Well. Someone is reading this...

History moment here.
We've just surpassed the 1000 hits in the past month mark. So thanks to all those folks out there that have this as your home page. Every little hit helps!

Nice.

What's more, there's certainly been a fair bit of interest since we really got the league seasons underway, here are the all time stats...

Thanks, you've been a wonderful audience!

League Race #7 - Bumper Sticker Swap Meet

It seemed a good idea to call it that back before the great PP fiasco.
Now I think it's going to be more "Rocket Sled Derby" - the TC500 cars have become monsters.

Thinking that if things don't change we may see TC480 next season, but by then we'll have all added in the non-removable engine tunes, or at least I will have...

So to race, and we'll see what the world looks like after this event.

The Track(s)
Two favourites and old timer tracks, not reverse, not wet, not anything but vanilla.
Trial Mountain - for both the Clubman and the TC500 events. And Grand Valley for the TC500.

I know the old TC500 Grand Valley target was 2 minutes, and I know the new Trial Mountain bench is around 1:30.

Trial mountain suits a car which has serious grunt, both the start/finish and back straights are proper fast and coupled with pretty easy corners leading out. But, too much power (Tom's Chaser I'm looking at you) and approach speeds become a serious issue. There are also a few bends that can be clipped but through the car off - indeed this is one of few tracks that regularly flips cars (that last chicane can do that). More than ever, slow in fast out will prevail.

Grand Valley. You all know Grand Valley. Whilst there's a reasonable start/finish straight, it's more about scrub and turn on this track. Getting good drive out of the corners and being settled for the next is paramount. 4WD cars here may still stand a chance. FWD - you're history!

The Cars
TC500. Don't forget to tune them folks. Though you did that last week right. See below for details and analysis on the PP changes.


Official Details
Clubman
Host: Andrew (Andyc709292)
Lounge: FCT GT5 Andrew
Date: 24-Jan-2013
Track: Trial Mountain
Start time: 9:00 PM
Laps: 5
Cars: Fixed
Tyres: TBC
Boost: High

Championship
Host: Andrew
Start time: 9:15 PM
Track: Trial Mountain / Grand Valley
Laps: 6
Cars: TC500
Tyres: Racing Medium
Boost: Low

Race on!

Tis the season to be jolly...

Check the seasonals.

Check the latest seasonal, this one in fact. It's compact 400pp cars on comfort soft tyres.

Then, consider that most if not all the compact cars in the game are FWD cars, and haven't had the hand of PP touch them. So relatively a compact F/R car is going to be much lower pp.

Then go get one of the following (luck finding them):

Just cool.

Cooler.

Coolerer

Err, warmer.

All of those cars have gone from a rock solid 400pp or above to well below. The Nissan at the top is now 340pp or something, and on all but the most open of tracks far faster than the competition. And the Evo, well that's now 370pp or something and frankly ballistic. 

It gets better. This seasonal has the SRF (Skid recovery force) turned on by default, so although it's comfort soft time, the lower powered cars handle pretty well - if not 'purist'.

Easy money folks - at least until they fix the PP issue.

Lets take the Jaaaaaaaaaaag

TC500 Reset night tonight...

I have a confession, I may have been a bit premature in my rage.
Certainly things have changed, but not by much even in the TC500 category. Certainly the 4WDs have lost out, but I think they had the advantage on all but epic long tracks anyhow. Still, shame to see them go, maybe a test race or two to see.

What's certain is that anything 'large' has gained considerably, a few of my cars are now woefully underpowered, but we're talking only half a dozen. Sadly my 330i has bit the dust, 434pp is way lower than it should be I think...

But, cars like the S-Type R and the Toms Chaser have gained well. Both are around the 600Bhp mark, so very powerful cars, and pulling easy 1:15 laps of our special TC500 track that we have (typically think 1:18 as a reasonable lap).

There are some clear avoid cars still mind, so not all great...

The Jaaaag

Chasers war on cornering

Nope - This was like this on every corner..

Actually I just like this car.

So, unless you had a F/R car that was on the limit of tuning you're probably going to be alright. Oh, and unless you used a 4WD car , Chris.

Race on!

