SimRacing.org.uk

Grid/server capacity: 22

Track: Thermalito (Full circuit) Download this (https://www.simracing.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=3358.msg203765#post_thermalito)

Cars allowed: Shelby Mustang Boss 302 Download this (http://gizmo71.www.idnet.com/srou/ukgtl/cars/SRou_GTL_69Boss302Mustang_1.1.0.0.exe)

Practice: ~19:20 (60 mins)
Qualifying: 20:20 (20 mins)
Race: 20:40 (18 laps)

Time of Day Setting: 14:00
Start: STANDING
Tyre wear: Normal
Fuel consumption: Normal

Server: simracing.org.uk Monday
Password: see above (#post_event_password)

Notes:
(1) It's best if all drivers can make sure they are connected before the Qualifying session as drivers on track during qualifying will not see cars that join after they are on track until they go back to the garage.
(2) Please make sure you are fully aware of the SimRacing.org.uk Rules.
(3) The AI control should be turned off so that you have control of the car at all times, including pitting. Your player file should therefore read
Autopit="0"
Force Autopit Off="1" // Forces autopit always off
No AI Control="1" // AI never has control over car
If you still finding pitting problematic, experience tells us that its less to do with positioning and more to do with approach speed. A slow approach to pit crew chief has proved most reliable.

Special Notes: None

Race length increased to 18 laps

Masochist!  :devil:
One of Leggsy's fave tracks. A bit hard work with these tanks  :helpsmilie:

This circuit is a new name for me, so I suspect that I ought to take a look at this track.

Unfortuantely I am away from Thursday evening until late Sunday evening on a petrol heads weekend with my friend. We are covering Donnington, Santa Pod, Rockingham and possibly Stock car racing at Kings Lynn as an added bonus on Saturday night.

 So, even if I am back I might be suffering from racing overload and chronic alcohol fatique  ::) It might be late Monday before I get a chance to d/load and run a few laps to learn this track, so I might opt to start at the back of the grid and have my excursions from the tarmac away from any witnesses!!! :-\

Sounds great Clive, have a great time.

Re: the track. You don't have to worry...........it's virtually an oval circuit, quite flat and with nothing hard to crash into.  :shifty:

 :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

I get the sense from this that Tony might have witheld a detail or two about the track..  :D

(Time to take a look methinks)

Do have a good time Clive!

Cheers,
Erling

Well (very) broadly speaking Tony covered it.

It is oval in the sense that one end joins the other.

There are certainly parts of it that are flat.

The concrete walls are made out of soft (ish) material.....................well concrete actually!

Oh, and there is a tunnel!  :laugh:  Oops, got that bit wrong, two tunnels.

I envy you Clive and I hope you do have some energy in reserve for Monday evening. My last trip to Santa Pod was way back in 85 when I was very lucky to see Sammy Miller do a sub 4 sec run in his legendary Vanishing Point, something I will never forget.

And a spiral ramp down into one of the tunnels, and chicanes with awkward exits, and tight corners that will
catch out the unwary.... a nasty tight uphill left onto the start finish.. oh, I could go on, and on, and on....

You forgot to say that the most interesting part is the exit from the second tunnel, here there is no need to touch the brake pedal

No, the wall does a bang up job helping you with slowing down.. ;D

Cheers,
Erling

You are right and the best thing is that so you can finish your lap with just the front wheels so your car weighs half and earns 2 seconds dry (http://www.vocinelweb.it/faccine/biggrin/48.gif)

We have run this track before in GTL but as they were both "fun" races the records are not kept.

As this is the first championship here a lap record is a certainty.

It s a great ground for Geoffers then (http://www.vocinelweb.it/faccine/varie/pag2/60.gif)

Yes, isn't it great ? - Absolutely love it!  ;D   Opinion may change though, once 18 laps worth of wear is put on the tyres..  ;)

Cheers,
Erling

I am reading this about 30 mins before I hit the road, and I feel that Tony may have been economical with the truth?  :-\

Too late to take a look now  ??? so it sounds like Monday evening might not be my finest race   :blink:

This track reminds me of Loch Rannoch, our Lawrence Clemo race almost two years ago.

