Round 1 - Donington GP [Jan 23rd]

Thank you Jonatan for organising tonight and taking care of any problems.

Race report tomorrow for myself

Joshua Anderson wrote:

Massive apologies to Dave in the second race, went into T1 together and somehow a light tap (or at least it felt light from where I was sitting) ended up in him barrel-rolling off the track. Waited up for him before struggling on, going off a few times and eventually giving up.

It seemed like a big dive up the inside with no chance of making the corner to me, at the start of lap 2:x . I think that you had tried that before also. At the start of the race it was a bit much.
But hey lets move on , see everyone next time, if I get a car..

I want to thank Jonatan for rushing the start of the second heat without which I would have been left out.
It was a great race, very well organized.

Results and Points are up, let me know if there are any misstakes, I think I got it all sorted the way they should be (my 1st time doing that stuff).

I'll report back tomorrow.

The points for Pole will be added after I've had a look at the Replay tomorrow, simply want to be thurough but don't have more time tonight.

Jonatan Acerclinth wrote:

Results and Points are up, let me know if there are any misstakes, I think I got it all sorted the way they should be (my 1st time doing that stuff).

All is okay, both poles should be awarded to Grant (Drivers Championship) and David Sabre (Independents Total Cup).

Lukáš Vydra wrote:

Jonatan Acerclinth wrote:

Results and Points are up, let me know if there are any misstakes, I think I got it all sorted the way they should be (my 1st time doing that stuff).

All is okay, both poles should be awarded to Grant (Drivers Championship) and David Sabre (Independents Total Cup).

Only Grant would get pole points. The point is for the person who took pole overall, not in each class.

The Laguna actually doesn't try to kill you if you know what you are doing, like Dave Miller. Thanks man!

Thanks to him, I finally dropped the "vibrating drill hammer" that flew out of my hands every damn aproach to a hard braking zone

So P6(starting P18) and P5(starting P9) look like your normal DJ results, but there was actually more behind it. I guess Dave's help also turned out to be the difference between me and Matthias in R2, where I first got overtaken(to be honest, I did actually leave the door open on purpose at the time because I wanted to settle in after one car got into contact with the red sea of Peugeot at the first turn) but then kept getting faster, passing and ultimatively finishing some 6-7s ahead of him.

But I'd still say someone that likes FWD would make a better job than me with this car

Richard Coxon wrote:

Only Grant would get pole points. The point is for the person who took pole overall, not in each class.

Alright, but the scoring table is a little bit confusing. It's said it's for both championship. Tricky stuff

Lukáš Vydra wrote:

Richard Coxon wrote:

Only Grant would get pole points. The point is for the person who took pole overall, not in each class.

Alright, but the scoring table is a little bit confusing. It's said it's for both championship. Tricky stuff

A misstake on my part, will change that the next time I have time. At work now so will make a tweak to the information during lunch.

Another crazy race.. seems like I just kind of couldn't keep up with the top half of the field in the race.

First off, I'd again like to apologize for hitting Steve in the rear; as I said, purely a mistake on my part.
However, on the topic of attacking, defending, etc. knowing I'm not a saint myself, I'd just like to ask some people that were around me during the races to be a little more chill. These cars aren't made for last-second braking and overly defensive manouvers. Things like cutting across the line in the braking zone almost certainly leads to a collision.

Now, my race report.
Semi-good qualifying pace, semi-bad race pace. Didn't really have much of a battle going on in either race. Finished heat 1 0.006s ahead of Peter Blom, because for some reason my car didn't want to shift anymore on the S/F straight. 
Other than that, I had a huge load of fun. These cars were amazing in rF1, but here in AMS they're incredible.
Congratulations on the podium in both races, especially Jonatan in Heat 2, who managed to give Grant a good run for his money.

Well, that was an evening of hard work to say the least...

