Gran Turismo World Series discussion

[VTEC Driver]

I've done quite a few custom races against a full field of 15 AI cars for practice now. I've learned a few things.

First, the AI is stupidly slow on the entry to every corner and impossibly fast out of the exit, which makes them a hazard on the way in and out of reach on the straights -- at least when on the same tire compound and rubber banding hasn't kicked in.

Second, the 'competition' damage is absolutely brutal. Bumper damage lasts more than a full lap. There have been so many times that I've been on the verge of having the damage repair itself only to understeer out into a wall and keep the damage going for another lap and a half. And it can really slow you down, too. In one particularly bad race, I remember losing 10 seconds in a single lap just from the damage slow down -- no crashes or spins, just going slow from damage. A good result is almost certainly going to depend on avoiding damage.

Third, going for a spin can destroy the tires. There have been a couple races now where I hit the curb badly on the RS stint and spun out. On a clean stint, I can do a 12-laps on RS tires and still have 15-20% remaining on the rear left tire. On the ones with the spins, the tread completely wore through on the 11th lap, leaving me do to pirouettes to the pit lane. I don't know if it was the spin itself or me spinning the tires as I tried to recover, but I lost more than a full lap of tire tread as a result. If you go for a spin, be prepared to adjust your strategy.

I've tried a three-stop strategy (10RM-1RH-12RS-12RS) a few times and it seems viable when I compare it to my two-stop times (20RM-2RH-12RS). It feels like the the RS tires will have a big advantage on the straights. Combine that with the custom slipstream and I expect it should be pretty easy to get by RM and RH drivers on the straights even if you have to bide your time through the middle section. And in the three-stop, most of the race is on RS tires, so
the risk of getting held up is maybe not as severe as in other races.

In these practice races, I've been putting the RH stint in the middle, but in the actual race tomorrow I feel like it might be good to leave it to the end, just to have some buffer in case the RS tires don't last as long as I expect them to.

Whichever strategy I go with, I think clean air and avoiding damage are going to be key to having a good result.

Good luck to everybody racing!

I admire your consistency and professional approach versus a race that more or less I am hating...

Right now I am seduced by the new 1.72 update driving the old Civic at SUGO... and it is adorable...
The sound of F355 is so nostalgic and remember me the good old times... that never will be back.

I wish all the best to all the braves that will race tomorrow !!!

 

[VillaJ100]

I've done quite a few custom races against a full field of 15 AI cars for practice now. I've learned a few things.

First, the AI is stupidly slow on the entry to every corner and impossibly fast out of the exit, which makes them a hazard on the way in and out of reach on the straights -- at least when on the same tire compound and rubber banding hasn't kicked in.

Second, the 'competition' damage is absolutely brutal. Bumper damage lasts more than a full lap. There have been so many times that I've been on the verge of having the damage repair itself only to understeer out into a wall and keep the damage going for another lap and a half. And it can really slow you down, too. In one particularly bad race, I remember losing 10 seconds in a single lap just from the damage slow down -- no crashes or spins, just going slow from damage. A good result is almost certainly going to depend on avoiding damage.

Third, going for a spin can destroy the tires. There have been a couple races now where I hit the curb badly on the RS stint and spun out. On a clean stint, I can do a 12-laps on RS tires and still have 15-20% remaining on the rear left tire. On the ones with the spins, the tread completely wore through on the 11th lap, leaving me do to pirouettes to the pit lane. I don't know if it was the spin itself or me spinning the tires as I tried to recover, but I lost more than a full lap of tire tread as a result. If you go for a spin, be prepared to adjust your strategy.

I've tried a three-stop strategy (10RM-1RH-12RS-12RS) a few times and it seems viable when I compare it to my two-stop times (20RM-2RH-12RS). It feels like the the RS tires will have a big advantage on the straights. Combine that with the custom slipstream and I expect it should be pretty easy to get by RM and RH drivers on the straights even if you have to bide your time through the middle section. And in the three-stop, most of the race is on RS tires, so
the risk of getting held up is maybe not as severe as in other races.

In these practice races, I've been putting the RH stint in the middle, but in the actual race tomorrow I feel like it might be good to leave it to the end, just to have some buffer in case the RS tires don't last as long as I expect them to.

