Changes to UKGTL beginning January 2023

[Wiltshire Tony]

In May 2021 I posted that I would retire from my UKGTL Admin role. ( https://www.simracing.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=25571.msg498551#msg498551 ).

However, it seems the power of UKGTL is strong in this one, so I will continue to do GTL racing series, but only for Monday night's, dovetailing with Lasse's legacy NoGrip series.

Therefore, there will no longer be UKGTL racing on Wednesday's in 2023.

This is good for me as it gives me less to do. It also allows those that want to, to partake in the Wednesday night Assetto Corsa events.

[phspok]

That is a huge loss, but I know how you feel. I only have limited patience for running
events these days. I am running a new series mostly for our Italian friends on Thursdays
starting this week with R3E, perhaps a few GTLers might come along to make it more multinational.

[Geoffers]

Good to hear you are not retiring Tony. I was seriously considering finishing with GTL at the end of this year but now I will almost certainly carry on with it & Mondays suit me fine. Since Thursdays RRE, Wednesdays AC & Sundays RRE/AC all seemed to fall by the wayside this summer I have been racing (mainly RRE) elsewhere & as the numbers of people racing are much better than they were here I have to say I have found it more enjoyable. I will however be joining the new RRE series starting this week to get a good look at the rear bumpers of several fast Italians   . As I don't seem to get on very well with AC (everyone who races AC here is far too fast for me), I doubt very much I will join their races very often. So it will be Mondays GTL & Thursdays RRE here for me. See ya all on track.  

[SpecialKS]

Nice to hear that there still will be GTL events next year   & you will not retire  .
You have always done a great job over the years  .

Mondays suit me fine and I'll be there.

Installed AC last year and tried some days to race offline, but I had the feeling that I am even less
able to tune a car there than in GTL   , although there are also many historical cars for AC, which I like.

So - see you on Mondays on track.

[EvilClive]

Many thanks for your organisational efforts over the years Tony. Also, for your patience around a certain individual's technical issues 

I still intend to be involved on Mondays as I enjoy Lasse's tintops and the series that Tony gives us.

TBH I'm not sure about getting involved in a new sim and all of the inevitable learning curve stuff. I have been invited by a couple of ex GPL'ers to start Assetto Corsa and I have also tried the "free" stuff from Steam in RRE.

Geoffers' comments about numbers in RRE sounds attractive, so I might give that a look.
 

[Daz9]

Kind of a mixed bag of news then!

More than happy to still do the Monday, I've really come to enjoy my time back racing online, and the people here are a big part of that of course.

Massive thanks for all that you have done over the years Tony. I remember reading the name of 'Wiltshire Tony' many, many, many moons ago, so you have been a presence for a long time. Being from the better county just up the road I even have learnt to cut you slack at being from Wiltshire, so you must be a top fella.....

What to do Wednesdays going forward then is the question. Clive, I have not raced with Geoff in RRE away from here as of yet, but the sim itself is nice for sure, I think it has got great FFB and physics, and does have some historical content, and I have had fun on it whenever I have ventured online.

I won't personally bother with AC unless someone convinces me otherwise, some cracking cars in it but I never really warmed to it in terms of the way it felt.

I have recently taken and passed the license test on Low Fuel Motorsport, and therefore can compete in their ranked servers in ACC. They are running a scoring thing much like you have at iracing, safety rating etc. Not done any yet, but I do quite like the sim to be honest, the FFB and the tire model feels about where I think it should be, not that I know anything really, and the sounds and graphics are really good. No historical content though, which does grate on me.

We need a GTL2 badly.

[Geoffers]

TBH I'm not sure about getting involved in a new sim and all of the inevitable learning curve stuff. I have been invited by a couple of ex GPL'ers to start Assetto Corsa and I have also tried the "free" stuff from Steam in RRE.

Geoffers' comments about numbers in RRE sounds attractive, so I might give that a look.
 

Quite a decent amount of historical content in RRE Clive & I have come to enjoy most of the modern stuff too. I am sure you would be most welcome on Thursdays, only downside being you may have to purchase quite a lot of content to do the whole series. The BMWs this week are quite good fun & not too quick & the NSUs next week are a real laugh.

[EvilClive]

Perhaps this is not the place on the forum to discuss moving to other sims lol....but...

 Quite liked the look of Low Fuel Motorsport, but first impressions are that it is still Assetto but with an iRacing overlay of driver grading?

RRE is one where I have tried some free content via Steam. RFacor2 has some appeal with more historic(ish) stuff.

But the bottom line on all this is that I want to race historic cars with all their faults and foibles and not aerodynamic  tupperware with slick tyres 

 As Daz says " we need a GTL2!!"

At least GPL is still going strong lol.

[Erling G-P]

Well you have certainly earned it Tony, a huge big thank you for all your dedicated work over the many years is wholly inadequate.

Been thinking long and hard about retiring from GTL & simracing myself these last few years, but will see if I can attend the Monday events.  Haven't done any of Lasse's series so far, mostly because of finding the amount of classes & cars involved quite bewildering.