The feeling of getting to drive these hugely fantastic cars was great for me. As I said in TeamSpeak when we did the Formation Lap for Race 1, I were back to when I was 5-6 years old playing TOCA on PC with keypads and no more idea of how to drive than that you should use the throttle a lot

With my work schedule I drove on Sunday to get an idea of the car (had a base set before then but tried to tune it a bit then along with Pascal and David) and I think it was close to perfect for me and my way to drive the FWD cars.

Practice:
Used the practice time to get re-acclimitized to the car. Didn't take long to get the flow of things again. That's the great thing with these things, once you've learnt how to drive them it's like second nature to jump back in, fantastic work on the physics by our HSO guys

Qualifying 1:
For Qualifying I wanted to try to give myself as good a chance as I could to have a good race and got a lap in which was about 1,5 tenths off my PB but happy enough with that, put me 4th on the grid, behind both of the Audi's of Grant (incredible one-lap pace!) & Jacob and Richard in the Honda. Perfectly happy with that, a good chance at getting a good start and making use of my Race Pace which I thought was decent at least.

Race 1:
The race got underway and I were just a tad slow off the line (bogged down slightly so had to clutch-kick it to get the revs up and get going properly. I suppose that's what did me in.
Braking for T1 I suddenly veered left and headed for the gravel and barriers. I thought I had locked up as soon as I touched the brakes but later was told by the guys in TS that me and Steve apparently made a bit of contact. I have no hard feelings about it, these cars are very edgy under brakes anyway so any contact other than straight from behind will result in massive issues.

(I hope you'll reconsider Steve, you had good pace and are always clean to race with).

I thought when I was headed for the armco that it would be the end of my race but thankfully the Volvo crash safety is well modelled and the car stood up well to the shunt. I had a bent front right wheel (slight lack of suspension ability and tiny bit knocked steering) and no rear wing, I hope who ever picked it up in the audience enjoy the keepsake...

Got going about 10-15 seconds behind the rest of the field and immedietly had a massive moment down the Craner Curves but was able to hold onto the car and get through the Old Hairpin. Took the rest of the lap a bit easy trying to understand the new handling of the car and then I lowered my head and put the pedal to the metal "Time to catch the rest of the field if possible".

Took me another half a lap to catch up to the field and started to work my way up it. Had one or two moments, some were harder to pass than others.

After about 10 laps I had worked my way up to 14th or something like that and was closing in on a big group of guys consisting of, among others, David Sabre, Rob Swindells, Peter Blom among others, I think there were a few others.

I had the "luck" of a couple of them having issues meaning I gained places without having to pass cars. Peter proved to be a difficult guy to pass. That Peugeot was working well mate!
In the end did a half dive up at McLeans (Matt Neal has made that move famous in later years) and Peter decided to leave me room, had he closed the door I would have been able to avoid his car I think, thanks for giving me the room on the inside, I hope I gave you enough room on the exit.

By that time I was 11th I think and closing in on Pascal for 10th. As Pascal said earlier, he was struggling and me giving him a suggestion turned out to be a bad idea. I was able to catch him and on the 2nd to last lap I could go for a move into Goddards but sadly Pascal had a moment under brakes which sent us both sideways and I span off on the outside, meaning Peter was back past and I had lost the plot and struggled to make use of the little bit of pace the car still had in the race.

In the end finished just outside the points which is a great recovery drive but would have wanted that 1 or those 2 points that was up for grabs


Qualifying 2:

After a bit of caffuffle getting the session going I wasn't quite in the right mind and failed to set a PB like most others, I assume, did.
But my half a tenth off my PB lap meant 5th on the grid, fantastic effort Ray to get the Ford into 3rd on the grid!

Race 2:

Started on the left side this time and had a better start, outstarting Ray who it looked like, had wheel spin gallore getting off the line. I myself tried to go around the outside in Redgate and was able to make it work, getting crowded out by Yves on the exit but gaining places on both Jacob and Richard W to lay 3rd going down Hollywood and Craners. Thanks for letting me slot in Richard, could have been an interesting run down the hill side by side hehe.

