iRacing Season Five Endurance - Sebring International - Mar 13

[Robin Durrant]

Thanks Jasper,

So do I! Got the season up and coming and need to be fit for it!

I still hate Sebring

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

I'll miss the race tonight, I don't feel well enough to make it to the end of an endurance. My eyes would probably esplode.

Sounds serious!

Well I must one of the few who loves Sebring, especially in long races where a conservative approach pays dividends, avoiding the worst of the bumps and keeping things neat and tidy around the big old curbs.

I wasn't sure how much Jasper or Raimo were sandbagging in practice and I wasn't surprised to see Raimo get a lot closer in qualifying, but given a class pole and an inside line into turn 1 I was pretty confident, at least for the early laps. I caught myself out at the start and watched helpless as Raimo tucked neatly in front into turn 1... only to be shocked when he gave the place back straight away! You really didn't need to do that, mate, and I'd have had my only fight of the race retaking the place!

So that put me back in the lead and the only remaining excitement I was going to have was worrying about whether or not to take tyres when I stopped. I originally planned not to, figuring that track position was more important than fresh rubber, but with a healthy 10 second lead just before half distance I changed my mind and changed my tyres, stopping a few laps ahead of my original plan just to cover the possibility that Raimo might pop in a few good laps on low fuel and then not change tyres himself.

As it turned out everyone else also changed rubber, though looking at my wear numbers (all better than 80%) I would've been fine to double stint them. When all the stops had shaken out I had an even more commanding lead, but kept pushing reasonably hard mostly to keep my concentration level up.

To top it off I finally got some really top notch doughnuts going after crossing the line.

The championship now looks rather interesting going into the final round...

[Raimo Piiksi]

Great racing again guys

I got a really good run at the start, but with more than a car length head start at the start/finish line I called myself a jump start and gave the spot back to Dave. And with the speed of Dave today I would probably have run myself into the wall trying to stay ahead 
After start and the first lappings of the Corvettes I had a very lonely race. Dave just inched steady away and I inch steady away form Adam. After a long period with difficulty to keep focused and small mistakes I suddenly saw Adam and Jasper only 5-7 sec behind. This luckily sharpend my senses again and I managed to hold off until finish.

And yes I saw gap at 1 - 1.5 sec between Adam and Jasper for lots of laps..must have been a great battle guys

[Ste Jones]

Relatively straight-forward race for me really, although I wouldn't say it was easy. I'm still suffering the after-effects of a cold and even during practice I was working up a sweat, by lap 10 in the race I was dripping with it! Trying to keep concentration was the hardest thing and I somehow survived a few 'rather be lucky than good' moments during the race

I used a bit of cunning in qualifying and managed to get myself a clear lap, although not error free, but it was still enough for pole. As it happened it seemed everyone gave up early, so I may as well have waited for the last five minutes when no one was on track anyway! For the race, my plan was to try and push as hard as possible for about the first five or six laps and then try and consolidate on that. For once, the plan actually came together and worked out pretty much as intended.

I still managed to have a few scary moments. The first time we lapped the Mustangs I almost caught myself out at Cunningham with the closing speed, I changed down too many gears and just about scrabbled round the corner all over the kerb. A few laps later I had a straight on moment at Tower, then on lap 15 I had the biggest opposite lock moment that I've ever saved at Sunset. Sometimes luck really just is on your side

Congrats to Ian and Shark and Dave, Raimo and Adam for getting the other podium spots. With the small field and a long lap it was getting quite lonely at times, so I was amusing myself watching the Mustang battle on F3, trying not to disturb them too much when I lapped them! There was also Gazza chasing down Dimm for fourth spot overall too. It was a bit weird 'spectating' other battles while I'm trying to race too

As I said before, I'm really not sure if I can make Spa. I'm away that week and although I'll be back on the Sunday I've got no idea what time it will be. Hopefully I'll make it. Either way though, it's been a fun season

[popabawa]

That was excellent fun

With Adam, Jasper and I so close in qually it was shaping up to be a decent scrap.

I was really annoyed with myself to get mugged by Robin at the start, I then lost a big chunk of time behind him as he was clearly stuggling but I couldn't find a way past until he span off.

I gradually pulled back on the Adam/Jasper scrap, picked up a place when Jasper went off and was right behind Adam when I had the accidental coming together with Simon. I have to admit a big chunk of misjudgement on my part, I left a gap then decided Simon was too far back and closed the gap again... 

Luckily I was able to catch the ensuing slide and get back on track pretty quickly. That left me about 5-6 seconds behind Adam at the stop. I'm not sure what happened with the pit-stop... I assume I had some damage after the contact with Simon but although the pit clock kept ticking although it didn't say it was repairing any damage Usually a tyre/fuel stop takes around 12s, when the clock hit 20s I got back on the gas and it let me go. Dunno if anyone else noticed anything odd?

The long stop allowed Jasper to jump back in front of me and I had an enormously frustrating second half of the race making too many mistakes to really make an impact on Adam/Jasper in front.

Luckily Jasper gifted me 4th place right at the end and the laps ran out before I could get close to Adam.

Grats to Dave / Raimo and Adam on the podiums, super drives by you guys 

Great driving by the Corvette's, thanks guys.

[popabawa]

Sorry to hear you guys had disco's, I noticed you dropped at the same time

I wonder if there was some internet oddness between us and the iRacing servers last night? My Latency ('L' bar) sat just in the orange zone for the entire race, I've never seen that before

[Simon Gymer]

Was ok on Virgin Media cable last night in the Harlow region, so I guess it was restricted to either a different area or ADSL or a specific ISP?

