FIA Race Discussion [Archive]

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Really in the lower lobbies like I am in, getting DR points is more important than FIA points. I got 30 points in a race a while ago where I finished in the bottom 10, because there was an A driver in the mostly D lobby. I wouldn't worry about FIA points unless you're top few splits, really.

For me, first race, Aston, using my wheel that I'm still learning to use: Started 10th, got up to 8th then slid off and crashed on lap 1. I use an office chair with wheel locks and sometimes they don't work very well. I really need a chair with no wheels! Anyway, trashed that race. Race 2, back to controller, started 11th but forgot to switch to M this time after qualifying. Ok, stayed on track, 7 on S, 1 H, 10 M, was 9th coming down the final chicane when a car I was leading by 5 seconds to start last lap was right there, I managed to stay 9th, but got 8th because of tire penalties ahead of me. Also the guy on my ass at the end got a tire penalty so even if he passed me it didn't matter.
Glad I tried again, hah.
 
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FIAGTC 2020-2021 Exhibition Season
Manufacturers Series
Race #10 - Gr4 / Suzuka Circuit

That was a nice way to wrap up this Manufacturer's Series season. After a rather patchy couple of free practice sessions in the Cayman, I was wondering if I lost it or what happened. My time was not within my target, I was inconsistent, and overall all crossed up. But in the last few laps of FP before the matching in the first slot, I seemed to get a handle on things, and again was optimistic that this round would give me a good boost in the final standings. The key was not to overdrive the car, especially on the softs... I eased up the braking points a lot and tried to carry the speed on the apex a lot more to compensate for the earlier braking points. Suzuka historically has been a good circuit for me, and I've felt more comfortable in the Gr4 cars, so things were hopefully tilted in my favor. And I need them to be, after such a bad start to the first half of the season.

Qualified awful... missed my mark and washed out wide in the last corner of the esses the first two laps (really uncharacteristic mistake for me as I'm really consistent in that section), and only managed to correct it enough to start 8th. But got a good run at the start, after starting on the Softs, and was able to put some pressure on the familiar Corvette that started ahead of me right off. Eventually got past him clean with a classic overtake on the inside at Dunlop, after we both were gifted a position by another who had gone off ahead.



So I was up two spots, and closing on the only other Porsche that had started ahead of me. We seemed very evenly matched, but I gathered that I had some consistent advantages in Degner and much of the middle sector. So tried to stay consistent and put some pressure on him. I gave him a look in the side mirror heading into T1 after a good run out of Casio, and I was surprised but he went wide, opening the door for a clean overtake. Was now up to 5th, and on a 2-stop strategy hoping to simply hold station at this point. Was doing my best to manage the tire wear, getting 7 out of the Softs, and 9 out of the Mediums. I feel like those were the right intervals with the right overlap to the slower tires that followed each time.



That other Porsche and I were consistent lap after lap, each within tenths every lap, but I eventually clawed out more than a second lead. I continued to manage that gap through the pit stops, and after running as high as 2nd or 3rd during those, I put on the required set of Hards in 5th place with two laps to go. From there, I noticed that my Porsche co-opetition had assumed the same spot as before the pit cycles, and I managed the 2 sec gap to cruise home 5th.

I had wondered for a while there if a podium was in order, but the top guys all ran straight 2-stop races, I think (no 3-stoppers). And with the perfectly clean race, not a wheel wrong on my side, not a mark on the Porsche, and three clean passes for position, I was really happy with this one, It was a very good one for the last race of the season. This is how it's supposed to be! The FIA points I earned may put me in the top 20 for Porsche in the NA region, which is great. I missed my goal to be a Star Player, and didn't get any podiums this time around, but had some good results in the last part of the season, against some pretty good competition.

Shout out to @Keith2324 ...been a while since we were matched! Too bad we didn't get to mix it up a bit. And note: I earned 49 (!!) SR for this race... that's a huge amount of SR to pick up. Too bad I was pegged at 99 as usual before the race!

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Pass for 5th, in the first stint, where I was able to hold station and manage the gap for the majority of the race, after starting 8th.