Then Yves made a misstake in McLeans, I'm not sure if he hit the cerb unsettling the car or if it was simply a question of too much power but around he went and I was now sitting in 2nd only a second and a half off the bootlid of Grants Audi.

It took me a bit of time getting into the grove, having ran with a damaged car in R1 meant I had lost a bit of the edge. Found it a few laps later when I were about 3 seconds behind Grant and just ahead of Richard.
As I found my edge of driving I started to reel in Grant, slowly but surely, at about 2-4 tenths a lap. It seemed like I were really strong between the Old Hairpin and Coppice while Grant was a bit stronger out of the slower turns of the Chicane and the Melbourne and Goddards hairpins. I would gain around 6-7 tenths in my strongest section and then Grant would pull a bit of it back in his.

What ensued was a battle of our minds, rather than our doorhandles.
I was getting closer every lap but then disaster struck. I managed to lock-up into the chicane trying to get ever closer and couldn't unlock the wheels so steamed off and had to dirttrack the chicane, loosing about 2 seconds.
I don't know if Grant let up a little then but despite my flatspotted tires I gained most of it back over the last 3 laps and were almost within Kamikaze range by the end of the race but it was not to be.
Grant drove a non-big-misstake race, I was able to force him into tiny errors but he never did a big one like I did.


But it was great fun to be on the pace and fighting for the top positions. I believe that's the first time I've had such good pace since we did the Adelaide F1 Support race using the TCL cars back in 2015 so I'm chuffed with both my races really.
To climb from near last (only Yves in the Beemer who started from the pits was behind) to within striking distance of points in R1 with a wounded car and then be able to give Grant a run for the Money (as I said yesterday and Pascal mentioned earlier) is a fantastic feeling for me. And I got to drive these cars in anger for the first time, been wanting to do so since 2017

Congrats to all that partook in the 1st round and to the podium finishers in particular who made it look easier than it is to run these cars close to the limit.

Now back to work but I think I'll celebrate with something to eat and drink on Saturday since I have Sunday off for once

Here comes the table

Grant Riddall wrote:

Thank you Jonatan for organising tonight and taking care of any problems.

Hear, hear! Good work and you even found time to race to 2nd

I had a throttle problem in race one, the potentiometer got progressively worse until the throttle stuck wide open at the end of Starky's. So I shut off the car and retired just after half-way.

This meant a race against time to open up my G29 pedal base, remove the pedals and clean the pots and put it all back together in time for race 2. I just about made the end of qualifying for race 2

I raced from the back in an ill-handling car that was way, way oversteery but survived to come home 9th. Some wonderful battles with Honza, David Jaques, Cezariusz and Oyvind for many laps - great fun to cap a difficult evening.

I have to thank Yves and especially Dave for great and clean (for the touring cars) battles, without you, both of my races would be pretty boring

If original mod for rfactor was great, now is excellent. Really fun to drive except weird brakes and giant flatspots (oh my poor force feedback...).
So quali was grat for me, PB -0,002

Race1
Average start, and some uninitiated contact with laguna, and then very high race tempo. Some nice fights, and at the end nice racing with Matthias . Sixth place was very good for me at the end of race.

Race2
Quali was + - similar as first. But race not. I dont know whats happened, but my car was much more oversteer. 7th lap was critical and i had spin and lost rear wing. After some hard fights i was 11. last 3 laps was very intensive and at the finnish i was 10th.  Thank you ROb for cool battles it was fun!

Thank you HSO for this race and thank you Jonathan for your great work!

Team Peugeot seems more competetive this year i hope

Yes, so had a pretty steady outing in the villainous Audi. I called it the "Evil Empire" because back in the day, I always saw the Audis as the villains in whatever super touring championship I watched, since they always seemed to be pushing the envelope, in the rules or on the track.

But I figured out that the best way to drive it was to take it easy, not being aggressive. The lap times came to me that way.

So the race became a bit eventless. I chopped Richard on turn 1 to take 2nd place, sorry about that, and then one of the Team Dynamics cars had a moment just in front of me in the Old Hairpin which I couldn't avoid, but luckily without damage to my car. It was just about following Grant home for an okay 2nd place.