It also reminds me of my Scalextric setup when I was slightly younger........ :D

Great track - nearly forgotten. Fun to drive - but only tested another car just released over at Evo-Modding  ;D. The Boss is still to come.
Hope to make this one wearing a kind of a corset against the back pain  :)

Hope your back gets better soon Kurt.  The Boss is a blast on this track, so you have something to look forward to  :)

Cheers,
Erling

 :offtopic:

New poll here (https://www.simracing.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=14378.msg260567#msg260567)

 :offtopic:

Tony Server show race length as 16 laps not 18!  ::)  :rockon:

Thanks Bill, server now fixed  :-[

OK....HA! HA! HA! ??? Thanks Tony  :P         Just downloaded this track, and took a look at it for the first time from the driving seat. :scared:

Ziu mentioned 2 tunnels...I am sure I counted a 3rd on my first lap, but it had vanished by lap 2???!!!  ??? so disorientating.


Lost count of the many camber changes and blind approaches to corners/barriers/chicanes/tunnels that will end a race very quickly around this circuit..... I know I tried all of them at least twice in around 5 laps!! Plus I have to memorise this track somehow by 8:15 this evening AND work out how a Mustang is meant to fit ( at anything approaching racing speed) through the tight sections?????

Just how Tony could throw this at me, after I had experienced a great weekend watching all kinds of motorsport leaving me feeling quite exhausted but with a smile on my face, I do not comprehend. I suspect he does not like me  :'(

I might try and post a couple of pics from the various venues we attended....if I can master the tekky bits and get them onto the forum  :-\

Hey, at least it's not a night race.

For pics you need to join a free hosting company, I use Photobucket but there are others out there. So upload your pics. Then you can get a direct link for each picture. Open a new post and select the "Insert Image". It's under the Italic I. Put your direct link between the words img {img]link[/img}

Sorry it's so late in the day but unfortunately I'm not going to make this. (99.5% certainty)

Have fun guys looks like a a pretty demanding track in these beasts I would have like to have given this one a go. :(

TTFN
John.
 

Replay and results now posted

This track has gone straight to my list of favorites; find it to be an absolutely exhilarating drive  :)

Knocked a couple of tenths off my pb in qual, but Geoffers was clearly operating on a completely different cosmic plane, being 2 full secs faster  :blink:  Ziu unsurprisingly was faster too, by a sec, but his race laptime suggests he could have taken it even further.

Didn't make a very good start, and when the smoke had cleared after T1, I was down to 5th, as both Matt & Mike Harley had slipped through.  Looked as if the leaders were getting away, so had to find a way past Mike quickly.  Went for the inside at the final hairpin on L1, but overshot somewhat, giving Mike a chance for the classic dive under manoeuvre.  I still got a faster exit though, so managed to stay in front.  Later on the following lap, when exiting the first tunnel, a 'Sorry' from Ziu and two stationary cars meant I was now in 2nd, as he and Matt had a coming together.

Knew I was running on borrowed time, and it would not take long before a certain Italian would come storming back.  Sure enough, the gap soon dropped, as Ziu reeled me in quickly. He got past rather rudely, but I owe him a couple after hitting him twice in the previous race in the series, so no complaints  ;)

With Ziu gone, I focused on the gap back to (presumably) Matt.  Stable at first around 6.5 secs, but then dropped below 6 secs.  Pulled myself together and upped the pace, pushing the gap back to 7 secs.   Then it suddenly jumped to 23 secs, so obviously Matt had run into trouble.  Removed the immediate threat from behind, but kept going as hard as I could, in case any of the front runners should suffer problems.  Towards the final laps, the gap to Ziu started dropping, and like any Coyote smelling blood, I naturally tried to exploit it. Tyres weren't up for it anymore though; as soon as I pushed harder, I was slipping and sliding through the corners.  Gap still dropped though, so Ziu must have had even bigger problems.  Would have loved for the race to last a few more laps, but as it was, it was too little too late, so had to settle for 3rd.

Grats to Geoffers for the win, and Ziu for 2nd.  Thanks to the few drivers I lapped for making it very easy.