[Wiltshire Tony]

Perhaps this is not the place on the forum to discuss moving to other sims lol....but...

As good a place as any Clive IMO.

I find RRE expensive and has too much "modern" content. I mean, browse the cars and they all look the same. Also it has no 3rd party mods so will not last IMO.

AC has loads of historic content, mainly by 3rd party's and would be my choice.

I hadn't heard of "Low Fuel Motorsport" so cannot comment.

[Daz9]

Low Fuel are doing ACC and RF2 Tony.

I have both but thus far have only put any effort into ACC, despite it being modern stuff only. Did my first online race in their tiered licence system last night in the rookie class and didn't see too much trouble.

RRE is expensive, I agree. But, the historic stuff in it is very, very well done I would say. There just isn't enough of it.

[Geoffers]

Yes, RRE is expensive if you buy all of it, but you can save money by buying car & track packs & purchasing VRP from the RaceRoom website in advance, this saves a bit of money over buying content in game. Obviously you need to own the track you are going to race on but you only need to buy the car/livery you are going to drive, you do not need to buy any of the cars you are competing against.

I won't compare RRE against GTL, clearly there is no competition if you want to drive old cars, GTL has by far the biggest range of old cars of any sim out there, the trouble is there are only a few sim drivers out there who want to drive a 17 year old sim.

AC has quite a lot of historic content, mainly mods, some of which are very good, some rubbish, & although I have raced AC both here & elsewhere, like Daz I am still not a big fan of it. Default setups are usually not good & personally I have yet to figure out how to make decent setups in AC. I also find it more difficult to drive than RRE & GTL & it punishes errors more, although I have heard that pro drivers consider it the most realistic in that regard. In my opinion because RRE & GTL are easier & more forgiving to drive, they produce better racing for us amateurs.

Regarding setups RRE does have the option of forcing the use of default setups. We don't use that here but both the other communities I race with do run most of their races using fixed setups & personally I really like it as you can concentrate on the driving without having to attempt to get the ideal setup.

I also have ACC, but I am even worse in that than I am in AC, & so I understand you need to be a bit of a setup wizard to get the best out of it & tyre pressures in particular can make a huge difference to laptimes. Maybe Daz could comment on that. I have not tried any of the other sims out there so cannot comment on them.

[Daz9]

I'm no whizz on setups, anyone trying one of my possibly slightly outlandish ones for GTL can attest to that...but, I have found that the Aggressive setup option (there is also Safe and Wet options) in ACC gives me something that I can normally work with, then it's a case of getting the tires to be around 27psi when racing as I understand it to be in the sweet spot. It will absolutely affect laptimes if the tires are way out, but I can say from experience that it also feels bloody horrible to drive. FFB gets set using the recommended option in Fanalab. It is all modern stuff though, but the GT4s do move around under you quite a lot if you like that kind of thing.

For RRE, as Geoffers said, buying the VRP and using that to either only buy single items, or packs when they are offer, seems to be the cheapest way to get into it. I do enjoy the feel through the wheel on that sim, but unlike Geoffers I get frustrated at the default setups, and if the natural state of a car is to not be very reactive at the front with a fair bit of understeer, I am just slow in all honesty. And then I overdrive, and then spin, etc etc etc. I do very much like the 90s DTM cars, epic sounds to go with them, and the NSU TT is also great fun. There are many cars that I still have not tried in all honesty.

There is a mass of stuff to try it seems, but not that much that caters directly for those of us that prefer the older cars. Currently on my PC I have installed

RRE
AC
ACC
Automobilista 2
rFactor2
Project Cars 2 (some historical content in there to be fair, but I feel the quality is patchy on some of the cars in the physics)
Dirt Rally
Dirt Rally 2.0
Wreckfest (kudos for hilarity)

And yet, I still pine for P&G, and spend most of time actually racing in GTL. That is going to change with these changes inevitably but paints its own picture of those titles.

I repeat, we need a GTL2. I don't believe for a second that there would be no uptake of it. They could start with 60s BSCC such as seen at Goodwood in the St. Marys trophy, then have dlc packs of 80s BTCCs, 90s DTMs, 50s GTs, 60s Le Mans, 90s Group C.....the list would be almost endless, it seems a sure-fire winner on the business model front, but what do I know. In fact, just someone make 'Goodwood Revival - The Sim' and I would probably die happy....

[phspok]

I thought you turned up at a R3E event once Daz? could be wrong.
This series of Riccardo's would suit you to the ground, lots of fast Italians to test your mettle against 
I used to post basic setups on the event page. If it helps anyone, I will do that in future, though mine are
a bit faster than defaults, but "Easy Listening" rather than super aggressive.

[Daz9]

Yes Matt, I did do one race, at Shanghai in the 911GT3 from memory. I think RRE really does feel good, don't get me wrong, but Thursdays can be difficult so lost the thread on the races here, maybe I will look again if another series is going to be ongoing.