League Race #3 - Le Mans - This Thursday

We've done it before.

Replay time:

The quote was "Not Factory Standard"

25 Minutes of epicness - this race could be almost twice as long!

See you either tonight for some race practice time, or tomorrow for the main event!

Race on!

Race #3 Le Mans Endurance Race

So here it is folks, the first of the endurance races of the season. Nervous? You should be!

It's time to get some serious racing into the season, 10 laps of the world famous Le-Mans race track (less with Clubman of course!). With night racing and tyre wear!

The track:

In the game it's called Circuit La Sarthe which in fairness it is in real life. What you need to know is that it's a fast track that benefits from little down force and lots of power... except, the pesky Porsche Curves, no down force there means no cornering.

The cars:

They're the 650Open cars that we all have (we do don't we). Things to note:

• In this class you can have TCS (traction control), I would, it'll save your tyres.
• Race cars are the order of the day.
• None of that red-bull, bull either. Check the charter if you need help on car rules.
• Racing in cockpit or behind the car may be a challenge. In car, no dash is one of the better views, it makes a difference at night.

The twist:

So this race is going to have tyre wear. For the first time (since the last update) we can now set the rate of wear. I've done some test laps (in the name of science you understand) and reckon that we'll launch on "FAST" tyre wear, the options being None/Normal/Fast/Very-Fast. I'll let your practice sessions figure out what that means...

Oh, and learn where the pit stop is, it's hard to find in the dark!

But this is not twist enough. We have time advance turned on (be thankfull I didn't want to race wet racing at night!). For this race we will start racing in game time at 1:00pm and have an advance of x45 which essentially means that for every minute of real time we advance 45 minutes in game time. So, 10 laps at roughly 4 minutes a lap means we'll have 30 hours in game time to race - plenty to see the sun come up.

Official Race Details:

Clubman:

Host: Andrew (Andyc709292)

Lounge: FCT GT5 Andrew

Date: 29-Nov-2012

Track: Circuit La Sarthe

Start time: 9:00 PM

Laps: 2

Cars: Fixed

Tyres: TBC

Boost: High

Championship:

Host: Andrew

Start time: 9:15 PM

Track: Circuit La Sarthe

Laps: 10

Cars: 650Open

Tyres: Open

Boost: Low

Tyre Wear on

Time Advance on (x45)

Reminder...

587pp Road Car, no TCS, Racing Soft, a stiff drink and a challenge from George had me hit 3:54:08:

Slippery Fellows...

It's Elise racing time, an engaging viewing if not our usual clean pro approach...

Now, Luke has requested that I record in HD and publish in a similar vein. This is fine, I can stomach the pure pain of watching a PC that's old enough to have some dude from the raj with an Ostrich feather for it's cooling meander through it's upload. But, I don't have the means to capture said video in the first place.

So I suggested we have a subscription service to the league to pay for the tech* 

Feel free to pass the love for this on to Luke in our next pointless race.

(Banger) Race On!

*Not really, if I were to charge I'd have to do it properly.

Race #2 Results

Finally...

Here they are folks.
The results of the Season's race #2. Oh, and a video.

Race Round Up

Clubman
Well, it wasn't the race we thought it would be, moving to Trial Mountain for the evening certainly opened things up, and using the Elise road cars opened things up even further. The challenge was keeping the cars on the  track more than anything - almost too much really. Still, was an epic race that saw season favourite (only cos he won last season) Chris way down the ranking.
Simon's first official race was a challenge I think - normally the cars are much easier than that!
The only reason I (Andrew) won was a last minute dash down the outside passing Paul and Evan on the line. Lucky me.

Championship Season
GT590s are a mixed bag of a car I think. They're very quick but it's still possible to put one into an easy spin, and certainly both races were decided by the accidents as much as the extremely close driving. If these two races indicate what the rest of the season is going to be like we're in for some serious action.
Whilst Simon and Luke didn't have the right tools for the job, there was still a good field to race, and we all had fun I think on the night.
Take note of Chris folks - he won few races last year, but took the championship with a consistently high finish, same again this year?

Overall, excellent driving folks. It's worth saving replays and watching them from other driver's perspectives. It's great to see that in the most part we're all trying to avoid pesky collisions - giving the rest of the league great driving experiences.

Official Results:

Clubman Series:
1.  Andrew
2. Paul
3. Evan
4. Luke
5. Roderick
6. Chris
7. Simon

Championship Race #1
1. Andrew
2. Chris
3. Paul
4. Roderick
5. Evan
6. Luke
7. Simon

Championship Race #2
1. Evan
2. Chris
3. Andrew
4. Paul
5. Roderick
6. Luke
7. Simon

Well done for reading this far, have a video of the second race in the GT590 class, Elise race to follow (maybe):

Next Race

We're doing the Eiger Shuffle folks. Which some of you will remember us racing cars such as this:

The keen eyed amongst you will notice the tank parked at the back. That's Dodge Roulette that is...

