Do race car drivers use assists in real life?

[devildog666]

The Audi R18 uses traction control.

 

[robisme]

Remember Its a GAME, aids are available, no reason not to use them if you wish, those Clever people who prefer no aids can do their own thing, just like we can
IF the game had no driver aids, then we would have to manage without, until then, I don't see it as a problem on this Game.

Like someone said, Pro's would be stupid not to use every possible advantage open to them. If available.
This fancy gear changing on the steering wheel IS an aid, it's not really manual clutch & change is it. semi auto I guess.

 

[HaylRayzor]

The Audi R18 uses traction control.

It doesn't need to be said that this car was not designed with amateur drivers in mind. And you can also bet professional drivers will be faster with it turned on than without it.

Which is not to say I'm pro driving aids. I honestly could not care less about people using aids, except SRF, which is simply a violation of the laws of physics.

ABS Anti-lock Braking SYSTEM
TCS Traction Control SYSTEM

Systems that exist in the real world on real vehicles.

SRF Skid Recovery FORCE

Like the Force from Star Wars, doesn't exist except in people's imagination.

 

[Zenmervolt]

Aids are banned in F1, and other series, as they want the driver to be in control of the car.

No. Sorry, but no.

Most highly sophisticated aids are banned either for "competition" reasons because the aid is too expensive (they don't want the wealthy teams to simply out-spend everyone else and win that way) or simply because the aids make the cars too fast and drivers start complaining or there are worried that the increased speed will cause danger for spectators.

Racing series care about money. If one rich team simply beats everyone else, the series becomes boring and income falls. If the cars get too fast there are safety issues (not directly arising from the aids themselves) and crashes are bad publicity (especially if spectators are involved as in the 1955 LeMans).

Aids don't get banned because the series wants drivers to be "in control of the car," no matter what the series may claim publicly. Aids get banned because they are either too expensive for all teams to implement properly, or because they allow cars to reach speeds beyond those for which the safety systems are designed, or because enough drivers/teams complain and threaten to leave the series (the reason for the bans of cars like the 2J).

 

[SirBerra]

Formula 1 has experimented with assists, incuding adjustable, adaptable ride height. Traction Control, ABS, AYC.. they're all just another tool in the tool box. If you told a racer that they'd have an edge by strapping a hamster to the nose of their car, you'd see it almost overnight. Systems become so advanced, and work so well, they are quickly outlawed.

If there's an edge, they'll use it.

No way. A "real driver" will tell the crew to remove that junk and let him rely on The Force like Luke Skywalker did. "Trust in yourself, Luke. Assists are for the weak in mind and body." I love these sorts of topics.

If I were a driver for a F1 team, I'd ask to have surgically installed sensory implants that would enable me to be hardwired into an electronic feedback loop so I'd always be at the 100% level of the vehicle. If that's cheating, too bad, as long as I can win.

So many times in GT5 someone comments as to why I was using such and such device and it only proved how lousy a driver I actually was. True. All gamers are not created equal and some of us do require assists to make life a little easier. If that wasn't the case, everyone would still be using the standard PS3 six-axis controller instead of a wheel and pedals.

 

[Livedog]

DRS and KERS are not aids, they are perfomance enhancements. An aid would be something that that makes the car be in some part responsible for doing something the driver would normally do.

 

[MOTORTRENDmitch]

If there's an edge, they'll use it.

Thread adjourned, best answer possible

 

[Livedog]

Oh, and the aids were dropped from F1 because it was decided that the drivers need to be in complete control.

 

[McClarenDesign]

Oh, and the aids were dropped from F1 because it was decided that the drivers need to be in complete control.

It was banned to encourage passing. Drivers were already in complete control both with and without it. Otherwise, they wouldn't have even made it to F1.

Thread adjourned, best answer possible

You'd think that'd be enough, but the debate rages on. Without anyone coming out and blatanly saying it, this thread has turned into another "if you use aids you're less of a driver/racer" thread, and the aids vs. no aids debate is rather old and tired.

It's another tool in the tool box. If aids are offered, no one forces you to use them. There's no sense degrading someone because they use aids, or drive differently than you. It's not wrong, just different. Live and let live. Let it go.

$5 to the first person that shuts down this thread.

 

[nitrorocks]

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!

Take a look at the FW14 link posted earlier for example

Traction control
Launch control
Active suspension
Semi-Automatic gears

I believe?

That car was loaded with assists

 

[MOTORTRENDmitch]

Anything to get an edge will be taken advantage of

 

[Morgoth_666]

Anything to get an edge will be taken advantage of

Indeed. Whether the driver actually WANTS to use it or not is irrelevant, if it makes him more likely to win, he will use it, period. To do otherwise is suicide.

 

[Ardius]

No. Sorry, but no.