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Solid end to the Manufacturers Series season. Enjoyed this really clean, straight fight. Not a mark on the car at the end. Proud of myself for some really consistent driving, lap after lap. It was fun managing the gap to another good consistent driver, but having just enough of an edge in pace to stay ahead.

Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport '16
Qualified: 8th
Race Finish: 5th (128 pts)
Door #5 (about 800 DR)
 
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Okay.....not really a good way to keep newer racers. Practice and drive clean and hard and get pissed on at the end of the race.....Might not be worth the time invested.
I understand how you feel about that. I used to think FIA was way out of my league and not worth the bother at my level. But I had gotten better and tried one once to rebuild my SR. It didnt work, but I was hooked on the longer races and the erratic variety of the Nations races. While I want to do well and look (and hopefully actually be) fast, i like the change up from the rotation of dailies that can get old and stale easily. If nothing else it is all a game so just pick trying to do the parts of it that are fun.👍
 
Manufacturer round 10

Slot1: I should never go in a FIA race without time to at least have a 10-15 minutes warmup session before. I did that today, qualified in P14 and then ran wide in T1 on cold hard tyres. Then pushed to hard to recover which caused me to have questionable decision to be on the outside on a threewide entry in T1 in lap 11 and then spinning by myself in spoon 4 laps later. P19

Slot1: This time put out a decent time in Quali, 07.5 but it was only good enough for P12. Started on mediums, ran 3 uneventful laps on them then did a 1 lap on Hards and pitted again. Got out on Softs in P16 and had a lot of clean air, climbing up to P12 as people pitted. Made my last pitstop in lap 11, got out in P14 then started pushing. Made short work of a yellow Viper and a red Scirocco in one lap the had 2 laps of clean air. As people pitted I went up till P10 and in front there was an FF fight that involved an orange VW and a grey Audi. That made them slow, manage to close in and follow the VW when he made his move on the Audi. P9 and was all over the back of the Scirocco. Tried a move on him at the hairpin, had the inside but touched him on the acceleration and got a 1s penalty. That costed me 1 position as the Nissan behind was close so had to settle for P10 and 127 points. This doesn't count, but called it a night.

So, season review - it was a good one in Manufacturer. Finished P151 in EMEA with 938 points, way ahead of my objective of top200. In Dodge leaderboards I missed the target coming only P14(targeted top10) but I had very strong competition.

I am saying goodbye to the Viper, next season I will move to Aston Martin, as we have a new team championship in our private league and I need the practice with the cars.
 
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Pretty happy with my score for this season but was a really disappointing finish. Had started really well, improving with every race, getting promoted to DR A and was 10th for Peugeot at one point. However, some of the later tracks didn’t suit the car and were a struggle. Had to miss the last race too which I was confident at picking up some good points, dropping from 15th to 18th for Peugeot. Oh well, has given me some confidence that I can do well in some tough lobbies in the future! :)
 
Offcourse did not do as well as xXpinkykissXx for Peugeot, but still very pleased with by far my best season yet:

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never been this high in DR, SR is 99:
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and really pleased with the statistics:
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I really liked driving the Peugeots, but I still think they are hideous to look at. I really did more practice this season and used the ghosts to learn the tracks and this payed off. Also liked to have only 1 race per week, this allowing me the time to practice. Last race at Suzuka was my first with traction control to zero and it seemed to really increase my laptimes. I had never expected to improve my driving before starting this season, as i am just a pad racer, driving automatic transmission but through practice i improved my driving a lot.

The Peugeot group 4 gave me the best results, all three races was in top 5. The Gr 3 performed much better then the Renault RSO i used the last season and gave me some good results. Except for Fuji all races I did I encountered mostly sporty drivers and had no incidents.

Hihglight was the Goodwood race, never expected to have a good result at such a short and tence race.

Think i will stick with Peugeot should there be a next season....Thanks to you all at GT Planet for the tips and all other contributions!
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Well, that was a surprise. I squeezed into the top 10 (EU) Peugeot rankings by 29p to finish 10th with 769p.

