Round 3 - Indy Japan 300 [Feb 15th]

Alberto Ibañez wrote:

Your blocking at turn 3-4 was really horrible Matthias, you can't cut down to the apex like that. Had to slow so much that got almost hit on the rear by following cars.

I'm really angry today, some things I saw made me really consider abandoning this championship, as much as I wanted to drive it. Some driving is ridiculous.

Alberto Ibañez wrote:

At lap 98 I was royally blocked at turn 3, so at lap 99 I stood on the outside to pass there. The blocking was so bad that he crossed in front of me and hit you (You were on my left), then he bounced to the right at turn exit and almost collected me (I was about to pass on the outside) forcing me to take evasive maneuver and glance the wall, bending my right rear suspension. That caused my spin at the backstraight after the race was restarted, as the car became uncontrollable. Two cars effectively taken out in a single turn Rolling Eyes

Got no time to watch the replay until now, so now i can see what you think:
- i've been really slow at this corner, didn't know where there problem has been, much slower than Kevin with same Setup (perhaps 98 Chassis vs. my 97 Chassis)
- You have been 2 Laps down, on your Lap 98 i've been on Lap 100 an P4 (i have no problem letting cars get a lap back if faster)
- i was simply surprised, that everyone was way faster at the entry of the corner, but i just drove "my line" (as every lap almost the same line). You've not been next to me at the "brakion" point, so i turned in to the apex
- on Lap 99 (101) i've still been on P4, you had almost the same gap as on lap bevor, and Karel Marciniszyn lapped you, but tried directly to overtake me in one go. On my braking point he was still behind you, so I've never expedet him to dive into the inside (he was 20Km/h faster than JP/Rocky at the same point of the corner at that moment), so we touched and he almost lost control, but gained it back before accelerating. but then he lost the car into the wall
- because of the collision i had to lift my throttle a little but, so that you closed the gap on the outside really fast, but instead of also liftig ,you turned your wheel right and hit the wall

If you think my driving is ridiculous, i should probably stop, before you have to - but in all my sim-racing years you are the first to complain about me...
I just don't like being blamed for something, i couldn't avoid because "driving to the apex" is the way of the fastest line, and on my point of view, you've both been a little bit to optimistic. I think if you would have waited one more lap, you would have easily passed me.

All in all, my best HSO Result with P5 with the worst feeling car i ever had, got no damage and no bad luck with the safety car. Very frustrating, that i've never been able to attack cars in front of me, try to make it better next time.

Still looking forward to the next track.

Matthias, sounds like the same thing I was doing in the first oval race in Miami. As we are all naturally road course drivers, our natural instinct is to drive to the apex regardless of what the rest of the field are doing however it seems like when it comes to oval racing that chopping towards the apex of the corner is not advisable especially when travelling slower than those behind. I think it was quite well described in the Miami topic here (again by Alberto): [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

There's only a few people in this series that have much experience from ovals so for someone like me as an mostly an amateur to single seater oval racing I reckon it's best to take advice from the veterans and try and learn from mistakes

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 i couldn't avoid because "driving to the apex" is the way of the fastest line

No it isn't. And you are actually the first one to admit it, because you wrote this at the start of your reply:

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  i've been really slow at this corner, didn't know where there problem has been, much slower than Kevin with same Setup (perhaps 98 Chassis vs. my 97 Chassis)
...

- i was simply surprised, that everyone was way faster at the entry of the corner, but i just drove "my line" (as every lap almost the same line).

You were not using the fastest line, which is quite different than the one from a road course. That was the problem, not the chassis or the setup. You were clarly "road racing" with late braking and entry point followed by sharp turn into the apex. That won't work here. At turn 1/2 you didnt notice that so much because those are very fast ones. 

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You've not been next to me at the "brakion" point, so i turned in to the apex

At ovals when you brake late and to the right your are giving up the inside lane and you can't go back there if a car is coming. You certainly can block the following car by "low lining" i.e. making early entry point so that he has no space to your left and must stay behind you, but not by changing lanes chopping the other car that is coming faster on the inside because that can easily cause an accident. You can certainly go back to your lane and even force the following car to lift, but not if the speed difference is high and he is alreayd commited to passing on that line. Not just because of that car, but because there will usually be others close behind him and the acordion effect can cause a really big wreck.
Unlike in road races, there are different lanes through the corners and it is quite frequent to see two or even three cars taking a turn in paralell (You get messages "Three wide" and "Still there" from your spotter, and that is what they are for). In road racing watching two cars in paralell is epic (Villeneuve vs Jabouille) but at ovals it is quite usual, so you have to take a different approach to the "line", always keeping in mind that there are several lanes and each one has his racing line (Like at the Autobahn).

I should also mention that late braking into a turn and going to the upside lane is at oval racing a message to the following car "pass on my left, I'm going up". Actually the first lap you did that I was not angry, just surprised because I thought you were going to let me pass, seeing that I was faster and unlapping myself (Which is quite a normal thing at ovals given that laps are half a minute and the yellows cause different strategies).

Finally, I quote Martin Audran's message at page 3 before the race:

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Some recommendations for tonight after the first two rounds:

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- When a driver is close in your left mirror, don't close the door in front of him. It's not ok to defend this way on oval track.

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 you had almost the same gap as on lap bevor

 Of course I had, you had blocked my passing and made me loose loads of speed at turn 3/4, plus I have the weakest engine in the grid (Mercedes). I had caught you easily in the previous laps and would have passed and be already far away had you not prevented my overtaking at turn 3/4. That is also exactly the reason why Karel caught us both and was trying to pass.