Most highly sophisticated aids are banned either for "competition" reasons because the aid is too expensive (they don't want the wealthy teams to simply out-spend everyone else and win that way) or simply because the aids make the cars too fast and drivers start complaining or there are worried that the increased speed will cause danger for spectators.

Racing series care about money. If one rich team simply beats everyone else, the series becomes boring and income falls. If the cars get too fast there are safety issues (not directly arising from the aids themselves) and crashes are bad publicity (especially if spectators are involved as in the 1955 LeMans).

Aids don't get banned because the series wants drivers to be "in control of the car," no matter what the series may claim publicly. Aids get banned because they are either too expensive for all teams to implement properly, or because they allow cars to reach speeds beyond those for which the safety systems are designed, or because enough drivers/teams complain and threaten to leave the series (the reason for the bans of cars like the 2J).

The FIA's reasoning for banning traction control, automatic gearboxes and ABS in Formula 1 in 1994 was due to wanting the drivers to be in control.

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.

But my point is that with those aids on, what do you learn about the car's behaviour, about its setup? With ABS there is no finesse in braking - its simply on/off. If you switch it off, you then have to modulate the brakes to prevent them locking up - it gives you a greater appreciation of what the brakes are doing when you have ABS set to on and a better understanding of how to setup the brakes the rest of the car to make the most of it.
Traction control and ABS are consistently faster than a human, but they are not what makes a driver fast. If you learn to drive the cars in GT5 with aids on all of the time, you are only limiting what you can learn and how fast you can go.

The OP sounds like he is asking if professional drivers use aids to be as fast as they are - aids make the car fast but what makes a driver fast is much more difficult to learn with an aid doing all the hard work for you. Race drivers use aids, but its not what makes them so fast.

 

[tribolik]

The FIA's reasoning for banning traction control, automatic gearboxes and ABS in Formula 1 in 1994 was due to wanting the drivers to be in control.

At least thats what I saw in a F1 documentary... featuring williams and other teams... If they where lying that I do not know... they talked about , TC, Active suspension, ABS, Auto gears, Launch control and a bunch of other stuff.

 

[Ardius]

Some of it was banned on the grounds of trying to prevent the richest teams dominate, but the FIA did also state that they were trying to react to crticism that the drivers were doing less and less work behind the wheel.
It certainly achieved one objective more than the other.

 

[tribolik]

Some of it was banned on the grounds of trying to prevent the richest teams dominate, but the FIA did also state that they were trying to react to crticism that the drivers were doing less and less work behind the wheel.
It certainly achieved one objective more than the other.

At one point Nigel Mansel said «someday the driver will just steer the car and the electronics will do everything else (launch, brake, acelarate, etc) and he wasnt happy about it... then they said the FIA banned assists so that the driver would be the one to be in control or else the audiences would stop going to/watching races...

The truth is that most profesional race series dont allow assists... (F1, DTM, GT1, Super GT) except for power steering...

 

[Zenmervolt]

The FIA's reasoning for banning traction control, automatic gearboxes and ABS in Formula 1 in 1994 was due to wanting the drivers to be in control.

Just FYI, parroting what the FIA publicly claimed as their "reasoning" does not actually rebut a post which says that what a racing organization claims publicly is not their real reason.

As I said in my previous post (emphasis added for those who apparently missed it the first time):

Aids don't get banned because the series wants drivers to be "in control of the car," no matter what the series may claim publicly. Aids get banned because they are either too expensive for all teams to implement properly, or because they allow cars to reach speeds beyond those for which the safety systems are designed, or because enough drivers/teams complain and threaten to leave the series (the reason for the bans of cars like the 2J).

Besides that, "being in complete control of the car" is an ultimately meaningless phrase. Should we make the driver manually set the spark timing and advance too since computers control that now? I mean, it's not technically "complete" control for the driver if the ECU is making those decisions. Or maybe they only mean "complete control" of certain things, like speed. Except that there are automatic speed limiters for pitting. So maybe not that either. Well, at least things like gearchanges. Except that the drivers don't have to bother with lifting throttle or pressing the clutch on gearchanges, the computer handles that. So that's not "complete" control either.

The point here is that the FIA is, ultimately, concerned about continued public interest in their races because they want to make money. When they make comments about wanting the driver to be in "complete control" what they're doing is throwing out a marketing slogan. It sounds good to race fans (who generally have some fetish for "purity" even if they don't really know what "purity" is in a driving context) and gives the appearance that the FIA really "cares about the sport" or some such romantic nonsense.

If they really wanted "complete" control, there would be no electronic throttles, no electronic rev limiters, no pit lane speed control, no telemetry data, and the transmissions would still be using manually operated clutches (and possibly be non-sequential or even non-synchro). Anything they feed fans about "driver control" is marketing.