Chevrolet 2014 Corvette Stingray Final Prototype

This is it folks.
You'll all have it downloaded by now no doubt, so I'll not talk about handling etc, besides that's just opinion...

Video of the garage and lack of settings...

And video of two laps around Deep Forest...

But, but, I haven't got a car...

Not got a 1960-1970 540pp race car for the Targa? Does such a thing exist? I think so (and I can lend them out too).
Dibs on the Ferrari...

Longest name. Period.

Dibs.

Monster.

$20Mil please.

Beige beauty.

Probably the fastest car here.

Nice, but not fast.

Same car as above, but in green!

Very fast, quite a handful.

Epic if you can control it...

Very steady motor.

Goes like an arrow. Straight.

Not all race cars in fairness, but all with race car heritage. And what's more some are available new from the dealer too...

Remember that Corvette test car?

Corvette gets unveiled, January 15...

Invitational - A night of driving.

You're all cordially invited to a night's driving, my style...

The cars

Anything 4wd and 600pp - I'd suggest a racing car personally. So something like this:

We might do Ferrari racing or something similar if folks want, but we never race these cars so time to give them a go!

This is not racing, but it is thrash and drive so expect things to be fairly fast. But where I hear you ask?

The track(s)

It's my list of Toscana (and a few other) tracks that I have shared out. It's not all of my creations, I think I can't race some of the V.1 tracks, but certainly there's a night of this ahead.

The plan

Basically, a few laps per track - noting the ones we like for future racing. Chase the leader, wait for the crashers, general thrash racing. Emphasis here is on having broadside fun, so no penalties, no points and nothing but open(ish) road to drive down - and I do have some spectacular tracks...

The Time
TBC - we'll probably do it outside of the normal nights of racing. Thinking either a Sunday night or a Wednesday. Let me know what you prefer!

Sound like fun? Let me know...

---

Other news

Here's the Gallardo replay, which in no small part made me think of the above thrash session...

Race on!

League Race#6 Results

All change! Points mean prizes and Chris has the lead...

What another top night's racing.

Clubman Roundup
Dropouts changed the mix in the race, and Paul was the final looser to this bout of Internet flatulence. You still get a point, but Evan's lead has gained again. Could Evan run away with the championship?
If we're racing the Gallardos on any regular basis he will. Those things were mad.
Somehow we ended up with the zebra brigade with only black and white cars, but that's OK.
I've been racing the clubman with boost on high, and it showed in some ways, no one was ever far back. But  I think everyone had a turn at the front. And then a turn at going sideways and finally a turn at hitting the barriers. Except for Evan... he got in front soon enough, and then stayed there in a super slick smooth driving style that paid off. Not sure how, my Gallardo handled like it had rear wheel steering and forks at the front...
Video to follow!

Superstars Roundup
We (those of us in the lounge at the start) all managed to race this - though Rod, you're online but not racing? Have you retired? And George was stuck at work. Booo!
A short enduro it was though. Ten laps at 1:14 or so per lap made it not much longer than usual races.
My choice of car was good, and bad. Good because it easily pulled a 1:13 in practice. Bad as it couldn't cope with off line cornering - I should have stuck with my ISF.
Luke had a factory (cough, me, cough) tuned RX8 and certainly put it to good use. I reckon trying to straighten the chicane out every lap probably cost him the race though, the replay shows places lost just about every lap.
Paul's M5 continues to be a dominating car. Never change it mate. A somewhat easy romp the finish, only contested by Chris who I think was ready to pass for at least three laps towards the end.
The rest of us scrapped it out behind. I never realised we rubbed paint as much as we did, the racing was super close, but never felt like anyone was leaning on other cars or had anything other than an accidental shunt.

And this one does have a video:

Official Results

Clubman

1. Evan

2. Andrew

3. Chris

4. Luke

5. Paul (DNF)

Superstars

1. Paul

2. Chris

3. Luke

4. Evan

5. Andrew

Next week

Next week's racing is something different. Look up Targa Florio. Then get a car that's 1960-1970 inclusive and set it to 540pp and Sports Medium tyres.

The track will be a custom Toscana track - as long as I can make it. 

Then we'll do the same in 650Open cars, marvellous.

Race on!