I didn't check ranking all season (unneeded pressure) and I thought it was going pretty well but not that well. If this is the last season, it was timely fashion to meet a longterm goal of mine.
 
Such a good feeling this morning. :D Like Tea_Leaves above, I've finally checked off a long-term goal. I really do hope this isn't the last season before GT7 though, because I'd like to actually display my S rank after all the effort I put into getting one! :lol:

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This season has been tough. Taking Mitsubishi with the line-up of races they announced probably wasn't a smart move, but I think the struggle has made the Top 10 all the more satisfying to earn.

The Gr.3 Evo is nice to drive, decent handling and braking. Just a little frustrating on tracks with long straights because it's relatively easy pickings.

The Gr.4 Evo on the other hand, urf. The stats on the tuning screen lie so much! I was expecting it to be reasonable in top speed and acceleration based on the ~6 ratings it has in both. Then I discovered quite quickly at Monza that the acceleration is so bad it struggles to hold a slipstream even against a car that doesn't have one. :odd: Only having 5 gears just feels weird too!

Monza, Tokyo and Suzuka were absolute hell, and Goodwood wasn't great. Alsace was the only decent race I got out of it, and it still didn't feel particularly competitive. As far as I can tell it's strengths are being hard to spin out, and having decent fuel economy on tracks that don't make it top out thanks to the very long 5th gear. Everything else with it feels subpar, and racing with it felt more like a test of survival than anything else. It's pretty easy to see the pattern in my scores - my season was completely carried by the Group 3 rounds, with the P3 at Laguna Seca being the saving grace.

If there is another season, I'm definitely picking something with some power next time. I've had enough of being a sitting duck! ;)
 
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I struggled at Suzuka last night in the Lexus. First attempt I qualified 16 and finished 16, so I thought I would give it another try. I qualified much better in 12th (almost a full second faster than the first attempt), but I made way too many little mistakes in the race that added up. So I finished 18th. I'm not discouraged, it just wasn't my night. A 40-minute race at Suzuka takes a lot of mental focus, and I think I just didn't have it last night. On to Nurburgring for the next round :).

I've really enjoyed driving for Lexus this season, and I'm glad I chose them, but I didn't realize until looking back now how much better I was in the Gr3 than the Gr4. Similar to @Zorz comments above, my 5 highest scores were all with the Gr3. Average finish for Gr3 was 7.6, while for Gr4 it was 12.6. I don't think the Gr4 is a bad car, I just have some work to do to figure it out how to get more out of it.
 
After what looked to be a promising start to the FIAs, GT Sport's absolutely atrocious penalty ended my fervent joy. The end of this season, while full of wins, was pretty meh for me.

Slot 1, I qualified with a 2:07.056, and it was a fairly conservative lap. I was in the OP VW Sciracco and in a B lobby, so I expected to start up front. After the first 2 laps, it was pretty damn boring race to be compleltely honest.



Ended the season 5th for VW. I really wanted to be top 3 and I was in the running until the DR reset. So, I'm a bit down here at the end. It feels like GT Sport believes I have all day to grind DR after their sh#tastic system screws over someone who has dedicated 2 years to promoting their game/sim. Im not a perfect driver, but I'm certainly not dirty. I usually do one race and call it a night. So it took me a long time to get to A+. I don't feel like the developers respect the effort involved.

I hope they do better for us. It's a great community, it has some of the best racing online, and it deserves the best marshalling system.

Hope your season went well. I will not be racing Saturday, its Halloween and I am going to enjoy time with the kids. To all the guys in here I race with, I truly enjoyed racing with y'all. You are some of the best and most respectable wheel men around. Good Luck, Have Fun, and Let's Play Again Sometime!

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Well, I didn't do as well as most of you but in the start of the season I did OK.
Then PD changed the Penalty System and suddenly FIA became s hostile territory where you knew you would loose SR. It made me not enjoy the later part as much as I did in the beginning.
If PD give us another season I might run. But it's certainly not a given thing. I am prepared to live with the ridiculous BOP but I am not sure I can stand the Penalty System in it's current state.
I might just run in lobbies.

