UKGTL Season 5 Classic Endurance Cup - Nürburgring (GP) - Apr 24

[Mark J]

Great atmospheric race last night    I felt like one of those old duffers off GT Racers Programme   Great endurance race on a great track, the E-Type felt like a proper race car with the Jag soundpack and long bonnet...totally took me back to my Mallory park day out the other week in the real thing.  

First off, apologies for the skin problems. I logged in early to book my space in the race, but left the pc un-attended until qually only to come back and find i had been disconnected For some reason there are two Legends Jags skins present, one lets me join okay but everyone else doesnt see me correctly/flashing, the other skin CTD's me as soon as i join the race. I was unaware of the problems you guys were seeing until SBG announced it and so quit and rejoined with a standard skin. Hope we can get this fixed pronto as i really like our legends Jag colours.

Race was great, real endurance in style and feel though shame i didnt have much wheel to wheel racing the entire race, apart from early good scrap with DG's Healey who got a great start off the line to get ahead of me. I need to get my TrackIR re-installed as i really couldnt see his Healey nipping in and out of me in the corners though it was good clean racing between us.
I spent the whole race between 7th & 9th chasing two cars 5 secs or so ahead. (basically the time lost in my early fight with DG). They were having a brilliant battle ahead of me but i just couldnt close the gap on them until they pitted.

..and yes you guessed it, my race was ruined by my...ta da...Pitstop !  Once again    
heaven only knows why but when i refuelled it i didnt put nearly enough in.
In my excitement of pitting whilst a giddy 3rd place after 50mins, i must have mistook fuel litres for minutes and came out of pits with only quarter of a tank in and 12 laps of 2mins racing to do. :'(
Adrenalin really does give me a brain fart in the pits

Rejoined in lame-ish 10th place, but car felt like a proper race car and fought my way back upto 7th as others late pitted. But then got low fuel light with 5 laps remaining and had to a dash and splash.  
This cost me 3 places to steve, DG and SBG in the dying minutes and i just couldnt close the gap with few laps remaining

Atmospheric lighting was fantastic as the sun set and the track lights came on  ...i  thought my graphics card had borked when i first came upon it at T2 !  I did however start to suffer some stutters and it began to cost me 2-3 secs a lap. Me-thinks i need to put my (now old) 7800GT card out to pasture and get a nice cheap 8800GT.
Congrats to podium and organisers  

[Steve Holmes]

Yeah, that was brilliant fun, apart from the skin problems.  Was a bit dubious to even start, since although MJs car was okay, I couldn't load Dan or Madd, problem with their e-type in my install, they were running invisible GT40s in my game, so was a bit worried if they came up to lap me, but I hoped I'd see their names floating above nothing!  So no qually and no test entry to the pits, leading to inevitable terrible pitstop.   

Had no idea where the speed limit line was, so tootled in all the way near the limiter and discovered the line was miles down the pitlane, bah!  Then missed my pitslot, did the back and forwards shuffle until they agreed to service me (the AI driver never had this problem, time to replace me!) and then spent ages trying to decide on fuel and figure out what the numbers meant.  All lost me around 15 seconds, from being 10 seconds or so in front of Dave, to being 5 seconds behind.  And my cunning plan of a late pitstop to jump a few cars went well out the window.   

It also meant I had to fight with Dave again, after struggling to get by earlier in the race, his Healey was quicker exiting the slow corners, really hard to pass, and very effectively driven too.  Like the first time, it was only really an error that let me pass, I'll take that but it was bad luck, was a nice scrap.

The atmosphere was brilliant, shame my headlights were a bit intermittent, I'd been unable to avoid a spinning car near the start, but no damage came up in my pitstop, fix the lights guys, please, its an MOT fail!

One of the most enjoyable races, and I feel a moral victor in the class B, slow car race!!   

I think I did squeeze an Alpine after T4 at the start, really sorry, I thought I was clear ahead of you and claimed the racing line but you didn't appear in my mirrors and then a couple of seconds later I saw you losing momentum on the grass.  That wasn't intended, no need since the Merc's grunt would have cleared you before the next corner, I didn't realise how quickly the Alpine could accelerate out, and assumed I'd put a couple of car lengths between us already.

[[POOdle]Keith]

I hadn’t been on GTL for a while as the classic MS Precision wheel had final broken   therefore I selected the relatively easy to drive Ferrari , Vette would have been too much of a handful on my return – and the GT350 for 33 laps – no thanks (I never drive the other cars if I can help it)

Quali was good, put in a clean’ish lap 2:25? – no real issues.

Race, yeah…OK - I wasn’t able to keep up with the Vettes and front running E-Types. Had an entertaining time with TinMan for many laps, he was slightly faster but made a few small mistakes – so it made for a good battle. Knowing Timman was basically faster – I chose NOT to change tyres during my pit stop > however that tactic didn’t work – and he passed me on lap 26? – I guess the tyres where slightly worn costing me 1-2 seconds per lap? (however car still felt balanced & easy to drive) plus I’m not that good at night driving.

Anyway 6th place I’m happy with that

Grats to the dudes in front.

K

[Mark J]

i was amazed that nobody quit the race until at least half hour had passed last night...good stuff, proves everyone was taking it seriously ! 

