Tuning Vs Driver Skill

[Garage13]

I like many have been playing the GT series for a while.Me and a few friends of mine have had a lenghy discussion on the subject due to the fact we were attempting to create a series of races where all drivers are balanced out in their cars.My friends were like me good at suspension tuning but they were better as far as consistency goes.Me on the other hand who is a member of a Drag team(Velocity Tuners) excell at transmission tuning and i was anywhere from 5-20 mph faster on the straights than any of my friends.Because my transmissions are beating them by that much and they are trying to regulate me to where i'm on par with them,this brings me to the question of who has the bigger advantage.The person who knows how to tune well or the person who knows how to drive well

 

[JR98]

I like many have been playing the GT series for a while.Me and a few friends of mine have had a lenghy discussion on the subject due to the fact we were attempting to create a series of races where all drivers are balanced out in their cars.My friends were like me good at suspension tuning but they were better as far as consistency goes.Me on the other hand who is a member of a Drag team(Velocity Tuners) excell at transmission tuning and i was anywhere from 5-20 mph faster on the straights than any of my friends.Because my transmissions are beating them by that much and they are trying to regulate me to where i'm on par with them,this brings me to the question of who has the bigger advantage.The person who knows how to tune well or the person who knows how to drive well

Depends. Some tracks a better tune will work but some tracks it's more down to the driver

 

[eran0004]

Well, why don't you test it:

1. You and your friends take a car fully stock and have a race. Compare the lap times, see how big the difference is.
2. Do it again, but this time allow for tuning. Compare the lap times, see how big the difference is.

That should give you a pretty good idea.

 

[PJTierney]

It largely depends on what cars and tracks people are racing at.

There are two different kinds of sim racers in my opinion; those that have natural talent and can deal with whatever car they have and eventually go quick in it, and those that are moderately quick, but need to put in a lot of practice and develop a car that they are comfortable with and can go faster in.

In both fields you will find extremes. There are "alien drivers" that can take any car and go impressively quick. There are also master tuners who have the skill to drive a car, but have set up one that allows them to go far, far quicker than a stock tune.

There are also drivers that are a bit of both, having enough driving talent to go fast but enough tuning knowledge to push themselves to go even faster.

So to answer your question, it varies; depending on the event a "driver" or a "tuner" will be faster but there is a large gray area where people do a bit of both to succeed. In my opinion supreme driving talent will win out overall, but a good driver with a lot of technical knowledge can occasionally succeed. Both are legitimate ways of winning.

 

[NixxxoN]

What about both? My tuning skills are not as good as driving skills but by learning a couple of things about suspension tuning, you can improve the cars a lot, and the most important, you can tune them to suit YOUR driving style, unlike random internet tunes, that maybe can work for you or maybe can't.

Anyway I think its 75% driving skills, 25% car tuning.

 

[JR98]

What about both? My tuning skills are not as good as driving skills but by learning a couple of things about suspension tuning, you can improve the cars a lot, and the most important, you can tune them to suit YOUR driving style, unlike random internet tunes, that maybe can work for you or maybe can't.

Yeah, I'm decent with transmission and suspension tuning but anything else I'm crap at. And my driving is pretty decent as well

 

[lGNAl]

Wanted to start a thread with the same topic for a while. Anyways.

The thing is you have two points that have to be oppositely equal. For example, driver X is at 100% tuning skills and 50% driving skills. Driver Y is at 50% tuning skills and 100% driving skills.

Now, the tracks come into play. With an oval track; Daytona for example; driver X should win. With a more difficult track like Nurburgring, driver Y should win.

But its not as simple as that. The minor differences come into play. While driver X might be a better driver overall, Y could be better at driving a certain type of car better than X. Or X can tune the gears or suspension better in some other types of cars.

So there's a lot to consider. Even more than what I mentioned.

@eran0004 Considering they are very consistent drivers. Otherwise its hard. One mistake here or there could cost a second or more.

BTW, Ayrton Senna didn't know how to tune or test to tune his race-cars. Prost did the testing and Senna went with whatever it was. And Prost "should" know the car better since he drove it a lot for tuning. But Ayrton would win anyways.

 

[watermelon punch]

The thing is you have two points that have to be oppositely equal. For example, driver X is at 100% tuning skills and 50% driving skills. Driver Y is at 50% tuning skills and 100% driving skills.

Now, the tracks come into play. With an oval track; Daytona for example; driver X should win. With a more difficult track like Nurburgring, driver Y should win.

I take it you've never done much oval racing.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

Driving skills and consistency is key. You can easily pick up a good tune even if you know nothing about tuning but if you can't drive then no tune is going to be enough.