 

[mr_serious]

That car was loaded with assists

Did you read my post? The bit before I gave the car as an example of how things have changed?

I was using that example to show how those aids have been removed from F1 and it is no longer packed with driver aids.

It was used in the '91 & '92 championships, none of the technology used on that car has been legal in F1 for 5 years, so your statement that there are too many driver aids especially in F1 is completely off.

Anyway as others have stated it depends entirely on the formula of the series. If they give an advantage and are allowed of course drivers will use them.

There are a few cases where the benefits of the technology are only slight and the extra weight might compromise other aspects of the car where a driver / team may choose not to implement an allowed technology, but on the whole anything that provides an advantage and is allowed by the rules will be used.

The real difference between real life & (offline) GT5 is the following...

Say for example the regulations state say a 600pp limit an no tyre restrictions.

Your competitors (the AI) will bring cars that are 500pp and soft sports or racing hard tyres. How realistic is that?

 

[Disavowed]

LMP cars use TCS not for speed but for consistency in the long run. As one of the drivers once said in an interview "You might be quicker without TCS for one or two laps but over the length of an entire race, TCS is faster... then when you factor in driver fatigue without TCS...".

As for F1, the technology used there is at a level where the cars can drive themselves around the tracks. It's not a question of what is disallowed or not; it's more like engineers VS FIA rules.

 

[Ardius]

Just FYI, parroting what the FIA publicly claimed as their "reasoning" does not actually rebut a post which says that what a racing organization claims publicly is not their real reason.

You might not believe the FIA's words but that is their words. The aids were banned on these grounds. Whether you think it was simply a lie or PR spin is irrelevant (even if it is), if the FIA say they banned on it on those grounds, then they did. Unless you are in possession of some kind of proof they were making it up?

The FIA didn't even have to tell anyone why they were banning those aids, the fact they chose to and gave that reason is enough proof for me that they at least were concerned with the image of the sport having cars that the drivers barely controlled, even if it wasn't the primary or private reason.

 

[Eric W]

The only time that I use any assists (i.e. traction control) is when I'm racing LMP cars.

 

[RX-7_FD3S]

But my point is that with those aids on, what do you learn about the car's behaviour, about its setup? With ABS there is no finesse in braking - its simply on/off. If you switch it off, you then have to modulate the brakes to prevent them locking up - it gives you a greater appreciation of what the brakes are doing when you have ABS set to on and a better understanding of how to setup the brakes the rest of the car to make the most of it.

Nope, I dont agree, I modulate my braking even wiht abs. I never apply full break pressure unless I have someone doing something weird in front of me or I overshoot a corner. Rest of the time I modulate my braking, it's not because I use abs that I can't modulate it. Same for Real life. It's not because you have abs on your car that you sens it all the time. I only feel I had abs in my car (real life speaking here) like 5-6 times in my all life, most of them when I had to go mad on break because someone did something weird in front of me while it was raining.

 

[Ardius]

Nope, I dont agree, I modulate my braking even wiht abs. I never apply full break pressure unless I have someone doing something weird in front of me or I overshoot a corner. Rest of the time I modulate my braking, it's not because I use abs that I can't modulate it. Same for Real life. It's not because you have abs on your car that you sens it all the time. I only feel I had abs in my car (real life speaking here) like 5-6 times in my all life, most of them when I had to go mad on break because someone did something weird in front of me while it was raining.

I didn't say you can't modulate the brakes with ABS on. I said that it makes it harder to understand, to learn. If you already do it, then fair enough but for someone who wants to make themselves faster and understand more about the setup and behaviour of a car, they really need to try it with it off.
Once someone has learnt how to drive the car with ABS off, then they can switch it back on to help improve their braking generally but with the added knowledge and experience of what the brakes do without ABS helping.

This is entire point I'm making - assists take away from the learning experience. Not directly the speed the car can go. Some assists like TCS and ABS do make the car faster regardless of ability - but in order to make the driver faster, he/she should look to learn without those assists first before learning to drive different cars on the limit as they will learn much more.

 

[Mr.Slow]

ABS and ASM won't be, as a professional driver will be faster without them.

F1 had ABS and TC and the drivers were professionals and were faster with them.

 

[Eric.]

Traction control that is very finely tuned to adapt to the car's speed and gear would always be faster than the driver trying to use throttle control. Paired with an electronic throttle body, the computer just needs to limit how much throttle the driver can use at each speed in each gear. That could be tuned to allow a tiny bit of wheelspin, or err on the safe side and put down a little less power than possible. Same concept as boost-by-speed and boost-by-gear systems.

And for the hundredth time, yes drivers use aids when they are allowed.

 

[JBanton]

Well I know that current F1 regulations means no assists, except power steering if that counts.