i7e Endurance Sundays Round 2 - Sebring International Day - 21 August

[Raimo Piiksi]

sorry, didn't say thanks for hosting in my first post 

btw thanks for the hosting guys, any hosting format is fine by me 
anyone tried "caterpillar" with MC cars? slowest GT in front, fastest LMP in back. then start. If we can do that inc free then we are set to go 

[Fred Basset]

Thanks for praccy session, although..

I don't know about anyone alse but I would prefer pure praccy sessions instead of a qualy and race for saturday.

See ya at the race.

Same for me, I was going to do a little practice tonight but generally can only get on later. The qually and race format on a Saturday is not the correct one in my view as it means people have to be on a server early. The open 4 hour session is much more flexible for "practice".

Good luck tomorrow guys, I'm away on holiday so won't be joining you until the next race.

Regards
Gary

[RikW]

Perhaps a little background might help.

As you should hopefully be aware, SRouk and Legends League are cooperating on the iRacing side. For some time now, Legends have been running "club" races on Mondays & Saturdays. They have been open servers to try and encourage newcomers to join us and they have included races to try and give some structure to them rather than just have people come & go. We offered to run these on the Endurance Sundays weeks as well as our own weeks and that is what we have been doing. Our budget only really allows for us to run 2 hour sessions. So that's basically why the format is what it is. But we are open to changing it if there is a consensus to do so - no point running something that is unpopular! Naturally, we would happily step aside if SRouk wanted to host their own practice sessions for the Endurance Sundays weeks.

From my own perspective, I like having a race as that is when you really learn about what is sensible or not when dealing with traffic, but 40 mins is probably too long. We could run a 4 hour session on Saturday by dropping the Monday one (since that has never been at all popular) but the risk then is that you end up with people just coming & going throughout the session with never enough at any one time to really practice in traffic. And even if there is a race at the end then it's made pointless because most of the drivers have left by then.

As for passwords, I have mixed feelings. It is very annoying if there is someone who really shouldn't be on the track but OTOH running closed servers means you'll miss the guy who doesn't yet know about the league and would become a valued member. It also depends on how much the league members will take part, I've never seen much point in closed practice servers with just half a dozen active drivers as they might as well just run laps offline.

[Fred Basset]

Rik, I understand about the cooperation and the cost of hosting. I'm happy to go along with a consensus view but this format does not provide the flexibility of 4 hour practice sessions.

Regards
Gary

[RikW]

No problems Gary, you're very welcome to make your views known! What is most important is that the sessions are useful and if they are not currently meeting the needs then we need people to tell us so

[Adam Parle]

I'd like to see more practice - but there's nothing like a race to get a better handle on where you need to watch out.

I would have been in attendance yesterday, but I was stuck minding the kids so didn't get on till later

[Fred Basset]

I'd like to see more practice - but there's nothing like a race to get a better handle on where you need to watch out.

But as a format it actually cuts down on the ability for all participants to practice, if we have a four hour session we can have an informal race if we want to. If you couldn't get on until latr last night that is at least two of us that didn't get any practice. Because of this format.

[Don]

I know I speak for myself.. but I don't have a lot of time to practice during the week and use the server on Sat and Sunday to try get up to speed and safe.
Yesterday I found it a little difficult trying to step up to race with only a hours worth of practice in. I'd vote for having a 3 hour practice session followed by a 30 min race for those that are interested, if that was possible.

[Javier Torres]

Was the race pushed back or suspended? Can't see the server...

[Don]

Really sorry to Andy and Gizmo, came back on the track without checking the splits, after worrying and checking fuel levels.. totally my mistake and very sorry..

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

Really sorry to Andy and Gizmo, came back on the track without checking the splits, after worrying and checking fuel levels.. totally my mistake and very sorry..

My race was toast through my own fault long before that happened. Once again I lulled myself into a false sense of adequacy, being gifted 3rd when Simon went off and then finding I had better early pace than Paul L I grabbed 2nd. Everything was going swimmingly, despite the really tricky traffic - with almost no top end speed advantage over the GT I had to make far too many passes in braking zones for my liking.

Sadly it all went wrong trying to get a good exit out of 16 to pass a couple of Fords - once again it started to swap ends so suddenly that my reaction simply reversed the direction in which I headed for the barriers. Bent the car really badly and had to crawl back to the pits - I've a horrible feeling that I caused Dmitry to run off in Sunset as I crawled at a snail's pace towards the pits.

Took the instant repair and fuel and got straight back out - there was no point holding back now if I wanted a podium place. Once again the car decided to surprise me - I took Sunset on my normal line and it just swapped ends, no warning, no nothing. Smacked the barriers on the outside so drove through the cones straight into the pits for my second repair (and an 18s hold penalty for "unsafe entry", just to add insult to injury).

That left me way down but effectively on the same stop sequence as everyone else so I set about clawing my way back up the field.