Anyone else have stutter problems with the graphics on this track ?  Whenever I started a session, it would be smooth, but as time and laps passed, it would start to stutter badly in places, getting increasingly worse.  Was quite bad late in the race.

Cheers,
Erling

Then you want know what was my qualy lap ? In practice I got 2:20.5. You could imagine without any problms in qualy.......but my XD not was working, this disturbed me too, one eye on the track one eye watching XD hoping that restarted to work.

The race was worst also ! A dodgems since the start and my front suspension was destroyed.

About my overtake on you, I don't  passed you rudely. When I overtake one I put him always the condition to avoid an accident or no, you choice to avoid it. If you see the replay on high view I put my car on the right space, when you were by side me you could choose to close me (accident sure) or lighten your throttle (no accident sure) and you take a wise decision. If my overtake was rude you not could have the space for decide what do, but I left it to you.

Grats to Geoffers and Erling.



I m very tired to go head so, it s better that I don't count how points I lost for several problems. But what that is frustrating me not are points but every time is hard racing with this arm and I give 120% always, 100% driving, 20% setup and after I find extra problems.
I m very tired.

In past I had some problem specially when I blocked my wheels braking because smoke but after few time was stable again. Two week ago when I replaced the HDD I added also a RAM memory 8 Gb so I have 16 Gb now and all system is improved.

Grats to Geoffers, Ziu and Erling on some impressive lap times around this challenging circuit. Matt also showed considerable pace, but he almost fell into my grasp late in the race after he made a mistake which I guess was down to tyres? But, he gathered himself together and held onto his 4th place.

After Tony's in depth description of this "easy" track, and the input from other drivers pointing out some small inconsistencies in his post, I was unsure what I would find when I downloaded the track at 4 p.m. yesterday. Tales of tunnels and spiral descents etc. proved to be more accurate than I expected, because I unwisely assumed that many of you were embellishing the truth a little  ;).
So, I had about 45 mins on track, once I had the circuit installed, before I had to leave my PC to go and prepare dinner during which time I had more or less remembered what came next and which way the corners turned. I think I managed a sub 2.30sec lap in that session.
The intention had been to get onto the server at around 7:30 and start some serious practice. Things did not work out that way, and it was almost 8:00pm before I managed to sit at my wheel. With so little time left before the race I concentrated on a race setup and ignored any thought of qualifying position, hoping to improve my braking points and lines.......this track definitely requires some serious attention in that department !!
My first tidy lap, late in qually, propelled me to 5th on the grid and that was not part of my race strategy as I was intending to lurk at the back hoping to survive and pick up places as others had problems. Preserving my tyres was also a high priority as I have a record of burning too much rubber too early.
It was fortunate that I had a relatively untroubled early race as cars behind dropped back and Mike Hartley who was ahead of me, decided to suddenly go and pick the flowers!! leaving me all alone. This allowed me to protect my tyres and drive ( relatively for me) smoothly.
I was still learning the track as the race progressed and was able to slowly improve my pace even with the tyres beginning to wear. When I came upon Matt after his incident at the entry to the tunnel I still had tyres showing green rubber and I tried to up my pace which was a mistake, because the harder I pushed, the slower I lapped and Matt eased away again.

I finished the race where I started, in 5th place, which was far better than I expected given my lack of preparation. I did grow to like this track and the challenge of linking corners/lines/braking points etc. to extract the best times. But I did end the race with tired eyes as the graphics were very poor on my PC with low FPS for the whole race and generally blurry track details, especially into the two tunnels. It was probably fortunate that I ran alone for most of the race, as a few more cars in view might have made driving impossible...the run to T1 from the grid was more guesswork than driving as the FPS was so low.......maybe time to finally upgrade from my 2gb memory?

Just i want added that to have the fluid game it's very important for get times lap fast. A game that stutter compromise seriously the lap times also with a talented driver.
In past i asked to myself why it s happened that you take pole or win sometime but you never constant, now i understood.
I m sure that you are fast driver but your PC cannot help you.

Of course changing the  RAM only cannot do a miracle, it depend from all elements. 

You think that i bought my PC just for make races, i installed just i light AV and a browser to go online. For the other things i use an HDD external that i switch on just when i need.

