aren't men like they used to be :( Too much driver assist crap. Especially in F1.
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er.. what are you talking about? F1 the last couple of years has probably had the least amount of driver assists than it has in 20 years! :dunce:

Take a look at the FW14 link posted earlier for example

Traction control
Launch control
Active suspension
Semi-Automatic gears

I believe?
 
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I'm confused if active suspension was banned in 94,
How comes Ferrari and Lotus just had their "new" active suspension system banned,
And why was they developing it in the first place if its already been banned for about 18 years.

link to source http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/16664827
 
GTlondoner
I'm confused if active suspension was banned in 94,
How comes Ferrari and Lotus just had their "new" active suspension system banned,
And why was they developing it in the first place if its already been banned for about 18 years.

link to source http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/16664827
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I'd imagine it was designed in such a way that it circumvents current regulations outlining what active suspension is defined as.
 
GTlondoner
I'm confused if active suspension was banned in 94,
How comes Ferrari and Lotus just had their "new" active suspension system banned,
And why was they developing it in the first place if its already been banned for about 18 years.

link to source http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/16664827
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The '94 active suspension was computer controlled independant wheel hydraulic suspension. Which is still banned.

The new 'active' suspension was not computer controlled but instead used a mechanical system where the brake calipers where able to pivot around the wheel under braking, which combined with a certain suspension configuration served to stop the front of the car dipping under braking. This enabled them to maintain a lower ride height.

It is a completely different, mechanical, system.
 
with new computer controlled systems it would make it impossible for someone not using these aids to compete on a pro level so its just easier to ban all of them.
 
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