Whichever strategy I go with, I think clean air and avoiding damage are going to be key to having a good result.

Good luck to everybody racing!

Tempted with that 3 stop strat. Did you refuel during second stop?

I can't get pace round here. Best lap is mid 2:09. Struggle with the red bull and I think being blown diffuser it gets more downforce when accelerating, but you run wide as too fast. But if you aren't, you understeer badly. Also struggle with traction both coming onto and out of the straight, and to a lesser extent in general everywhere here.

 

[Moose78]

On a lark, I just tried a 4-stop strategy -- 1RM-1RH-11RS-11RS-11RS -- in a full-field custom race for practice. Surprisingly, it ended up giving me my fastest overall race time yet. The one really nice thing about it is that with two pit stops in a row at the start, it puts you well away from the rest of the pack, so you can drive some fast laps on the RS tires without any traffic around. Of course, with the rubber banding in custom races, it only took 3 laps to catch back up and have to pick my way through the cars, but in an actual race, I expect the clean air would last quite a while.

Tempted with that 3 stop strat. Did you refuel during second stop?

I added fuel as I needed it, but just enough for the coming stint. So I added enough for 12 laps on the second pit, then again to 12 laps on the final pit.

 

[BGreenFace]

On a lark, I just tried a 4-stop strategy -- 1RM-1RH-11RS-11RS-11RS -- in a full-field custom race for practice. Surprisingly, it ended up giving me my fastest overall race time yet. The one really nice thing about it is that with two pit stops in a row at the start, it puts you well away from the rest of the pack, so you can drive some fast laps on the RS tires without any traffic around. Of course, with the rubber banding in custom races, it only took 3 laps to catch back up and have to pick my way through the cars, but in an actual race, I expect the clean air would last quite a while.

I added fuel as I needed it, but just enough for the coming stint. So I added enough for 12 laps on the second pit, then again to 12 laps on the final pit.

If it wasn’t for the fact that I don’t have time for the nation cup, I think I would try your 4 stop strategy.🤔 I think that with the fighting and people being bunched up together during the middle part of the lap, having a bunch of clean air and and not getting caught in the fighting could be an underdog strat, and I definitely would like to see someone try it 😉

 

[MetalApe]

Thanks to @Moose78 for all the strategy work. I was awake early this morning, so popped down under for a race.
I was the slowest qualifier, started 11/13 with only the two who didn't bother qualifying behind me. I expect that was a smart strategic decisions from those two to avoid first lap trouble.

I decided to start on hards, as expected the first lap is chaos. Starting 11th I was actually well placed to avoid the trouble, I started still in the final corner, so couldn't floor it at the start giving clear room ahead, drivers behind were well clear as well because they get the problem even worse.

Even with that, I couldn't avoid rear ending someone who hit the wall, luckily no penalty just damage. Which confirmed my plan to stop after 1 lap, switched to RS, and somehow I'm running 9th. I don't think anyone ahead of me stopped, I know at least one behind did. Not sure how I was ahead of everyone else, either they stopped or lost more than a pit stops worth of time in first lap incidents.

From there on all went well, I did 1H-11S-12S-11M. Had no problems with traffic, the odd cars I did catch on slower tyres either just let me past to avoid trouble, or with better tyres, I just out accelerated them onto the front or back straight without problem.

Ended up 4th, not bad for the slowest qualifier in the race.

 

[Hiponiak]

Fresh from the race, some insights:

• qualifier was horrible, bumps on every lap, qualified 9th with 1:15 (mid 1:08 was my best lap in practice)
• race was surprisingly clean, managed to finish 6th with low 1:09 best lap.
• strategy: 20 mids -> refuel to +1 lap and 10 softs -> 5 hards
• start on mids and until fuel ends gave me a calm head not to think about both but avoiding traffic and focus on driving
• avoid contact at any cost, try to drive clean as championship damage takes its toll here big time.
• felt confident though won’t repeat as one idiot can ruin your race and it’s a full hour of grinding.
• Weird stuff is best lap is based on 1st one that is not full so in a race best one was like 59 seconds or so. Pitty as it kills competition a bit. So if you aim for it go fast from the start.

