iRacing Sports Car Grand Prix of Long Beach

[Daunt]

For anyone that's interested - I'll be representing team B2O Racing in a hosted event at Long Beach, a 1hr 40 min race with the DP and GT3s.

Thread on iRacing - http://members.iracing.com/jforum/posts/list/3482789.page

Would be cool if we could field two teams.

 

[Noodleguitar]

Looks interesting but not interesting enough for me. I don't have Long Beach (yet) and at this point I wouldn't have much time to practice for it anymore.

 

[Chris Sierzega]

I just picked this track up a few days ago. I really really like it.

Would you be in the Audi for this one, Kyle? I think it'd be cool to take part.

 

[Chris Sierzega]

Just saw the entry list on the forum thread. I think it'd be cool to take part and learn the track beforehand, however we probably wouldn't be winning anything.

But it seems like a cool way to spend 2 hours, so if you would have me on the team, I'd love to join in.

 

[Daunt]

I just picked this track up a few days ago. I really really like it.

Would you be in the Audi for this one, Kyle? I think it'd be cool to take part.

Of course I'd be in the Audi for this one and of course you really like it! It's a shame not everyone owns this track. Crazy talk.

I don't expect to win anything, nor do I ever.

Did you ever get your wheel situation solved? We could possibly do a driver swap. I was considering more doing it solo but I don't see why not.

 

[Chris Sierzega]

Of course I'd be in the Audi for this one and of course you really like it! It's a shame not everyone owns this track. Crazy talk.

I don't expect to win anything, nor do I ever.

Did you ever get your wheel situation solved? We could possibly do a driver swap. I was considering more doing it solo but I don't see why not.

Yeah, I sent mine back to Amazon (year long warranty) and just got a replacement. So that's good for now.

If you're cool doing a team thing, that's what I'd like to do. But it doesnt really matter to me

 

[Daunt]

Sure I'll make the changes so we will run it as a team. I'd like to start the race, if you don't mind, so that means you will get to finish if you're ok with it.

I'm going to schedule a tentative hosted session Sunday night at Long Beach. Ken and I talked about using that as a means to test a few league things, and in general just to get some practice in.

 

[Daunt]

Also there's a little known setting that allows you to adjust laser point cloud density, so you can increase it and you'll find it looking a bit better. Obviously it doesn't replace a finished Long Beach but it helps with the immersion some.

http://members.iracing.com/jforum/posts/list/3477452.page

 

[Chris Sierzega]

Cool info. I actually saw this in the iRacing forum thread and like the results a lot. Being able to see everything in more detail adds a lot to the track, and helps with visual references as well.

I'm going to try and put in some more practice today when I put up the long session.

 

[Daunt]

Cool info. I actually saw this in the iRacing forum thread and like the results a lot. Being able to see everything in more detail adds a lot to the track, and helps with visual references as well.

I'm going to try and put in some more practice today when I put up the long session.

Nice. Like I said. I'll save practice until after the 6 hr race.

It does improve it quite a bit and I enjoy it a lot... just wish they'd make some of the buildings physical objects. It can't be that difficult to make them textureless objects. That's the biggest barrier for them is the art, so I don't see why they wouldn't make all the buildings and such actual objects.

Just doing that would improve the map by x100. All the shadows of all the different buildings would cast, along with the trees and rides... that alone would make a tremendous impact on the feel of the track.

 

[Chris Sierzega]

I'm sure at this point though, it might be better to just rescan if theyre going to go through creating the art and all that. Imagine a 2017 scan of Long Beach

But as far as practice goes, I can't seem to avoid sliding on these damned streets, it feels like there's oil on some parts of the track. Is it because the surface is so rough, being public streets 95% of the time?

 

[Daunt]

I think weather is going to be a huge factor here. Hot and even warm weather will be incredibly dicey and will require slow in - fast out more than any other track I've probably raced before.

Weather for the session will be dynamic - afternoon. So unless it just so happens to be overcast, it's going to be a balance between oversteer/understeer.

Here's my hotlap from last season (DX11 at the time didn't feature laser scan point clouds yet). This is extremely favorable weather though and I believe the GT3s will be in the 1:19-1:21 range.

