Round 4 - Grand Prix de Spa [Jul 16th]

Results and points for Round 4 are now up.

Richard Coxon wrote:

Unlucky Mick, you drove well.

Thank you for being honest with us.


That was probably the best win of my sim racing career. Was great to keep the Ford up with the Porsches at the beginning.

Thanks to my teammate for bringing it home and withstanding that much pressure.

Unlucky Jan, Juha and Michael, you drove a great comeback, same goes for Pascal and Scott. Very unlucky guys.

Thanks for all the kind words 

I sure enjoyed our 3-way-battle early on. Hadn't that much fun in a while!

85 tours de grosses bagarres avec les 3 Lancias avant les problèmes de freins, problèmes qu'a aussi connu Michal sur sa 935.

Ce serait bien que ces problèmes soient réglés si on veut avoir des candidats pour rouler sur les 935 lors des prochaines courses.

Jason White wrote:

Results and points for Round 4 are now up.

You made a small mistake: You gave me the points for both 4th and 6th place

David Jundt wrote:

Jason White wrote:

Results and points for Round 4 are now up.

You made a small mistake: You gave me the points for both 4th and 6th place

Check with Coxon if you like, but I don't see a rule that says only the top score for a driver will count in a race.

Found this in the rule thread:

Richard Coxon wrote:

Juha Bos wrote:

I like this.

If you drive two cars, and both finish in a points scoring position, do you get points for both cars?

No, just the highest placed one you drove. Assuming you drove over 30% of the cars total distance.

Ah ok.  Thank you David.

Sure.

Not that somebody says I "cheated" to keep 2nd

Yves Plaçais wrote:

85 tours de grosses bagarres avec les 3 Lancias avant les problèmes de freins, problèmes qu'a aussi connu Michal sur sa 935.

Ce serait bien que ces problèmes soient réglés si on veut avoir des candidats pour rouler sur les 935 lors des prochaines courses.

I can see that the 935 is maybe still running the brakes a bit hot, so i will apply the same correction as the other cars for the next race.

I am sorry for your retirement Yves, it hasn't been easy to fine tune this mod, and somehow you have been getting bad luck with the cars you get

To everybody else, thank you for your words, it wasn't an easy race by any means, but i tried to be as steady as i could be, even if i wasn't being as quick as my teammate sometimes, but my main goal was to get a totally mistake free race, and i damn nearly achieved that

Wow congrats to the Ford Richards

117ème tours,plus de frein.Régler a 100%
Toute mes excuses,pour les incidents.La Ferrari était bien cabossé.Le pilote bien fatigué.
Dommage Bruno.
Bravo Richard C.,Richard W. belle exploit.
Bravo Emmanuel.

Gérard Ryon wrote:

117ème tours,plus de frein.Régler a 100%
Toute mes excuses,pour les incidents.La Ferrari était bien cabossé.Le pilote bien fatigué.
Dommage Bruno.
Bravo Richard C.,Richard W. belle exploit.
Bravo Emmanuel.

Vous étiez à un très bon rythme Gérard et je ne pouvais l'accompagner. J'ai aussi eu des problèmes avec les freins ont lâché 3 fois causant des accidents et d'avoir à reconstruire la voiture dans les stands.
C'était vraiment dommage ma connexion tombé parce que j'étais dans mes derniers efforts en commençant par le tout Janak vers le haut.
Comment suis vieux a également perdu du temps supplémentaire dans la boîte cesse de devoir aller à la salle de bain.
A la fin, j'étais complètement épuisé!

Richard Coxon wrote:

Unlucky Mick, you drove well.

Thank you for being honest with us.


That was probably the best win of my sim racing career. Was great to keep the Ford up with the Porsches at the beginning.

Thanks to my teammate for bringing it home and withstanding that much pressure.

Unlucky Jan, Juha and Michael, you drove a great comeback, same goes for Pascal and Scott. Very unlucky guys.

Thanks for all the kind words 

No bad luck for the #2 Porsche 956. Just the dumbass sharing the ride with Pascal!

Pascal setup for qually. I loved his set, but nowhere near as fast. I tweaked the set for the race and our strategy. And spent the week urging him to remain calm and stick to the plan. (And it was the perfect plan until I got in the car.)

We weren't going to race. Just quickly cruise at Boost 1 and keep an eye on the other 956. Then, we would release the Mikula to go hunting after I kept the seat warm for the required number of laps -- even had fuel strategy set to go "balls out" if I got us too far behind.

Where those two warlocks in that damned Ford came from? The blood of a virgin spilled at some dark alter, dancing in loin cloths, banging chicken bones together, and the backlit face of Michael Kranefuss appearing in the column of smoke from a bonfire? "This can't last. Let him burn it up." But Coxon kept coming!