League Race #6

Euro Trash Special.

Race on folks. We're back into the New Year points races, and what a way to start.

To recap

Race #1 - Eiffel & TC500 cars. A nearly full field of cars except for George and his absent Internet connection. We saw Baloo join us for a race and Simon joined the league. Lots of overtaking and generally the custom track proved itself yet again. How cool to think we're the only online race in the world that races that track. Probably.
This race also saw the start of the clubman season. Fixed cars racing a shorter race saw M3s Vs. ISFs (if my memory serves). It looked like an easy win for the Lexus, but the M3s had it in the end. Clubman racing proven.

Race #2 - Was Motegi East in the 590s, but a lack of DLC for some moved us to Trial Mountain. The Clubman race was an almost random pick of car, and we ended up with Elises on sports soft, or shopping carts as it felt like. Such a close race in the end with those cars. On the line overtaking thanks to good cornering meant a win for me!
The 590s continue to be excellent race cars. Simon and Luke had their own race as they didn't have the cars for the class, a one time error given they were both lapped!

Race #3 - Le Mans endurance. The first long race of the season. And in some ways not as expected...
Firstly I forgot the clubman race, oops. Secondly I had a kick 3 laps into the 10 lap race, so we did a restart with 6 laps to go. This changed the dynamic of the racing entirely, and the smart racers changed tires too from medium to softs to gain the edge in the race. The even smarter ones fuelled their cars to the end too. Night racing, pits, and a position change thanks to no fuel. Excellent!
Also noteworthy is that this is the first 720p replay we've had. I think we'll all agree it's better to watch the racing in high-def now. I'm just waiting on international recognition of my film talents...

Race #4 - Nurburgring GP/F & GT590s. But before that, Minis Vs. 207 GTis. Off the line we went at what seemed a sedate pace, but the racing was ultra close with many position changes and generally good conduct in cars that only really passed each other if you had the corner perfect.
The 590s were epic of course. I think this is probably one of our more competitive classes, but only just. Luke has another honourable mention here, the conversation went something like this:
Me: "Oi oi, got your car sorted?"
Luke: "Yup, spent some time on here getting it tuned for the race, ready to go."
... enter an Audi R8 road car.
Me: "Errr.... dude. Japanese 2wd Race Car - that's the rules"
Luke: "...."
To be fair, Luke came back with his 70's Calsonic Skyline and damn near won the race. Good effort!

Race #5 - NurBoring as everyone is calling it. Anyway, we didn't do it. But that's fine as I've moved it to the last slot in the season (which was vacant), we're still racing there, and it'll be a crazy length race for sure.

And that's it for the points races, so much other cool racing has been going on as well though. An example would be the hill climb night, which not many of us attended, but ended up being an excellent test and thrash session. Evan I think had all the class wins in that one, proving his smooth calculated style works a treat given the opportunity to shine.

Next race

It's race #6 folks (I'm counting the NerdBirdring OK).

The track
We know it well. Rome Reverse (ignore the little red arrows below).

For this race we're doing 10 laps of this track. No tire wear though (I think our TC500 cars would be all over the place with tire wear).

The cars
Nothing too epic, TC500 cars. Anything you think that'll be fast around here eh.

This combination across 10 laps should be interesting. The two straights really benefit a fast car, but getting the power down through the big corners is a challenge with a car that understeers. Also, a poorly set up car will go ape through the chicanes and tight bends early on in the lap, losing time for the rest of the lap easily.
Simon, not sure if you are racing, but there's a very nice car in your garage to race - no reflection that you're head of HR & Finance or anything you understand....
And, ringer in the mix - we believe that George is back, certainly last week's racing had him online. Welcome back mate, looking forwards to seeing you in 2nd place on the podium eh...

Official Details


Clubman
Host: Andrew (Andyc709292)
Lounge: FCT GT5 Andrew
Date: 10-Jan-2013
Track: Rome Reverse
Start time: 9:00 PM
Laps: 5
Cars: Fixed
Tyres: TBC
Boost: High

Championship
Host: Andrew
Start time: 9:15 PM
Track: Rome Reverse
Laps: 10
Cars: TC500
Tyres: Racing Medium
Boost: Low

Race on!