Good luck fellow drivers!

 

[VillaJ100]

Not a good start, rammed on both fast laps and 16th. Someone actually moved over to wipe me out on the straight 😂

 

[FlapJackFlash]

GT2 EMEA high B lobby

Qualifying didn't go too bad, got a 1.07.567 for P5, about 0.6 of pole. More importantly didn't get any damage - if you do it's definitely worth restarting as an out lap is faster than waiting for the damage to repair, and any damage kills your top end speed so much, and makes it more likely you'll understeer into another barrier.

Decided to got for RM-RH-RS, with refuelling to the end on the 1st stop, as Caster pointed out the refuel animation adds 2s to the pit stop and I didn't think the extra weight would matter that much on the RH. Kind of forgot T1 would be a nightmare here so ended up getting hit a little, enough to give damage so started losing places waiting for that to repair.

There was an interesting variety of strategies in use, I ended up battling closely with someone else on the long RM stint, but battling here is very costly, both in terms of time lost and risk of damage. I generally let anyone past who was obviously faster/on better tyres/had already pitted. Pitted on L19 for RH as had no fuel left, refuelled to the end of the race (also - did not know about the refuelling diamond! That would have saved me so much botched lap maths if I knew about that sooner!).

RH stint didn't go too bad, managed to extract some good pace from them, then pitted again on L26 for RS where I made up time on people who only refuelled enough for each stint. Could have gone in earlier but didn't want to risk it. As the strategies combined near the end it seemed I was comfortably in 5th, then P4 had a spin so come home 4th for 124. Would be fun to try different strategies but you can so easily have your race ruined here through damage - everyone below 9th got lapped due to issues!

Be interested to know what BB people were running. I usually run mine to the rear for the rotation, but had to put 1 to the front to balance the tyre wear otherwise I found I was shredding the rears.

Good luck everyone!

 

[VillaJ100]

Not a good start, rammed on both fast laps and 16th. Someone actually moved over to wipe me out on the straight 😂

Q16, P4. Tried the 4 stop, 1H 1M x3 11S. worked really well, stayed out of trouble lap 1, clean air for lap 2 but at the end I'd caught up to a rammer who had lost that much time and who pitted as well. As I was on the soft I had to be patient and went past on the straight.

Then just lapped consistent high 1:09s for the rest of the race. Was a knot of traffic from P7-P10 fighting which was a struggle to get past them as picked up minor knocks that lose a ton of time but just hung back until they caused damage to each other and then took them. I was P5 until lap 33 when the guy who was the fastest on the track doing low 1:08's in P4 who I was trying to hang with started slowing down and eventually I flew past on the straight aa they were crawling. I honestly think they ran out of fuel.

Finished around 32 seconds behind the winner and 8 secs behind P2 and 3. Everyone from P6 downwards was lapped. Happy with that and won't run again.

 

[afc5150]

That was a pretty tense 34 laps. Only 34 as the top 3 lapped the field. Darn sandbaggers.

Q14 to P5 in a mistake-free GT2 lobby slot 1, worth 96 points.

Did 5H, 20M and 9S and really ran by myself for most of the race.

79 points in the bag and now wait for the next season.

Big thanks to all for the tips and recaps, and especially @Moose78 for all his testing and reports.

Cheers.

 

[AEther]

GT2, started Q10

Relatively uneventful race, almost like a time trial. I ran 19M-6H-10S, intending to go 20 on M but my fuel ran out early. I was also sorely tempted to try the 4 stop but I forgot the pit on lap 1 and kept going on a conventional strategy.

I had no wrecks or spins, which is better than I could say of most. I jumped five spots on lap one just from various crashes. I very nearly caught P2 on the last lap when his 12 second lead shrunk to one second but didn’t have enough to get him.

I could definitely be faster but I stuck with safety first and finished P3 for 74 points. Still, with three straight podiums this is the best success I’ve had in GTWS.

 

[ZEE]

GT3 EMEA High B lobby - 6PM SLOT - UK - RED BULL X2019 25TH ANNIV - QUALIFIED 3RD - FINISHED 4TH - TC 1 - BB-5

Woweeee, was this an intense race or what!!!