 

[Daunt]

I've worked hard on a set for the past few days or so- there are a lot of compromises that have to be made for a decent set. Still needs work I believe.

My set is looser than normal but it's not alien-type loose. It's managable and necessary I believe to get rotation and turn in. I don't know what it will to do tires but I doubt it's a good set to SAVE tires with... I've managed to get in the high 1:19s with my best lap but it is so far usually been mid 1:20s. iRacing default weather, in afternoon.

 

[Daunt]

Pretty excited for this event coming up on Saturday. I'll be doing plenty of practice this week, if anyone would like to join in for a session I'd be happy to up hosted practice.

Interesting news is that Robin Esterson, who is planning the event, will not be participating any longer but will act as the official marshal. He'll be enforcing obvious infractions with warnings and possible penalties, as expected, from line crossing and cone knocking (NOEL) to worse penalties to ensure a clean race. He'll also be throwing full course yellows for multi-car incidents.

He was last looking for a broadcaster for the race, but not sure if he's gotten one yet.

 

[Daunt]

Fuel Info:

Fuel / Lap : ~2.32L (52 laps on full tank)
Estimated 175 liters needed
Pit to take tires and ~55L

 

[Noodleguitar]

How did it go?

 

[Daunt]

Well first, here's some screens of the race... the new paint...

Second, my overall take is very disappointing. for a few reasons... so let me go into detail...

The track- Overall it's great, and this is my first time with an actual race there. No complaints in general, but I can see how absolutely horrid this would be in official. the main problem with the track though is the pace lap, which overlaps my bigger issue....

Full Course Yellows - On paper it is a great idea. In practice though, now that I've tried it... it's horrible. Sadly. 40 minutes in and we'd ran a total of probably 10 ish full green laps while we had 3 FCYs. Consider that during the yellow the pace lap is EXTREMELY slow at long beach, I'm talking slower than Zaandvort, I'm talking slower than pit lane... it takes 2 laps at 4 minutes each to go back to green. So think about it... 4 minutes x 6 laps of FCY means we had almost 30 minutes of caution by the time we made it to the hour mark. Drivers who were not forced to pit for repairs ended up making it 20 minutes to the end... that's how much fuel was saved...

Which bring me to the next issue with it... We had two marshals calling them out... all 3 were due to fucking stupid DPs, so had nothing to do with the GTs. At the hour mark Robin (The organizer and Marshal) decided it was too many and said they'd be less common.

Well 2 laps into that green run, the lead GT spins out. I was running 3rd... he took out me, 2nd place driver and at least 1 other car. And no yellow. I was pissed. Incredibly pissed. So i had to tow back, went down two laps and just seethed the rest of the race.

We had one more FCY and I think it was another DP incident. Not sure. That was my biggest complaint as far as FCY... even with two marshals it was not very consistent and I felt like it can never be 100% fair / uniform in calling. With all of us driving it would be even harder.

Lastly, classes - we all know the issue that iRacing seems to ignore with hosted multiclass. Each car being its own class basically... well it was decided not to make this a class race at all so everyone was in one class. Not sure why that made more sense than just making each car it's own... so GTs had no idea what place they were in.

---------------------

Anyway it was alright but needed a lot of work... mostly I blame race control as stupid as that sounds. I ended up finishing 5th, but I had no idea what place I was in at the time and after my unfortunate incident, I was extremely angry the rest of the race.

 

[Noodleguitar]

The paint looks nice. Although I think it would look better with the bright green highlights instead of yellow. And I don't really like the red on it but I'm not a fan of red paint schemes in general. The chrome really does look like metallic in these screens, nice!

Too bad that the race was disappointing. If the pace car speed is that slow I don't think full course yellows are a good idea in sprint races. It's not realistic for the safety car to go that slowly.

If race control is not sure if they can apply consistent actions to incidents they shouldn't have done any FCYs at all.

iRacing's mixed multi-class system has been missing for so long now. I think they might be waiting until they have the in-game menu working for selecting races/viewing results etc.