Made it up to 4th, but despite a pace advantage Purdie was too far up the road to catch. I'd pretty much settled for that (and the hope that only Richard would have lapped me, having unlapped myself from Paul when he took his final stop) when with about 6 minutes to go, I came across Andy Gooderson crawling with a damaged car, and Don just ahead. I figured there had probably been contact, and committed to pass Don on the right of T9 so that he could take the apex as normal, and was flabbergasted when he drove straight into me - until I saw the replay and realized that his steering was broken from the contact with Andy. A very unfortunate way for me to end the race when I'd come so close to a half decent result despite those two resets, but not entirely a surprise. At least I made it further into the race than last time!

I still feel the relative performance of these cars is all wrong for multiclass racing, especially at the faster tracks, and worse still I can't drive the GT at all, and the HPD I can drive okay at 90% but at flat out racing speed an off is always a blink at the wrong moment away, and I have neither the feel for the car nor the speed of reaction required to save it when it does go wrong.

[Darren Seal]

First of, I would like to apologise to Adam K and anyone else I caused problems for on the opening lap.  I'm really struggling with the NTM; at low speeds the back end steps out under braking without warning, with no chance of catching it.  

By the end of lap 1 I had spun twice, was last and well adrift.

I managed to fight my way up through the field into 2nd, but it soon became clear I had pitted 2 laps too early.  I chased down Jasper and passed him, and managed to get the gap up to 12 seconds.  But in pushing to make the gap even bigger, I spun again under braking.  

After my 2nd pitstop (for a splash n dash and damage repairs   ) I rejoined 15 seconds down.  I managed to get the gap back down below 5 seconds, but I guess Jasper was just doing enough by that point..

Well done Jasper.  Rock solid as usual...  

Congrats to Richard for the LMP victory...  Well done to team mate Andy for 3rd.


Hope to see you guys next race...

[Andy Birch]

After retiring early on in round 1, the aim for this week was to just to the end.

This was my first race at Sebring (in iRacing), but after little while learning my round in the morning, I was feeling pretty comfortable and able to lap consistently. At Watkins I seemed to be able to find good single lap speed, but here I just wanted an easy car to drive. After qualifying 8th, and a steady start, it was just a case of keep the concentration, and not getting lured into pushing harder than I really wanted to. I made up places - mostly through other misfortune - on the opening two stints, and then decided to push a little harder after the last stop. After racing with Barry early on, it eventually looked like I'd be racing with Peter and Dmitry for positions. We were all on different strategies, so had no idea how it would pan. After the last stop, and turning up the engine, I gave chase to Peter - unfortunately he went off the road before I caught. Things looked settled - until I noticed the gap to Dmitry drop right down. With only a few minutes to go, still went for it, but needed a few extra laps (I'm sure you had it until control  )

Good fun - it's a far better feeling when you actually finish. Getting round the GTs meant needing to keep concentrating at all times, and everyone seemd to always be aware of what was going on around them, and only had a couple of 'is that a gap' moments.

Last little thing. And it has only mildly freaked me out. Whilst looking through the results I noticed I didn't have my usual number (#72). Then I saw Dmitry was running it. I'd noticed last week that we're also running identical colour scheme on the HPD. I've not done the math(s), but the chances surely are 1 in an awful big number. Coincidence, or the case of iRacing identity theft?

[RikW]

This felt like a verrrry long race! Unfortunately it was pretty much decided on the LMP side by the time we had gotten a 3rd way through and after that it was just trying to keep enough concentration to avoid binning it. The last part of the race was just a blur and I can't really remember any of it...

I managed two traffic free laps at the start of qualifying to take pole without any worries. Got away well at the start, not repeating the mistake I made at the Glen and only Simon was able to keep close but he span on lap 5 leaving me with a good gap behind when we got to the GT cars for the first time - a gap I needed all of with it costing a good 6 seconds a lap to get past them! I guess I might have been a bit on the cautious side there

With those behind all having offs over the next few laps there was no more pressure and I was only headed by Paul due to my opting for a shorter second stint. By the end Paul was the only other driver on the lead lap which meant a 1-2 for TWFR and with Fulvio coming through to take 4th in GT and Baz also finishing it was a good day all round for the team .

Congrats to Jasper for his second GT win.

[Adam Parle]

I'm still not having any fun in iRacing since the NTM ...

After a miserable nights practice yesterday, I was pleasantly surprised with how things started tonight - a solid qually, and a solid opening 15 mins of the race.

I managed to pinch a place in the opening couple of corners, and then I was watching my mirrors from then on.  It was all going too well, and when the LMP2 cars started lapping us, I ran wide at T1, giving the place back, and then proceeded to drive like a complete numpty - I must have spun the damn thing three or four times before I quit out in disgust.

It was probably for the best though ... the swear jar wouldn't have taken much more of that.