Seemed to be a massive slugfest come Turn 1, everything felt so competitive that I was t-boned on Lap 1 Turn 1 (hairpin), Brought the car back and battled my way up to 6th but this was before facing alot of pits stop early on following Villa's strategy which I adopted in this race. Went for a similar 1RH>1RM>>11 RS LAPS X3 as you read below. Some intense chasing and battling happening all over this race and course. Luckily I stayed face to face with all the rivals, to chug on but this played much diffrently to the actual GTWS race. I had to accidentality pit last lap to recover my tyres as the RS kept getting shredded on each stint. I could not achieve a 3 change on RS tyres. Luckily my fuel held up. The only way I managed a solid 4th was due to another French driver gettign a huge 1min penalty for no pitting.

Overall a good race but now the X2019 has way more twitchyness handling now, to talkabout in this new physics model so far. I am doing well in my class and now that it is all done, let see how the points accumulate for the overall finish and see where I sat in the cup and netting 4mill in creds.

Spoiler: ROUND 4 RACE PICS

 

[dazdilly75]

Well, I'm glad that's over. I've never driven the RB competition in GTWS because it's a car I despise. I literally just participated to see how it would go. Qualified in a surprising 7th and for some reason I completely abandoned my strategy and went 21 RM, 10 RS, 4 RH. It cost me 5 places and I finished the race in 12th.

Overall, I've really enjoyed this GTWS season and the Nations has given us a varied amount of cars and driving styles to challenge us. There is no escaping the RB, but I got what I needed (points) and that's enough for me. It's been my highest ever finish in an exhibition season. Seems like I'm getting better with age!? Thanks for all the help and opinions from you guys, which makes it even more enjoyable to participate in these events.

8 million credits for my troubles! Not a bad few weeks!

 

[Moose78]

A frustrating day at the track...

Attempt 1: GT2 - North America - 12 PM EDT - 163 points available - Door #3 - Q7 (1:07.894)

I started on RH tires, planning a three-stop 1RH-12RM-11RS-11RS. I managed to survive lap 1 unscathed and dove into the pits for RMs. Only one other driver was trying the same.

The trouble came on lap 2. There was a yellow flag through the tunnel in sector 2 with a couple of ghosted cars, which I happily drove through to pick up a couple positions. As I approached the final corner, there was a very slow moving car with a 4-second penalty on the left of the track. (Checking the replay, they had engine damage. Yikes!) I moved to the right to get by them, but just as I approached, they swerved in front of me. I had no time to react and smashed into the back of the car, which resulted in my own 4-second penalty and damage. More incidents followed as I limped along the track . It took until lap 8 to finally clear the damage.

Despite the mess early on, I still managed a P6 finish for 130 points and a 1.5% increase to my DR A progress, taking it to 14.9%. I felt like I could do better, so I went for another attempt.


Attempt 2: GT2 - North America - 1 PM EDT - 127 points available - Door #2 - Q2 (1:07.672)

A weaker field for this race meant that even a win couldn't beat my point total in my previous attempt.

I started on RM tires, planning a 12RM-1RH-11RS-11RS strategy. It was working great. The Q1 driver chose to start on RS tires an sailed away. Chaos behind ensured that I had plenty of space to run my laps.

Everything was going peachy until lap 27. I was in a fight for the lead. We'd both gone in the pits on lap 24. I was on RS. They were on RH. It should have been easy to get by, but for some reason I wasn't able catch up on the straights. Of course they were horribly slow through the twisty bits of sectors 2 and 3, which allowed the P3 car, who was also on RS tires, to catch up. They had no patience and barged their way through, pushing me into the barrier at T11 for all kinds of damage, which took until lap 30 to finally clear up.

By that time, I'd given up another position. Finished P4 for 111 points and a 2.1% increase to my DR A progress, taking it to 17.0%. I did manage Fastest Lap and Clean Race, though, so I guess that's something.

Anyway. Let's try again...


Attempt 3: GT2 - North America - 2 PM EDT - 143 points available - Door #2 - Q2 (1:08.048)

I was getting a little tired of driving at this point and could only muster a mediocre qualifying time. I decided to start on RHs for a 1RH-12RM-11RS-11RS strategy.