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

although it didn't say it was repairing any damage Usually a tyre/fuel stop takes around 12s, when the clock hit 20s I got back on the gas and it let me go. Dunno if anyone else noticed anything odd?

I thought my stop felt very slow too - though I could see the car moving around as they changed the tyres. I wonder if in the process of changing the damage model they've changed the normal stop procedure.

Was ok on Virgin Media cable last night in the Harlow region, so I guess it was restricted to either a different area or ADSL or a specific ISP?

My ADSL connection was fine all through last night.

[popabawa]

After the last update I had a good test of the damage model. It was offline but (undamaged) pitstops took exactly the same amount of time (about 12s). Any 'proper' damage repair required would be accompanied by a "optional repairs" message which I definitely didn't see last night.

Because we had one 'fast repair/tow' turned on, according to the release notes, this should have repaired everything immediately anyway prior to changing the tyres and refuelling

[Gazza49er]

 :'( :'(   Yet again i throw away a good position!

Becoming a bit of a habit this, good pace all weekend, good qualy and then muck it all up in the race. Was banging in high 55's low 56's all weekend no problem so was quite pleased come race only to have problems right away. For some reason i kept locking up the brakes in the early laps which eventually made me spin and put me at the back of the Vettes, I had more problems braking at this track then any of the previous ones  

Even trying to catch up i couldn't get my normal times and was not really catching until i think the cars ahead had issues and was able to get on the back of James and Dimm. They swapped position a few times and eventually i had a go at getting past James which didn't really go to plan

Lost a bit of time there and had a big gap to Dimm but i think i had some damage as it didn't feel quite right but still managed to get very close with a couple of laps but traffic put pay to any chance of getting him.

Grats to Steve and all other podiums.

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

I had more problems braking at this track then any of the previous ones  

That's the bumps for yer.

[Simon Gymer]

Because we had one 'fast repair/tow' turned on, according to the release notes, this should have repaired everything immediately anyway prior to changing the tyres and refuelling

Hmm, so it uses your "fast repair" even if you don't want it to? Perhaps you have minor damage you're happy to carry on with, but later you crash into the wall heavily. If it automatically uses your fast repair for the minor damage during a pit stop then you have lost your chance to use the fast repair for heavy damage later on.

[popabawa]

Hmm, so it uses your "fast repair" even if you don't want it to? Perhaps you have minor damage you're happy to carry on with, but later you crash into the wall heavily. If it automatically uses your fast repair for the minor damage during a pit stop then you have lost your chance to use the fast repair for heavy damage later on.

Yes, that's how it's worded although after last night I'm not 100% convinced it worked like that in practice

Remember though we're having to keep the fast tow/repair on for the Corvettes, once damage repair is enabled for all cars it won't be an issue as we'll probably tiurn off the fast tow/repair.

[mr_oily]

Summary on that one - fun while it lasted!

Didn't get much time to practice before Sunday and it wasn't until about 3pm I sat down to start getting my eye in. Bit of a rookie mistake but I practiced solidly up until the race and to be honest, think i probably overdid it. Always practice, leave for a bit and then practice again!

Felt I had a good pace in practice anyway, mid 55's quite doable on low fuel but took the decision to run on full tanks in qually in favour of not punching above my weight and ending up defending hard in the opening stages. On reflection that was quite a dumb move - instead of being a couple of spots off where I thought I could be I was at the back of the pack with my team mate along side which is never pleasant (nothing personal Dimm ).

After an initial scrap where we could quite easily have binned it, I spent the opening part of the race just trying not to force the matter with Dimm - the rest of the pack were still in touch just about so it made sense to conserve tyres and find a rhythm and hope traffic would give me the opportunity to take the position without anyone needing to change underwear.

Aside from a brief scuffle with what I'm guessing was a damaged Reign Man (sorry for the slide wide mate!) and some interesting moments in traffic that was about it until as Gary mentioned, we had a little coming together around lap 16'ish. The second example of really poor collision detection in that race - we should have both made it out without issue but the iRacing Gods took it upon themselves to fire me around the front of Gazza's car and into the tyre barrier (honest!).

I did a fast tow but 2:30 down and with the prospect of potentially ruining a Stang driver's race I pulled it back into the pits. Seconds later I was disco'd so perhaps that would have happened anyway who knows.

Not a good outing points wise but I absolutely loved the balance of the Vette around here - a few clicks back on the brake bias from the fixed setup and it felt perfectly set up. Any "moments" weren't really surprises as they often are for me in iR, perhaps the odd snatched wheel but overall it felt surprisingly hooked up.

Anyway grats to Steve - is there any chance of a replay of that .55 dead lap - have to see the pedal movement! Awesome pace mate, I take hat off. Grats to Ian and Simon too, not forgetting Raimo for another solid finish in the Stangs - such a shame you didn't make it Dario!

Oh yeah - Karsten, I'll be expecting you back at Spa son - no excuses!

Just a quick couple of reminders...

a) please report all incidents you've been involved in - we've all been a bit relaxed with this but it really helps moderation so would be appreciated

b) it's mandatory you all attend the iRoC event this Sunday 

[Adam Parle]

Just to echo what Oily has said - please do report incidents you were involved in.  You don't need to be looking for a penalty to report things, but moderation of the incidents will lead to an increase in the overall drivign standards.