Well. This season I picked the Ford GT as my steed, to gain experience. I think it was too big a leap though.
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So, I'm a bit down here at the end. It feels like GT Sport believes I have all day to grind DR after their sh#tastic system screws over someone who has dedicated 2 years to promoting their game/sim. Im not a perfect driver, but I'm certainly not dirty. I usually do one race and call it a night. So it took me a long time to get to A+. I don't feel like the developers respect the effort involved.

Yep, this is why if I ever experience a DR reset on my main account, I’ll stop playing this game indefinitely. It’s ridiculous how easily your rating can get ruined and frankly, I have other things I’d rather do with my time than clawing back to where I was. Just hope GT7 has a rehauled penalty system that prevents this problem.
 
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Yep, this is why if I ever experience a DR reset on my main account, I’ll stop playing this game indefinitely. It’s ridiculous how easily your rating can get ruined and frankly, I have other things I’d rather do with my time than clawing back to where I was. Just hope GT7 has a rehauled penalty system that prevents this problem.

Agreed. We were chatting on the TPC Discord (join us, haha) this morning about the future of FIA. The lack of updates, even just to the penalty system which hasn't been touched in months, seems to indicate that we're going to be in a holding pattern until GT7 comes out. I could give a **** about more tracks/cars, since I still have plenty to learn on all of them, but leaving the penalty system this way sucks. I have more CRBs on the alt from driving like a complete bellend than I do when I try to be patient and careful.
 
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Last night wasn't much to talk about, other than I did 3 attempts and finished worse than I started in all 3, with none of them bringing in enough points to erase my score at Laguna Seca. I thought for sure this would be another 200+ point race, since I usually drive well around Suzuka, and the last FIA Manu race at Suzuka during the "official" season was a relatively easy 210 points for me, but unfortunately I didn't quite have the pace I thought I did. My best result was my 2nd attempt with a 6th place for 184 points, after qualifying a very promising 3rd. I didn't do anything particularly wrong that race, but my race pace just wasn't there.

All of that means I end the season with 4 of 5 scores over 200 points, and the 5th one only 4 points short of 200. While I finished 60 places better overall than in the last "official" FIA Manufacturer's Championship, my Manufacturer and local rankings stayed exactly the same. It was a great season (even if it was partially - or mostly - due to the slight lack of competition), but I'm slightly frustrated to have gotten so close to scoring 200+ points in all 5 scored races, but coming up just 4 points short in one of them.

Edit: I also finished just behind (1 position and 6 points) @Winnie847.
 
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Okay.....not really a good way to keep newer racers. Practice and drive clean and hard and get pissed on at the end of the race.....Might not be worth the time invested.

On the other hand, if you won the race you should have gotten a nice DR bump - which will put you in a higher lobby that awards more FIA points next round. Have you checked you K-stats? They'll show you your exact DR and SR numbers.

https://www.kudosprime.com/gts/stats.php?profile=search
 
I see the comments about the current penalty system... I'm no fan of it and it's blatantly stupid. I will say this though: I think it's having more of an effect on my DR than my SR... I'm extra cautious, much more like I would be in a real world car with real world consequences, and it's likely costing me DR when I don't attack or I yield positions that I'd rather defend.

You could say... well that's how it's supposed to work. But since it's a sim environment, the others we are racing may not approach it that way, and if they are willing to risk a reset, to run through someone, or to defend their own position unfairly, it's really just there choice. And that's where the sporting question comes in. IRL, we are both in the same position: get hurt, bust up a car, end your race... all the same consquences with relatively same value for both of us. But in the game, if people place different values on a SR/DR reset, or their precious ratings, then the competitive balance is unfair... we aren't both subscribing to the same social contract, and it impacts the sporting nature of the competition. That's the issue.