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 you've both been a little bit to optimistic

Consider this:

I stood in the upper lane and was in position for passing you on the outside of the corner exit. I went through the corner faster than you, and even left space for Karel to overtake on my inside, all this in complete control. Karel certainly went in a bit hot, but still left plenty of room to my car and got by with no problems.  

We both went through the corner in paralell with no incident. When you hit Karel, he was not going up to you from overshooting the corner. It is you who went down against him because of the way you cut the corner. If you had stood in the same outside lane as me -Which would have been a completely legitimate way of blocking me-, Karel would have passed us both cleanly on the left.

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 i had to lift my throttle a little but, so that you closed the gap on the outside really fast, but instead of also liftig ,you turned your wheel right and hit the wall

When you lift your throttle on an oval while still steering left, you go left (down) not right. You not just lifted, you opened your trajectory and came back to the right instead of staying left, which was unjustified because given your apex speed you could exit the corner forcing the car to stay on left easily. I had to open my trajectory and take evasive action. Of course I didnt brake hard, that would have caused me to understeer into the wall or into your back.

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in all my sim-racing years you are the first to complain about me...

I suppose your simracing years have been on road courses -where I certainly have no complaint about you at all.

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  I should probably stop, before you have to

Please don't. I admit I was quite angry after the race, but I understand this is very different racing from what people are used to here, and it can be frustrating for both sides. Actually, 99% of your arguments I would share IF this had been a road race; but oval racing is different.

Also keine Sorge, wir können gern weiter zusammen rennen, das nächste mal wird es sicher viel besser sein

See you at Long Beach 

The Toyota engine is the weakest of the grid Alberto (almost 30 hp down on Honda/Ford I believe), and the gap between the Mercedes and Honda/Ford is not really significant.

Otherwise I agree with everything you said, you can not apply road racing techniques to ovals The best thing to do would be to watch some real oval racing ^^

Ah right, I forgot about the Toyota. But in any case bear in mind that the differences between power are not what you see if you open the engines in the physics editor because that one does not count the boost multiplier. Starting from a base with a small difference, (F.e. 5-10 HP) this gets increased greatly after you have applied the boost 5 setting and can become the 30-40 HP you say. But certainly, if you are racing at boost 2 or 3 there is not a huge gap.  Sadly the mercedes is a sucker at ovals and uses lots of fuel, so I was limited to boost 1 and 2 during my races at Motegi and Homestead and I admit that I didnt crank up the boost to pass Matthias because I thought I could do it on the outside -sadly the incident happened and the yellow came, otherwise I would have gone to boost 5 the next time.

Juste quelques questions à messieurs les admins concernant les règles sur ovales :

- Est-il interdit de dépasser à l’extérieur des courbes ? mon set me permettant de passer à l’extérieur assez facilement je l ai fais quelques fois à MOTEGI et n’ayant pas vraiment compris le motif de ma sanction "illegal place", je voudrais ne pas refaire deux fois la même erreur.
- Et je suppose que sous drapeau jaune les positions doivent être maintenus jusqu’à la ligne de chronométrage ?
- Concernant la pénalité de passage au stand on a combien de tours pour l'effectuer aussi
je me suis mélanger les pinceaux les drapeaux jaunes en série se sont passés au moment de mon "Drive-through penalty for illegal place" et sanction rédibitoire au final : DQ

I was in a Mercedes powered car at Homestead and even though I pitted twice, my first stop was past the halfway point of the race. So, I could have pitted only once in the race and that was with only 2 yellows.

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I was in a Mercedes powered car at Homestead and even though I pitted twice, my first stop was past the halfway point of the race. So, I could have pitted only once in the race and that was with only 2 yellows.

Yeah at Homestead it was OK, but at Motegi I had crazy fuel consumption. But I talked with other people about it and they seemed to be getting much better mileage than me

Maybe it was my driving, no idea. I know that at road courses I have always used much less fuel than some other people (Which is no wonder I suppose because I'm much slower also ) but at Motegi it was really exaggerated

Hmm, interesting. I was burning about 1.8L/lap at boost 1 in the Honda.

For me it was 1.98 litres per lap at boost 2. I know because I calculated that if there had been no yellows at all, I would have missed the finish line by a single lap

Alberto Ibañez wrote:

if there had been no yellows at all

Well I didnt mean that I hoped or even considered an scenario where there would be no yellows at all, but re-reading my post it certainly sounded like that I really thought myself very clever by reasoning: "People were cautious at Homestead and then they relaxed for Vancouver, now they will have realized again that you can't race like that and Motegi should not be too bad" But of course as usual reality is later always worse than your worst nightmares

Alberto Ibañez wrote:

For me it was 1.98 litres per lap at boost 2. I know because I calculated that if there had been no yellows at all, I would have missed the finish line by a single lap

My mercedes was 2.0 ltrs a lap on boost 5

Tomorrow I will make a last post with some recommandations for the rookies on oval and for those who are not making the right things in order to have a pleasant race for everyone, and if nothing changes I will have to start to give penalties (2 races suspension).


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Demain je vais faire un dernier post explicatif pour les débutants et pour ceux qui ne font pas ce qu'il faut pour que tout le monde puisse avoir une expérience agréable, et si rien ne change je serai dans l'obligation de commencer à pénaliser (2 courses de suspension).

@Greg et Pascal: j'ai aussi eu une pénalité sans que je sache pourquoi. Peut être un problème avec le circuit malheureusement Je ne peux pas en dire plus. A surveiller sur les prochaines courses.

Pour valider la pénalité il faut le faire sous 5 tours, les tours sous yellows ne comptant pas. Si vous obtenez la pénalité au début du yellow, le décompte de 5 tour démarrera au green suivant.