However If one aspire to be fast must have a fluid game without any stutter, the rest depends on his skills and his talent.

"................................. the rest depends on his skills and his talent"

This might be where the plan falls down  :-\

Moaning again, are we ?  ;D

You scored a respectable result on a difficult track, with next to no preparation - and you've been 2nd on the grid in two previous races in this series, so talent is quite obvious  ;)

With that said, 2 Gb is definitely on the low side these days.  My current, but far from new PC, which I built in 2010, has 3 x 2 GB or 6 Gb total, and that's not at all impressive anymore.  Don't know if more system memory will benefit GTL though, or if it's more down to video memory (if lack of memory explains yesterday's stutter).  Maybe Ziu can tell us if upping his system memory from 8 to 16 GB made GTL run better ?

Cheers,
Erling

I want remind to you the race on Brainerd, you not only win you beat all......Geoffers, Attila, Erling and the Worst driver also, Ziu

I have an i7 CPU, 12GB RAM, SSD drives and a brand new GPU with 8GB onboard memory and the start finish straight stuttered for me, but only online so there is a bottleneck somewhere.

Dismal race for me, sadly not in the right frame of mind for racing, so did not do well and suffered from lapses of concentration. Don't know why just didn't feel 100%. Hopefully just a mood thing and hope to be back to normal next time.

BTW my car was overheating and laying down smoke even though engine health was in the high 80's. Did not see anyone else smoking? Both Oil and water were red for most of the lap.

Nice to see MikeHarley back again, perhaps he could say Hi?

My PC was good also with 8 Gb, it had some stutter when I braked hard because smoke. With 16 Gb I improved it.

Mmmmh but I think that you wanted an other kind of answer......well,  1% depends from my right foot

What resolution are you using ? Me 1920x1080, I have i5 Gforce 740.

Maybe your bottleneck depends from your video card

My PC is an i7 cpu, 500GB SSD, 8GB ram and a NVidia card with 2 GB ram. I had no problems with lags here or on most tracks. Resolution 1920 x 1080 which is Native resolution of my 24 inch wide screen monitor.

I forgot to say that GTL work well just with one core. Who have CPU 4 core like i7 or i5 have go to BIOS and setting 1 core only, or when start GTL go to task manager and setting 1 core. I set it from BIOS

Last night's machine is i5 8gRAM, 2g GTX760, and I got stuttering on and off line at a couple of parts of the track.
I turned off shadows, and set track to medium detail, and it might have helped, not sure. The reason I gave Clive
a gift of many seconds was because (for the second time with this machine) my GTL decided to minimise to desktop.
I have no AV at all other than MS security essentials, WIndows, and everthing I know about is set to notify
about updates only. I maximised it and carried on, but was stopped sideways in the tunnel entry  :o

I have fitted a smal fan blowing at the CPU fan, and that may help, the monitoring prog I have doesn't record
anything Mt Vesuvius, so is a mystery.

First, I had no problems with running the track on my old coal-fired PC, smooth all the time.

Qually. Surprised with my qually time as I had only managed one lap under 2.23 in testing, although I could have gone a little faster as I made a couple of small mistakes in the latter half of the lap.

The race. Got a good start & appeared to have a tidy advantage into T1, but just as I was about to turn Ziu came flying past on the inside & then I got a clout from behind which pushed me wide. Not sure what happened (haven't watched the replay) but some people must have been a bit too ambitious! Mike Harley grabbed the lead & I followed him through T2 & had a look at passing into T3 but chickened out, luckily, as Ziu (who had probably got red-mist after T1) dived up the inside & didn't make the corner! Did get past Mike at T4 & made my escape while others sorted themselves out.

Had around 11s lead when Ziu got into 2nd place & started to catch me, but after another 2-3 laps the gap started to increase again. I wasn't pushing to the maximum as it is very easy with the Mustang to get into trouble, so just tried to keep it neat & tidy & hit my braking marks. Also found the engine health went down rapidly, was into the low 50s at the end, so didn't want to blow it up.