But that said, in the FIA races this year, I actually was much cleaner and had my races disrupted (sometimes thru self-preservation as noted above) much less than the summer seasons... I only re-ran the races due to any unfair play like that 3 times out of 14 races (and really only 2 times were because of a punting)... but it cost me over 3000 DR in the process, compared to where I started the season.
 
I'm not sure I understand this point system. Got my first manu win tonight, but only got 7 points? As did P2 and P3. Started P5 in an Aston, finished P1 with no penalties. Granted it was a D S lobby, but the podium all got the same points? Is there some explanation?
To add to what @roamingbard13 said, available points are based on the average DR level in your race (others who have better knowledge can explain the details even further). At D/S, the point values are so low that it's likely having to round the points up or down, so you could get 7 points for your win, while 2nd and 3rd could get 6.9 or 6.8 points, which would be rounded up to 7 points since the game doesn't do fractions of points.

The points system used to give way more points in the races, with the Top Splits getting over 2000 points for a win. Now Top Splits get between 300 and 400 points usually. Under this old system the points spreads were large enough that lower DR levels wouldn't have to deal with the nonsense of everyone scoring the same points regardless of position, since there were enough points for the algorithm to deduct points for finishing lower than first without ending up with several fractions that get rounded to the same point value.

Under the old system, if I finished a race with more than 1000 points, I considered it a success. Now that goal is 200. I have no idea why they felt the need to change the points system (then again you can say that with a lot of things PD does...), especially when the current one really screws the D/S races.

Here's a screenshot of one of my seasons under the old points system. The 1700 points result was from a 3rd place finish.
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I really enjoy there tire strategy races. Something about not being totally sure of how I’m doing during the race makes it more exciting.

I jumped into this with zero practice races and about 4-5 laps of practice in a lobby just before the race, which ended up being 2nd split. Qualified with a 2:07.4 but I know I had the pace to hit a 7.0 if I just hooked the lap up. The grid was one of the closest I’ve ever seen, especially in the top 12. Most of us were separated by a couple hundredths. Because of this I decided to start on mediums to try and avoid the first stint fighting. It worked perfectly. People ahead were bunching up, and I was able to hold off some guys behind when it was necessary, then I let them pass me when the time was right and it didn’t cost us much time. A couple guys made some major mistakes and allowed me to move up without fighting for it.

My initial plan was going to be a 2-stop, but once I realized that my pace on mediums was garbage and on my 5th lap the understeer kicked in something fierce, I decided to ditch them and switch to a 3-stop. It was too late to run 7 laps on each soft stint so I went with 6. Once I had the softs on I started to catch up to people and fortunately for me nobody wanted to fight too hard and we worked together to facilitate the overtakes at convenient times. Before the opportunities presented themselves I just lifted and coasted a little which really helped me maintain consistent pace on the softs.

Avoiding hard battles and finding the clean air was key for me here and it allowed me to move up 4 positions from P7 to take a solid podium in the final race of the season.

Shout out to @GTWolverine and @csmirnoff who were in the race with me, among others. It’s been a pleasure racing with you all this season. Can’t wait to do it again! Here’s my view of the race and my season’s results posted below. Cheers everyone!



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Raced for ***** and giggles tonight since I only had 2 manu scores banked. Put about an hour of practice in today, and figured I’d take it easy and just enjoy the race.

I got matched with @HaydenFan69 , @CurbHog , and @afc5150.

Well now I know where all the cool kids were... it was a bummer to not have any TPC fellows in my split, and only one other GTP member, in my race in the first slot. Last race of the season, was hoping to get some good racing in with all you.

I really enjoy there tire strategy races. Something about not being totally sure of how I’m doing during the race makes it more exciting.

Agree... I liked the challenge of getting more out of the Softs in this race. It actually worked well for me to stretch them out a bit, and not only could I get one more lap out of them, I was faster in the process by remaining smooth. I noticed everyone that I was managing behind me get sloppier and lose more time during the two long stints than I was, and that was really rewarding. And when you are battling for track position with another good consistent racer, living within those 0.10's each sector is a very fun challenge. I made one small mistake in Casio one lap, lost almost 0.3 on a 1.4 sec lead that I had to build one tenth at a time... I could imagine the chasing driver thinking maybe that was an opportunity, but I was able to squeeze another couple of tenths out in the first segment after, and then restore the same lead over the next lap... it's such a fun battle. And over a longer race like last night, much more realistic... and dependent on some mental discipline to manage the pace, gage the tire wear, etc. More of all of that would be great.
 