So what happens? The old man is the one who loses his mind and eventually writes the car off! Pascal does the 1st stint, right at the prescribed pace, and puts us at the front. I had a great test the very night before and was chuffed. So I jump in the car like a badass. The Ford is by with a longer stint. The other 956 has dropped back.

I hang on for a few laps until the Ford finally pits. I'm in the lead! Wilks is now in the car? Well hell, he was nowhere near me on the hot laps sheet. But after settling in, he starts gaining. Ooh. I was worried about Jan getting in the 956 and chewing me up. Now my car doesn't feel right. Yeah, right?

Trailing throttle oversteer, very sensitive to trail braking. But, in the end, I would say it was all about me getting too deep in the corners. Pascal was worried about burning out the brakes. (He has more experience with this mod than I do, so okay.) So, at the last minute, we backed the pressure down 8%. I should have adjusted my braking points to that, but I totally missed it. I kept driving to the old points. I spin a couple of times and the Ford is by.

Then, midway in my stint, I got a couple screen freezes. I didn't notice it at first, but my wheel is now at 10:30 when running straight and making the left-hand corners extremely tight and the rights over twitchy.

Pascal asks if I want to short pit, turn the car over and fix my wheel. So I do. When he gets the car, we're a lap down. He double stints. In the 1st stint, sticking mostly to low boost, he gets the lap back on his own. In the 2nd stint, we agree he should cut it loose and get back to the front. He chews the gap up at 4-6 seconds per lap. And he takes the lead back. But I still need about 20 laps run to be legal.

When he turns the car back to me, the Ford gets by again. When they pit, their last, I close up nicely but can't overtake because I spin again. Still with those damned brakes! And we still need to stop for fuel one more time -- with about 10 laps to go. Short fuel? Softer tires? Full boost? Can Mad-Mikula run them down again?

Wilks is back in the car. I've got to close or keep the gap as short as possible. I've got to redeem myself. Boost is maxed out. And I'm over driving. And wrote the car off in Blanchimont.

I felt horrible for Pascal. But as bad as I felt, but to hear Pascal on TS, now I felt like I killed his dog!

Pascal, no hanging your head about this one. You drove brilliantly! If I had stuck to the plan, we'd be golden. This one is all on me!

Congratulations to the "Wonder-Richies"! That was a drive for the ages. (Next time you have one of your "BBQs", I'm sure several here would like to come along.)

Great text mr. Urick..

I wish to appologise for hitting you.. but, it was unavoidable. My car was wounded, I planned to go for repair within next few laps, and when I saw you, you were moveing, I just couldnt avoid you..

A small freeze of screen inflicted my lounch to the wall in EuRouge, and even the car was drivable, top speed was reduced significantly and my hunt for the possition was quite over. I tryed after a repair was made, but the gap between rised again due to long pitstop.

I wish we were higher at the end, but somehow, the whole race was doomed from the beggining..

James did a great work with driving two stints with allmost demolitioned car, when I sit in it, i think all the damage was gone, even though, the car was behaving a bit strangely, not even close to practice sessions ???

However, we finished the race, to bad for such a low postition, this beauty car diserves a podium, at leas

I was so utterly exhausted last night that I didn't even congratulate the winner/podiums.

So, congrats!
Well done to all finishers.

I was absolutely humbled by the superior pace of many of the group 5 cars. I think I must have lost a lot more time in the sand trap that I initially thought and was a lap down to almost everyone quite quickly after that and damage repairs.

Just never could find my practice pace. A small adjustment to the car just prior to race, which seemed really sweet at first. However, it proved to cause more problems than it was worth over the course of a stint. Tight as all hell on entry, far too much trailing throttle oversteer, and on top of that going back and forth with being tight on exit to super loose on exit. Add a few brake locks and it was a real battle just making sure I kept the car in the road. I was consistently more than 3 full seconds off my training pace the entire race (and far worse at times)...

A lot of fun, but very tiring.

Firstly well done to the Richards on their win and well done to Haas on his Group 5 win. Happy with my result, second in Group 5. However stupid mistakes, for some reason didn't take tyres on my first pit stop, that stint was fun.

Just want to apologise  for my collision with Chapman on (I think) lap 95 at La Source. Just watched the replay and it was definitely my fault. In the panic of the collision I wanted to get out of the way of the oncoming cars and reversed. In the race I didn't even realise that I actually reversed right into the way of Haas! In the panic I was looking down at my gear lever trying to find the reverse gear and backed up right into his path. It's difficult to look with the cockpit view and didn't think I had enough room to make it around if I drove straight on, looking at the replay I obviously did. So apologies to Haas also, still after that a great result for you!

Jason Whited wrote:

I was absolutely humbled by the superior pace of many of the group 5 cars.  