That said having a really good tune can make a lesser driver more competitive but it is not a substitute for driving skills.

 

[NixxxoN]

Yeah, I'm decent with transmission and suspension tuning but anything else I'm crap at. And my driving is pretty decent as well

What do you mean by "anything else" ? Suspension is by far the hardest tuning part in the game, and if you take out suspension and transmission, what's there left? Ballast, brakes and aero?

 

[MidFieldMaven]

Like @lGNAl said, Ayrton didn't tune. He raced. He pushed himself lap after lap and was never satisfied.

 

[Draggon]

Thats a good question... all I know for certain is that a good tune can get me up to 4 seconds a lap quicker, even on a small track like Brands Hatch. Maybe that means I am a crap driver.

 

[Johnnypenso]

As an avid tuner who won a couple of F.I.T.T. tuning contests in my day, I'm going to say that the finer points of tuning are dramatically overrated and by far the most important thing is driver skill. The basics of tuning are very easy and just about any good driver knows these basics. The right gear ratios, add the "free" parts that don't cost any PP, add certain parts to maximize power output and then most good drivers know what adjustments to make to get a car to rotate through toe, LSD tuning, springs, ballast and brake balance, and you're 99.5% of the way home. Most importantly, really good drivers can make the car do what they want it to do, within reason of course, whereas ordinary or average drivers cannot and just accept what the car gives them. That's what separates the aliens from the rest of us, that ability to make a car dance, while the rest of us are just shuffling our feet to the music.

An average driver with a good tune will never beat a good driver with an average tune. The difference in skill levels in sim racing is huge, one only need look at TT results and you can see there's a huge separation even amongst the top few hundred. Take this TT for example:

Nearly 50,000 entries:

1st 1:47.2
13th +1 second
73rd +2 seconds
199th +3 seconds
502nd +4 seconds

Within the top 1% of entrants, you're already at 4 seconds a lap difference. You can do whatever you like with the car tuning wise, you will never, ever, ever make up that 4 second gap..or three...or two..or likely even one.

 

[lGNAl]

I take it you've never done much oval racing.

Use to in GT5 and was quite good at it. Did tune the cars suspension a little by making it a little softer for Daytona (I don't know how to tune that well but it worked for me), but the transmission I always kept top speed at 390kmph with stock aerodynamics. On average I would end up 3rd or 4th. But I never went back to ovals in GT6.

 

[JR98]

What do you mean by "anything else" ? Suspension is by far the hardest tuning part in the game, and if you take out suspension and transmission, what's there left? Ballast, brakes and aero?

Mainly differential I'm crap at. And im only decent at an overall tune. I couldn't do any specific tune for a car

 

[Jaywalker]

When F1 cars were still F1 cars... *sigh*

 

[GT_Alex74]

Driving is difficult, but if you drive a lot, you get the reactions printed in your memory and muscles, and it becomes quite easy from your point of view - though it can be a matter of years of regular practice.

Tuning is difficult, and it requires physics, mechanic and driving knowledge. People build supercomputers to create and improve race cars. And then, the drivers come in and tell the engineers it handles like ****.


In the end, if we only speak about tuning cars at the exact same specs, and taking the whole lot of drivers, then it comes primarily to driving skills. More to gain on here, plus, good drivers tend to understand better the settings and their effects.

Now, if we take a league of relatively close drivers (with which the 107% time to qualify would work), then tuning could make up for some differences.

If we take into account different cars in that league, then... the cars can make a greater difference than drivers. But which one is better can change according to the track and conditions.

I personally think driver wins, because there is such a huge gain possible to make with skills, you really can't expect how much until you've been destroyed by a pro or assimilated. But improving your skills also comes to driving a variety of different cars - though tuning also requires tons of driving if you don't rely on supercomputers.

And also, beating STI 10 and Megane RS downhill with a stock NA MX-5 makes you think you did not do that because of the car's performances

 

[KazaMR2]

I think I may as well put in a point, I find that driving skill helps more than tuning. Even on SSR7 you need a good amount of skill there. For example I beat a guy in a nearly fully tuned R34, when in my SW20 with almost half the HP. But on the other hand it may have been my tune on the MR2 as I feel I perfected the transmission for that stage.

I'd say it is more skill over tuning either way though, as I play at SSR7 almost all the time and rarely ever lose. Yet tuning does count at about a 25% ratio. Well that's what I think anyway.

 

[eran0004]

@eran0004 Considering they are very consistent drivers. Otherwise its hard. One mistake here or there could cost a second or more.

Yes, but the ability to avoid making mistakes is part of the driving skill, isn't it? The less skilled driver will make more mistakes than the skilled driver and since skill is beaing measured, why not measure the mistakes as well?