This time, the good times lasted until lap 16. I was on RS tires trying to get by another driver on RMs. They went deep at T13. I tried to seize the opportunity to get by. I was well along side them (pictured above) into T14. They turned in earlier than I expected and I ran into them. We both got bumper and suspension damage. I felt it was my fault, so I stayed behind them, planning to stay there until the damage cleared. Of course, with the Championship damage that would be more than a lap. And in that time, the driver behind caught up and pushed each of us into the wall as they barged their way by. It took until lap 20 to clear the damage.

Surprisingly, I was still in the fight. When all of the pitting was done, I was in P3 and gaining on the P2 driver on RMs with every lap. I finally caught up on lap 33, planning to make an overtake on the start/finish straight. Unfortunately, I was following too closely and bumped them in the final corner, giving us both bumper damage.

That opened the door to the P4 driver, who passed us both. I had an opportunity on the final lap to pass the now P3 car, but it was my fault they had lost P2, so I gave them a bump draft instead and followed them to the finish line.

Another P4 finish for 127 points for a 3.0% increase to my DR A progress, taking it to 19.9%. I still feel like I could do better, but that's more than enough. Clearly a clean race is not in the cards for me today.

I was really hoping for a good result today. Going into this round I was 2nd place in GT2 North America. A good result could have put me on top. Oh, well. So it goes.

 

[gonjaman3000]

Hi. Did anyone try using the fuel management to shorten the refueling time in the pits?


I gave it a shot on my 2nd attempt. But the bumper damage I found on lap 14 or so lasted nearly half the race. The loss of front downforce is a serious thing here.

 

[GOTMAXPOWER]

Champion of Birmingham! 🥳

I quite like these Red Bull races, it's a steering wheel car so you're never going to have the raw pace to properly contend on a controller but because it's so nervous on the power you can always get a decent result if you find your pace and don't make mistakes.

Since the update a couple of months ago the tyre delta has been huge, that makes strategy a lot more interesting because the softs are 3-4 seconds a lap faster than the hards. You have to work out where to slot in that single lap by checking the map to see where the gaps are and where you will come out of the pits, the time to take fuel plays a part in that too. I ran 17M, 1H, 8S, 9S.

The first stint was a bit frustrating because I was stuck behind somebody who was on the same strategy and just couldn't get enough of a run to pass, that burned the rear tyres off with wheelspin exiting the hairpin but they held on just long enough to make it into the pit window, at the same time you have people who qualified miles behind flying through on softs because suddenly they're 1s a lap faster instead of slower which took quite a few innocents out in the first race. Once things spread out it's a totally different race, just settle in and find the flow and see where you end up once everybody gets that hard lap out the way, for me that was P5 (could've been 4th if I had pushed the issue in the first stint but it felt risky).

The points system in these championships is not good in my opinion, I've dropped down to DR A over the last couple of months with the BoP issues in the daily races but then score more points finishing top 5 in a 50k lobby than I would finishing 10th in a 60k one, I know that's why they've added the 100 point bonus to top split but it doesn't feel very fair to the majority of players below that who are being outscored by worse/slower players.

 

[Moose78]

A pretty good result for me in the end. Held on to 2nd place. I'll take it.

The rainy race at Fuji was the most fun of the bunch for me. The classic car race had the potential to be really fun, too. It's too bad the cars weren't more evenly balanced for it. The Gr.3 race at Interlagos was okay fun, too, but I would have rather seen some other category or one-make race. Gr.3 is way overused. I enjoyed the final round, too. Lots of strategy options. A good length. I just wish I could have executed it better.

Both of my accounts are now firmly in DR A. If a new season of Manufacturers Cup is announced soon, it looks like I'll be competing in GT1, which because of the limited time slots means I'll only be able to compete with one account. Or maybe that's going to be it for the year. We'll see.

As always, thanks to everybody here for making the season fun! I always enjoy talking strategy and reading about your races. Until next season...

 

[Mumster]

GT1 9pm EDT. On the road on a controller on a hotel WiFi via remote play. Q14 P13. I was just happy the connection didn’t drop. 😂