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Last night's manu race was one of my more interesting to look back on because while I finished well, I still left feeling frustrated with myself.

I knew I was only going to get one shot at it, as I had to leave immediately after slot 1 for a work project. But I was feeling pretty optimistic as I'm pretty okay at Suzuka and the track is favorable to the TT.

At first, I'm a little wary when I draw door number one. I haven't fared well historically with that door number but I also knew it meant I was in a lower ranked DR.B lobby than usual. Qualy goes okay and I get P2. I choose to run a 6S/5M/1H/6S strategy - which is one of the many things I look back at as possible bad decisions on my part.

Things start out alright as I close in on P1 (I'll refer to him as NL going forward) pretty quick and by the hairpin I have to back out to avoid making contact with him. I get a good run on him after that and get the inside line at Spoon, overtaking him. I come to realize later that NL started on RM tires, doing a long stint for a 2-stopper. Which I don't understand - if you're on pole create distance to the field, don't let them draw you pack into the pack. But anyway, here's where the frustrations really start to build up for me - I get a 0.5 sec track limit penaly on 130R. That along with two other track limit penalties will come back to haunt me.

That first penalty allows the chase pack to catch up with me at the end of L2. I get divebombed at 130R and the chicane, dropping back to P3. NL drops to P4 because unlike the other jack:censored:'s he doesn't divebomb. But we get the positions back as one guy bins it then the other goes wide. I spend the rest of the stint putting significant distance between myself and the pack. By the time I pit on L6, I have something like 8 sec on NL in P2. I come out of the pit box 3-4 sec behind P1 and just in front of P3. I close the distance on P1 and am on his tail when he does his first pit on L10. I build my lead up to the 4 sec neighborhood before my 2nd pit on L11 - and here's where I think I made the mistake. I do my RH stint here thinking that I want my softs at the end of the race. Pitting again on L12 put me in P4. It also put me in a position later in the race when I'm back on my RS where someone pulls out in front of me and NL. The dude is on cold medium tires and we're on warm softs but he starts blocking and defending like a madman right at the first turn. It takes us 1 1/2 laps to finally get around him - all the while I'm watching the new P1 just pull away from us further and further. As I watch his lead grow, I realize that we're not going to overtake him when he does his final pit for RH tires. And I was right. Within a lap of overtaking our blocking RM frenemy, I overtake NL and start pushing to close the gap on P1. I'm 1.5 sec behind him when he pulls out of the pits for the final lap. His tires are cold but mine are extremely worn from all the fighting I had to do. I creep up on him but don't really close the gap until the final chicane. I finally close the gap fast but don't have enough track to the finish line and end up 0.3 sec behind him.

Yes, P2 is nice. And 61 points is actually my highest points awarded this season but I left so much time out on the track. I never really ran a fast lap. In fact, I ran several slow laps. I get my head out of my bum and do one lap 1 sec faster and I win. I don't get that track penalty L1, that divebomb probably doesn't happen and I don't lose time having to overtake two people - and I win. I don't get the other two track penalties later in the race and I win the race. I save my RH stint for the end instead of after my RM stint and I'm in less traffic in the middle of the race, I create more distance and I win the race.

Good result, yes. But lots and lots to think about and work on. I'm going to take all this as a good sign, though. I'm kicking myself for strategy and technique instead of binning it and letting myself get caught up in chaos. In fact, NL and I had some real good close racing. I don't think we so much as brushed up against each other and we went door to door several times. Maybe this means I'm actually becoming a better driver?

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Last night's manu race was one of my more interesting to look back on because while I finished well, I still left feeling frustrated with myself.