 

[NLxAROSA]

IMO, no amount of tuning will get you to the top of the leaderboard, only driver skill/consistency will.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

IMO, no amount of tuning will get you to the top of the leaderboard, only driver skill/consistency will.

Actually to get to the top you need both skill and a good tune.
I did a lot of tuning on Forza and using my tunes I know several who managed to post top 100 times, some top 10s and a few #1s. I created a tune in the first few days of FM4 that I was able to post the #1 time on Indy with and put it up for sale. I received several PMs from people who bought the tune and were able to post their first top 100 time with it. Some of these drivers were not all that good but the car I built was faster than anything that had been out there at that point and due to the way it was tuned was easy to drive flatout. The first full lap I drove it there I posted a time that was 2.5 seconds faster than the #1 time at the time so the first guys to buy it found that top 10 was a piece of cake.

 

[Draggon]

There was a seasonal super lap awhile back ( I dont remember which one ) where I barely got gold the 2nd or 3rd lap. I tried and tried to improve my time but even tweaking my tune didnt get me more than a half second. Then I plugged in someones tune, maybe Praino, and I went to the top 1000 or so until the last few days of the seasonal. Hence this theory:

A great tune can make a poor driver look good, but a bad tune can show what a great driver can do.

 

[MidFieldMaven]

A great tune can make a poor driver look good, but a bad tune can show what a great driver can do.

I'd replace the word "tune" with the word "car" but both ways work.

 

[pasigiri]

IMHO ...

Taking a stock car and driving it consistently fast takes skill. But when tuning is introduced, it comes down to one's preferred driving style.

 

[GT_Alex74]

But when tuning is introduced, it comes down to one's preferred driving style.

There are different ways of improving a car, and you can try to make it fit your style. But there's only one fastest setup, and it's generally not the easiest one.

 

[pasigiri]

There are different ways of improving a car, and you can try to make it fit your style. But there's only one fastest setup, and it's generally not the easiest one.

Although I see what you are saying, I'm not so sure. Since we are all different, one size can't fit all. Basically, the tool and tune must be in harmony with the user for optimal usage.

 

[ODB]

There are different ways of improving a car, and you can try to make it fit your style. But there's only one fastest setup, and it's generally not the easiest one.

Yeah, really good example from resent Bathurst TT was how low DF levels top guys were running, really impossible to me to handle so loose car trough out the whole lap so I had to "settle" wit bit more DF making the car bit too sticky in corners and loosing a hair of time on straights naturally... So seems to me that rather than making the setup to suite your driving style particularly, more important is to make the car suite your driving skill 👍 So even if there were certain ways to make the car faster by tuning it, the truth is that it will always take huge driving skill to be able to handle the car on it's absolute limit through out the whole lap (not even talking about some hour long online race or something )... Sometimes even power setups can affect so much to cars handling that I may have to settle with engine stage 3 instead of high turbo foe example, even though on high turbo I could be faster, I just get too freaking frustrated for that turbo kicking me out of shape all the time

So yeah, what difference the tune makes, if I can't even handle it and there really is guys out there who can make those top times pretty much no matter how you setup the car, they will just simply adapt..

 

[Garage13]

as I stated before taking into account the driver not being average(since there isn't such a thing as average)I'll admit that ODB does have a valid point as with everyone else who's posted(Thanks).I personally feel I'm fast in a car that I know well that won't pull the rug out from under you as you push the car. Yes a driver who has more talent may be able to go faster in the same exact tune,but that same exact tune may slow the driver with more talent because he or she may normally have the car set up for looser or tighter handling depending on preference.I have heard of a saying "You can tune your chassis and gain 100hp" as opposed to fiddling with the engine. You can get faster with a tune that suits your driving skill and comfort level.

I will also agree with pasigiri the tool and the tune must be one to get the most out of it

 

[Imari]

There are different ways of improving a car, and you can try to make it fit your style. But there's only one fastest setup, and it's generally not the easiest one.

I'm not sure I agree.

The fastest setup is the one that makes you go the fastest, and that's not the same for everyone. It's true in the sense that there's only one person who's the fastest, and therefore their setup is the fastest one. But I don't think that's terribly helpful because that particular setup might not be the fastest for the second fastest person.

 

[HBR-Roadhog]

Yep, some people can take a car with a lot of oversteer and tear a track up with it getting just a little drift when needed and flying through corners where other drivers would not be able to handle it so they would either have to drive it slower or crash. Those drivers would likely be faster if the setup had a bit less oversteer but still slower than the driver who can handle and use the oversteer to his/her advantage.