Congrats to Ziu & Erling.  :clap: :clap:

Cyas all next week.  :thumbup1:

Fun race for me.  Got caught up in the scramble in T1 at the start and ended up in second to last place.  After I got my bearings as to where I was, I got out of the sand and took off after the field.  Must say I overdrove the car a little untill the tires warmed up and had a couple of near off's.  Then made good progress as guys were racing hard against each other ahead and was to my advantage and soon caught up and got into the fight.  Passed a few and also a few dropped out so ended up with a better finish than I expected even before the race started.  Could not keep pace with Clive as usual so just drove most of the race watching the difference in time with the car behind me.   Tony's smoke screen is a mystery to me, at first I thought he had too much rear brake bias, but then as I got closer I noticed it would send out a puff every so often even on the long straights.  Weird!!!  First time on this track and grew to like it.  Being that it is ficticious I think they could have made T1 a little less hazardous......

See you all at Mosport in the beasties
Bob M.

Results (https://www.avonrise.co.uk/srou/kurts/Thermalito_01052017)

8)

What about Geoffers dropping to 8th place during lap 5 and regaining the lead in lap 6?

Noticed during offline practice, that once the car started overheating, it was difficult to get it to stop again. Happened to me after digging myself out of the sand somewhere; oil and water temp would repeatedly turn red in various places on track.

Strange with the very differing mileage with regards to stutter problems; doesn't seem to be dependent on hardware configurations.  Noticed that it's definitely accumulated in my case - a memory leak perhaps ?    - When watching the replay after the race, stutter set in and got increasingly bad after a while. Exited, reloaded the replay and skipped ahead to the place I left.  Now all was butter smooth again.

Cheers,
Erling

Well, I was enjoying that until I had to log off just before the end. It looks like I may have trouble making some of the future races for a while due to an unexpected change in family circumstances. A long story I won't bore you all with.

Just about made the race with enough time for an out lap only so started last on the grid. Made up a few places by T1 and narrowly missed being taken out by Bills flying Stang and somehow exited the turn in 8th. Made up another place a lap or so later when Steve (I think) ran wide. Then threw it all away when I put a wheel on the grass on the run down to the 2nd tunnel and then after bouncing off the Armco messed up the sharp left hander running way wide so in all lost 5 places putting me back to 12th. Managed to recover to 11th a lap or so later passing Eifelblitz and around lap 9 got past Tony and Misnoimis so was back up to 8th Spent the next few laps with Misnoimis up my chuff able to extend a small gap in places only to have him reel me back in in others a private battle which was shaping up to run to the flag. Unfortunately I had to end my race early.

Congrats to the podium, I am in awe of the times the front guys were posting where I am supposed to find 8 seconds from around here defeats me.

Thanks guys a blast as usual.

TTFN
John.
 

I had quite an enjoyable race. I managed to avoid the melee at the first corner but could not quite settle into a steady rhythm and made about four small mistakes. Slightly out breaking myself a couple of times and being a bit too enthusiastic on the gas a couple of times. I hit nothing but it probably cost me about 20 seconds overall and at my pace I can’t afford to lose time.

I did some late practice offline and was just pushing into the 2m 27s. Online In qualifying I managed 2m28s but in the race couldn’t better 2m30s. I was amazed how quick the front runners were. :o At least I wasn’t lapped thanks to the long track.

I had a few nice little races with various people. Unfortunately they either made mistakes which ended the fun or were too fast for me. I was having an interesting race with Jeep towards the end and was pushing hard to try to get him to make a mistake (as I had done earlier) when with a lap to go he pulled over (said a problem had come up) family problem ? I hope it is sorted out now.

With no one close enough for me to chase and no one close to push me from behind I just coasted in on the last lap.

Grats to winner and podiums.  :clap: I think they should  all be done for speeding.   :hang:

Yeh noticed that on XD during the race, I was going up & down the order every time I went through a timing sector. Happened for a couple of laps then cleared up, was half expecting to get discoed!  :cursing:

Thank you Kurt, hope the back's getting better.

Only this ? During the qualy the timer of my XD was blocked at 18:46. It was terrible !!!!

However during the race for two times i thought that you had some accident, XD put on first position, very confused  ::)