I knew I was only going to get one shot at it, as I had to leave immediately after slot 1 for a work project. But I was feeling pretty optimistic as I'm pretty okay at Suzuka and the track is favorable to the TT.

At first, I'm a little wary when I draw door number one. I haven't fared well historically with that door number but I also knew it meant I was in a lower ranked DR.B lobby than usual. Qualy goes okay and I get P2. I choose to run a 6S/5M/1H/6S strategy - which is one of the many things I look back at as possible bad decisions on my part.

Things start out alright as I close in on P1 (I'll refer to him as NL going forward) pretty quick and by the hairpin I have to back out to avoid making contact with him. I get a good run on him after that and get the inside line at Spoon, overtaking him. I come to realize later that NL started on RM tires, doing a long stint for a 2-stopper. Which I don't understand - if you're on pole create distance to the field, don't let them draw you pack into the pack. But anyway. But here's where the frustrations really start to build up for me - I get a 0.5 sec track limit penaly on 130R. That along with two other track limit penalties will come back to haunt me.

That first penalty allows the chase pack to catch up with me at the end of L2. I get divebombed at 130R and the chicane, dropping back to P3. NL drops to P4 because unlike the other jack:censored:'s he doesn't divebomb. But we get the positions back as one guy bins it then the other goes wide. I spend the rest of the stint putting significant distance between myself and the pack. By the time I pit on L6, I have something like 8 sec on NL in P2. I come out of the pit box 3-4 sec behind P1 and just in front of P3. I close the distance on P1 and am on his tail when he does his first pit on L10. I build my lead up to the 4 sec neighborhood before my 2nd pit on L11 - and here's where I think I made the mistake. I do my RH stint here thinking that I want my softs at the end of the race. Pitting again on L12 put me in P4. It also put me in a position later in the race when I'm back on my RS where someone pulls out in front of me and NL. The dude is on cold medium tires and we're on warm softs but he starts blocking and defending like a madman right at the first turn. It takes us 1 1/2 laps to finally get around him - all the while I'm watching the new P1 just pull away from us further and further. As I watch his lead grow, I realize that we're not going to overtake him when he does his final pit for RH tires. And I was right. Within a lap of overtaking our blocking RM frenemy, I overtake NL and start pushing to close the gap on P1. I'm 1.5 sec behind him when he pulls out of the pits for the final lap. His tires are cold but mine are extremely worn from all the fighting I had to do. I creep up on him but don't really close the gap until the final chicane. I finally close the gap fast but don't have enough track to the finish line and end up 0.3 sec behind him.

Yes, P2 is nice. And 61 points is actually my highest points awarded this season but I left so much time out on the track. I never really ran a fast lap. In fact, I ran several slow laps. I get my head out of my bum and do one lap 1 sec faster and I win. I don't get that track penalty L1, that divebomb probably doesn't happen and I don't lose time having to overtake two people - and I win. I don't get the other two track penalties later in the race and I win the race. I save my RH stint for the end instead of after my RM stint and I'm in less traffic in the middle of the race, I create more distance and I win the race.

Good result, yes. But lots and lots to think about and work on. I'm going to take all this as a good sign, though. I'm kicking myself for strategy and technique instead of binning it and letting myself get caught up in chaos. In fact, NL and I had some real good close racing. I don't think we so much as brushed up against each other and we went door to door several times. Maybe this means I'm actually becoming a better driver?

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Congratulations on your podium finish! Looks like you had a pretty good season with Audi. I took slot 1 as well, I suspect I would have been in your race but I had some ...SR related challenges... leftover from this past Nations Gr.1 race so I was put in a lower SR ranked lobby.
 
Sharing this, as it's pretty fun and I thought it was cool.

Pic from the FIA Gr4 race at Sardegna this summer, where the Porsche Cayman Clubsport was lifting the inside front tire under acceleration out of the medium speed turn, slightly uphill:

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...and a pic from a recent event at local club track, of a real Cayman Clubsport GT4 Spec car, doing exactly the same:

upload_2020-10-29_16-6-30.png


I'd say PD got the handling and physics model down just right, for this car! So cool...
 
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