I was not able to replicate that in heat 2. I had an issue before practice where I couldn't change gear, and now that happened again on lap 2. I guess the sequential mode on my TH8RS is acting up, but then again I hadn't used since the last time we did 1996 BTCC.

But I will take a 2nd place with only 1 hour of practice every day of the week. Thanks all.

Two nice races for me without any incidents for a change!

Two also very similar ones. Both i qualified second and finished third. In the first one i had to defend myself from Ray for almost the whole race, with the Audis (i agree with Jacob on the evil empire thing!) Just out of reach.

In the second, one, it was a Jonathan Rydell Denying me second place, but the pace of the race was faster this time ,and i was close to both him and Grant all the way to the end, the car behaving nicely even when the tires started to get worn.

I am pretty happy with the cars, and how AMS has responded so far to my new physics, both here and in CART88

Jonatan Acerclinth wrote:

I were back to when I was 5-6 years old playing TOCA  

I remembered this too. Selecting the ford mondeo and thrashing it round Thruxton on the classic PS1!

Last night was some serious fun driving these cars. My pace differentiated a lot through the race. Qualifying and one lap pace was amazing. Start of the race again, amazing but as the tyres start to wear this car seems to loose its shine a bit. And then in the last few laps when tyre wear is strong with everyone this car seems to handle it better than others.

The races were great!

Race 1 I bogged on the start but noticed Richard had wheel spin so it was battle of who could get there car going first only to find Jacob in the other Audi had the best start to get himself up into 2nd for a 1-2 for team Audi I seemed to have better pace than Jacob in the first half but the second he slowly started reeling me in. Thankfully I had built up a gap to maintain it but still kept me on the edge of my seat! Great 1-2 finish for us !

Race 2 I started exactly the same but decided to take a very defensive line into T1 when I noticed a flying BMW of Yves had a blistering start! After lap 1 I noticed I had a 3 second gap to Jonatan and set about mainting it. - that wasn't the case, Jonatan was the quickest driver on the grid for race 2 and had some pretty great pace, reeled me all the way down to less than half a second. Unfortunately a small error at the chicane gave me enough breathing room till the end of the race. I was giving the Audi a hard time on the tyres just to keep Jonatan at bay, all the while Richard was around 2.5-3 seconds behind with equally great pace!


Good racing as usual, Jonatan handled yesterday very well both on and off track so thank you! Cars felt fantastic to drive and the physics are impressive!

I remember thinking this mod felt a bit iffy in rF1, at least the Vauxhall I drove then, in AMS it's a huge improvement! Thanks for all the hard work y'all have put in!

I am not surprised if the tyres on the Audi go down harder - Shouldn't the AWD powetrain layout/system cause the car to be heavier, creating a higher burden on the tyres?

David Jundt wrote:

I am not surprised if the tyres on the Audi go down harder - Shouldn't the AWD powetrain layout/system cause the car to be heavier, creating a higher burden on the tyres?

Exactly. Less tire wear from traction, which is distributed in the 4 tires, but more overall weight.

And as we know, weight is an important factor in about everything. So it might be more even, but it's still going to take a toll on the overall performance.

I wonder though - which game "favours" the Audi more? rF1 or AMS(or is it about the same)? I know the car was locked away from fast drivers back then.

Damn this all sounds great! Wish I could be there on wednsays!! I could show that Audi how Hondas handle business  

that me and Steve apparently made a bit of contact.

Jonatan, think that was as you moved across on me your rear touched front of my car which sent you spinning,i was way on outside trying to stay out of trouble when you came over,you probably couldnt see me on your outside.

If the reception is possitive I'll continue doing this but for now, this round will be finished during this week, I hope. Thanks Jason for doing the Narration

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zMVpfdH84gY



EDIT: Due to a slight misshap the volumes aren't quite where we'd like them, Jason and myself, so a re-upload will occure but I'll leave the video where it is until the re-upload is complete.