The skin problems/rejoins cost me nearly all of qualifying, only managed 2 flying laps before session ended.  I thought i had already used the E-type skin since the skin pack update but must be mistaken 

ah, it was poodle and Tinman who were having the epic race long scrap ahead of me ...i was trying my best to join you both and make it a 3-way scrap but just as i got it down to a few secs you pitted 

Looks like the night was a GTL racing success, well done to all involved 

[Wiltshire Tony]

Nice one Tony "Ron Dennis" Wiltshire for an excellent qually position, a real shame you got punted but well done for bringing it home, keeping things organised and explaining pit stop procedures to me lol    We have a foundation to build on

Thanks Oily, yeah one of my best qualy's which took me by suprise! However my race was stuffed by an unexplained, unforced error which even in the replay looks kinda odd. Hard braking for turn 1 and the car turns right on it's own. Possibly driver error except that I had been practising my approach to this tight corner all week. After that I was on the back foot and in the high 20's. Few laps later I turn my headlamps on and the guy behind must of thought I was letting him through. I wasn't! Any way we touched and I was spun. Poor show that the guy didn't let me by him later on but I guess he thought I had flashed him thru. Ho hum. Otherwise fairly isolated race unfortunately. Pit stop was a farce. Backwards and forwards till the board shows up. Will be practising that from now on. Strange because in the past that has never been a problem. Wasn't the dusk/night effect great and then the stadium lights up. Awesome.
Finished nowhere but loved every minute of it. Well done organisers.

[Mike Wrightson]

I've done the evening-night stuff in rFactor before and it is awesome, but nobody seems to run it much, which is a shame.  It is so atmospheric!

[ginsters sponsored]

Regarding problems with pitting. Unfortunately, its known to be a bit flakey in GTL and the problem was mooted when discussions about enduro races began. Hence we have used mostly standard tracks to minimise risks. I realise its no consolation to those affected but luckily they have been in the minority so far. Its something we need to keep an eye on and hopefully you gents will get better luck next time  (Don't think there's anything we/you can do to help?)

Its a real shame that many of the add-on tracks aren't really as suitable for dusk/night time racing. Both Leman versions suffer from texture problems which is a real shame as a night race around Lemans would make a superb season finale for me. Prolly be another night time enduro before end of S5 though 

[Simon Gymer]

I can understand why many leagues don't run night conditions, because the PC requirements double to be able to run in the night no matter whether it's a standard track or not.

Not sure about the pit stops. Having never done one in GTL before I didn't really know where to stop in relation to the bloke. I just parked it where his hand was and that didn't work. Looks like you need to be further to the right than you'd expect, so maybe that's the trick. Certainly worked for me that my 3rd attempt was the furthest right of the man.

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

Not sure about the pit stops. Having never done one in GTL before I didn't really know where to stop in relation to the bloke. I just parked it where his hand was and that didn't work. Looks like you need to be further to the right than you'd expect, so maybe that's the trick. Certainly worked for me that my 3rd attempt was the furthest right of the man.

At most tracks you can see where the box is marked out - last night I couldn't really but the actual stopping area was fairly easy to find as it was just to the right of the two gentle rumble strip type things.

[Madd-RIP]

  The donkies in my garage lied and made sounds like they filled it up....gits

[Wiltshire Tony]

I've done the evening-night stuff in rFactor before and it is awesome, but nobody seems to run it much, which is a shame.  It is so atmospheric!

Hopefully it won't be to long before you experience the sheer delight of enduro racing with the daylight realism setting at 10x. Hint, hint. Nudge, nudge

[Mark J]

Conversely, i found the opposite to Simon, my ideal pit stop box appeared to be quite close to the man, for the pitboard to come up.
If i left a gap to him like you do in GTR2 then they ignored me !
Perhaps the width of the car had something to do with it 

[Wiltshire Tony]

Pit stops shouldn't be a problem. You should always practise them (as I learn't last night) and then you get a better idea of where to "aim" for.
Turning on the AI would be a fix but would lose you some realism.
The comments about fuel not being added are odd. I've never heard of this problem before.

[spanner]

Its taken a while for me to post, sorry.

First thing, WOW! I'll echo everyones sentiments i loved the day/ night change. I wanted to stop and admire the sky at one point, and then  i jumped when suddenly the circuit lights came on! Brilliant.

Was that a full night time darkness? Can it go darker? It seemed at some points to be brighter than daylight, must have been circuit lights. What about a dawn race?

What an enjoyable race, with so many different cars with different braking, cornering etc it was quite a challenge. I've always enjoyed this track which swayed the decision to run and picked the alpine as it was the better handling one which meant i would catch people in the corners but lose out on the straights! Sorry to Phil at the first corner giving you a few nudges and sadly SBG I never ran that far up the field, it wasnt me! It seems most of the race i was shadowing a Merc both upto my pitstop and then for the last 10 laps. The only pitstop issue i had was i thought when you request a stop you'd get a response over the 'radio' like GTR2 so was a bit worried nothing would happen when i did stop. It all went well though, there didnt seem to be obvious markings for the pit stop but it worked for me.

I think i must have got the tyre pressures pretty well spot on as tyre temps were consistant all the way through, and the fronts didnt seem to loose the plot completely.

It was only my second race in GTL and after the cadwell/ zolder mix up, i was close to jumping out with the skin problems preventing me from doing anything but i'm glad i didnt! And I ended up doing better than i thought!

One thing i've noticed, highligted from the GTR2 issues people have had is that the data rate for the GTL race was set as LAN, but for GTR2 you've explicitly stated it has to be ISDN. I'm not entirely sure what i should set my setting to. Did people see FPS slowdowns with the night running? I didnt notice any affects.

[Mike Wrightson]

It depends on the track, but it will get darker than that   What adds to it is that the temperature drops too, and affects grip and power.  I notice that at night my FPS drops a little, but not massively.  There are some settings you can tweak to help minimize this.