Jason the BMW and the Ferrari are not in the same league as the Porsche and the Lancia.don't be too hard on yourself.

Better yet, take the Porsche or Lancia for a spin and see what you can do in them

James Knowles wrote:

Jason  the BMW and the Ferrari are not in the same league as the Porsche and the Lancia.don't be too hard on yourself.

Better yet, take the Porsche or Lancia for a spin and see what you can do in them

Thanks. And that is true.
However, in training extensively with the BMW I had found a rather "sweet zone" sort of pace that I thought could be competitive. The brake lock into the sand trap cost me a lot. Hit the barrier there too and had it repaired in the pits, so that took time. A few other smallish mistakes were time consuming as well.
2 of my stops, I actually sat in the stall quite a bit longer than it took the crew. Trying to rest, I was getting tired. So, lost time there too.

I was amazed by the lack of attrition, or even of others driving group 5 cars alone doing the same...taking small breaks while in the pits.

Cheers to those able to hold it down consistently for so long!

Yeah... I don't know what to say except for what Scott already mentioned.. Worked my ass off to get everything working with the qualifying setup, Scott being an absolute magician for the race setup..
And yeah, we expected the other 956 to be our direct competition but it was the C100. After Scott took over and his wheel screwed up, I asked him to give the car to me and fix his wheel (just like I did last year at Kyalami when Raul had problems with his wheel) and I went on to go back to the lead from being a lap down..
Then Scott took the car again and since the C100 has a better mileage than the 956, I asked Scott to push a bit more and in the end, he lost it... So that's my only ride in the mighty 956 gone for this year..
Scott said it sounded like he killed my dog, but the only thing that kind of died there was my enthusiasm in racing and my faith in being able to even finish a race this year..

To summarize it in one sentence: I wish we could just re-launch the race, that's how disappointed I am in the end.

But still, gotta give credits to Scott, his race setup was magic, he was consistent and also very helpful when it came to distances and avoiding spinners.

Gérard Ryon wrote:

117ème tours,plus de frein.Régler a 100%

Wait, what? That's not the brake pressure, right?

@Yves/Michal:

Have you guys monitored the heat of your brakes during the race and checked if your brakes got hotter?

If you kept braking late and hard with a car that has such a powerful engine, but thus a longer braking distance aswell, I wouldn't be surprised that they started failing.


After I jumped into the Sauber, "Jakes" kept telling me to be careful and increase the braking distance in order to put less stress on the brakes.

TBH, I still want it to be a challenge to manage the car, including the brakes.

What makes them last at Spa/Monza might work too well for the Norschleife/Mugello.

Do all cars have the same brakes now?

I had brake presure at 76, bias to 56 on front

as i tested now temperture was not higher than 460 degree Celsius

They dont all have the same brakes. The problem is prolonged heat exposure, but i will make them more equal next time yes.

Michal Janak wrote:

I had brake presure at 76, bias to 56 on front

as i tested now temperture was not higher than 460 degree Celsius

I drove a Gr. C car, but I had rather neutral settings of 51:49 in the CK5 to avoid getting too much heat towards the front discs as they get hotter.

But Michal, brake pressure and bias is one thing, but the way you braked is also important. I heard brake wear here is mostly attributed by how hard you hit the pedal?

So if you brake late and stomp the pedal down for far too long(possibly even locking your brakes), 76% pressure might still kill you.


I am not saying you did, but I'd just consider it. Driving style also plays it's part.

@Richard: Just don't make them "too" fail-save. I love endurance racing and managing your car's capabilities is a part of it.

Not sure if the cars would need it for Mugello, Spa has more hard-braking zones than the next track? Did the 935 suffer at the previous tracks too?

Some will hate it(I might too if I get it), but it's a part of the racing for me.

Pedal to the metal for 1000 kms without consequences if you try too hard is... a bit unrealistic. If you feel like your pedal gets longer, just drive accordingly. "You make your bed you lie in it"


Actually; Do the turbo-powered cars suffer earlier than the non-turbo cars in this mod?

Dont worry, i wont make them indestructable, just align them with the rest.


As for the turbo question, i am not sure what you mean. The engine "sensitivity" would need some tweaks to be to my liking, like i did with the cart88 mod.But i won't be making drastic changes while the season is still underway.

Michal Janak wrote:

I had brake presure at 76, bias to 56 on front

as i tested now temperture was not higher than 460 degree Celsius

i might be gun shy from the experience with the first race before the adjustments, but to be on the safe side, i was targeting hot temps less than 350, 460 is way hotter and thus, harder on the brakes than i ever dreamed. the issue is, we dont have any feedback in testing to "how hard" we are using them, and the wear rate, unfortunately this is just something not in this mod.

dave