Race on!

League Race #2 - Motegi East - GT590

Welcome to the next points race in the series folks.
Apologies for the lateness, no matter, after Race 1 I know you'll all be on board for this one...

Firstly, you'll need to ensure you've downloaded this track.If you've done the last academy then you'll have it already, otherwise read this.

The Track

Twin-Ring Motegi East is a real track that's been around in the GT series before. This track is well suited to the cars we race, making it an iconic Japanese event.

The Cars

Started in the last season, this season they feature heavily. Why? Because they're so much fun that's why.
That's right, the GT590 spec cars, so stuff like this works...

 NSX - Fast, and Fidgety

 Lexus, maybe some Lexi - Ahaha!

 Old School Rule

Do Not Race This Car

Official event details:


Clubman:
Host: Andrew
Date: 15-Nov-2012
Start time: 9:00 PM
Laps: 5
Cars: Fixed
Tyres: TBC
Boost: High


Championship
Host: Andrew
Date: 15-Nov-2012
Start time: 9:15 PM
Lounge: FCT GT5 Andrew
Track: Motegi East (DLC)
Laps: 6
Cars: GT590
Tyres: Racing Med
Boost: Low

Noosa Hill Climb

The weather didn't start off fantastic (looking quite torrential for a while) but Sunday afternoon turned into a please sunny spring afternoon....perfect for racing and soaking up the atmosphere of these classics.

 Rob Van Wegan, 1965 Ford Mustang.  Quite a few Mustangs having a run and making some beautiful noises.

 George Brook, 1982 Alfa Romeo GTV.  How can you not love a classic Alfa-so much soul.

 Kevin Krosh, 1969 Ford Capri GT coupe

 Julian Segar, 1984 BMW E30 318i  Quite a few E30 bimmers there, very nice.

 Brian Munn, 1975 Ford Escort Mk1 Rally Spec!!

 Bruce McKenzie, 1978 Ford Escort RS1800 Another Rally Spec!

 Leonard Falknau, 1982 Nissan Bluebird.  Sports sedan class bringing back Group C memories when these used to head wheel to wheel with Commodores, Falcon,s RX-7's etc at Bathurst.

 Chris Fung, 1974 Porsche Carrera.  Still simply stunning, a true classic.

 Bruce Chamberlain, 2011 Westfield XTR2.  Very fine looking bit of kit indeed...not sure where the groceries go in this one.

Johann Koelmeyer, 1973 Mercedes-Benz 450SLC  The mighty auto running in the regularity event.

Nev Scott, 1999 Subaru WRX

We never ended up seeing the, ahem slightly modified Subie run at speed, only run was aborted after getting stuck in 5th gear. Shame really as Nev set the fastest hard top time Saturday talking the class win and 3rd outright  next to 2 open wheelers.

Here's Nev's run quickest run onboard from Saturday.

Randall North, 2010 Ford Focus RS, not sure what was creating the noise but this thing sounded like a jet going by.

League Race #1 Results

Golly there's a lot that goes into organising these races now that there's a few more of us and we have the clubman series.

Champion Series Roundup
Still, all for the best I say. Pics to follow, but here's a video of what I think was the first TC500 race, so the second (Clubman being first). Whatever, it's a great race and proves the class...

So many good moments, Evan, on Lap six there's a point where your track is obscured by dirt, you come through it into a smoke screen, good commitment!

Paul, I think I was lucky in your drifting wide on one of the last corners, it handed me the lead.

And Chris, well, every time I got a break I'd look in my mirror to see the orange machine slamming up behind me.

Excellent stuff folks, and certainly a very clean one considering so many racers and such nimble cars!

Championship Race 1 Results

1. Andrew

2. Evan

3. Chris

4. Luke

5. Paul

6. Baloo

7. Simon

Championship Race 2 Results

1. Andrew

2. Paul

3. Luke

4. Chris

5. Baloo

6. Simon

7. Evan (DNF)

Interesting note, three of you scored 9 points overall, nice tight start to the season!

Clubman Roundup

M3s and Mazzer's at the TC500 Track #2 - 488pp sounded like they'd be similar performance to our TC500s but in reality not a patch. 

Early betting had the M3s pegged for an easy win, but it certainly wasn't in the end. We all had our fun moments, mine on lap four taking me from hero to zero - I think with these cars a clean race is needed otherwise having the same cars can mean a hard slog to catch up.

Clubman Results:

1. Evan

2. Paul

3. Chris

4. Andrew

5. Luke

6. Baloo

7. Roderick

8. Simon

Next week 

Remember the 8th is a non-points night, so whilst there's racing to be had it's an opportunity to try out new cars in a competitive environment.

Also, as we have some new and returning racers can we operate a gentleman's rule around catch-up if a car spins and drops back - i.e. lets try and give the cars at the back a good race too.

Planned racing is Trial Mountain in GT590 race cars.

See you then!