Some short fun races to kick off 2024

Holiday Fun Races

Hello everyone, for those who have some time off at this time of year, I hope you had a nice break.

To welcome 2024, I thought it would be nice to have some short races, just for fun. Not championship events, not especially historic, and something a bit different to normal.
The emphasis will be on short races, on simple to learn tracks in fun cars. This isn't about optimising set-up and strategy, but rather about jumping in and having some close racing with a variety of cars and tracks.

I don't want to give away too much at the moment, as I don't want everyone racking up test miles (you know who you are). Basically, there will be five 10-minute races with 15 minutes practice/qualifying for each.

The races will take us from the late 70s right back to the 30s. We will race in Europe and also in North America.

The races will start on Saturday 6th at 7 pm Paris time. You can join all of them or just whichever you fancy. You are also welcome to spectate, join the voice chat Discord channel and cheer us on. You can pick any of the cars including ones others have already chosen. Though a bit of variety is welcome.

Driving standards should be as normal HSO but, as the emphasis is on fun, there will be no damage (except for Woochoo engines), no penalties and, if you find yourself miles behind the pack after an off, a bit of creative, safe, short-cutting, to catch up to the pack, will be tolerated. Just don’t overdo it.

And finally, before anyone tries to work out what car/track combos I'm likely to choose, just remember Dundrod doesn't meet any of the above criteria.
And we have often spoken of having a Nash Dash event..…

More details to follow later in the week.

And keep an eye on the Discord Channel.

Hi again everyone

As promised, below is a bit more information about the **Racing event this Saturday.**

In case it wasn’t clear in my first message, the plan is to have these five short races one after the other:

- 15 minutes practice/qualifying for race 1, then a 10 minute Race 1, then
- 15mins practice/qualifying for race 2, then 10mins for Race 2, then
- 15mins practice/qualifying for race 3, then 10mins for Race 3, etc, etc
- Then repeat right through to the end of Race 5.

The car / track combinations have been especially chosen to be easy to learn and then to allow some fun wheel-to-wheel racing. So, hopefully, it will provide a fun action-packed couple of hours of racing to kick off 2024.

To allow people to get everything downloaded and installed before the event starts on Saturday, I’ll be releasing details of the various mods over the next few days.

I don’t want people to spend hours practising, so I won’t be releasing everything all at once. I also won’t say which specific cars will be used on which specific tracks until Saturday. And the car setups will be fixed for each race. So, you can, of course, get used to the various tracks and cars as I release them, but you won't know which combinations you need to optimise. Let me know if that is not clear.

The first cars to subscribe to in the workshop are a little awkward as you have to subscribe to the 4 cars separately. Once in game though, they appear as one group in a car category called HGT. Many of you will be familiar with this pack of cars and know they are fun to race. They include a Porche 911, a Capri, a BMW 3.5 CSL, and a Corvette C3 Stingray. This set of cars is the ones that will be used in Race 1 on Saturday.

The first track you need to subscribe to ready for Saturday is Toban. Another track that some will be familiar with. You’ll have to wait until Saturday to find out which of the 5 races this will be used for.

So that’s the first set of cars and the first track for you to subscribe to. Links to the Steam Workshop for all of them are below.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3066439286
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3066436227
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3066425404
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3066433886
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=922033738

Will this event run on HSO servers? Will there be any password? Thanks

Stef will host the races on his server. Stef has also hosted most of the recent HSO races and practice servers. So it will be similar to what we normally do. I will publish the Server Name and password here tomorrow.

There won't be any pre-event practice server for this event though. I am keeping the details of which cars will race on which tracks a surprise. You can of course test the various cars and tracks offline, so you are familiar with them. You just won't know exactly which cars will be used for each track. I'm hoping to avoid our more enthusiastic drivers spending hundreds of hours perfecting each combination just for a ten minute race

Hi again everyone

Today I can release a few more details and links to the cars and tracks we will be using on Saturday.

The second race on Saturday will move us to the late 60s / early 70s and feature the mighty Trans Am Golden Era cars from Storm Gang. These are a blast to drive.

The third race will see us jump into cars from a similar time period, but they couldn’t be more different. The Eve F3 cars. What they lack in power though, they make up for in agility. Rather than using the default version, we will use a league pack. This pack features far more choice, compared to the default Eve, which only has three car skins. Again the link to the workshop is below.

A thing to note with this pack, the custom screen allows quite a bit of variation but we will be racing with the basic engine model – no cheating, please! Also, I’ve noticed that there is a Woochoo skin in this pack – will the creator of our Universe be joining us?

The fourth race on Saturday will be the often talked about **“Nash Dash”.** For this we will use the normal HSO 1954 car Mod. Again, no cheating, just choose one of the Nashes available in the 2-litre class.

And finally, another of the tracks we will be using on Saturday is the mighty Spa (I’ll tell you which race it will be used for on the day). And yes, this doesn’t meet my criteria of a short, easy-to-learn track, but most of you will have raced here enough now that it won’t be a problem. We will be using the league-friendly version to (hopefully) avoid any issues. Link below.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2985911376
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3015017978
if you haven’t got the HSO 1954 car mod installed for the Nash, follow the instructions here: https://discord.com/channels/1014219216678830200/1056233437578674177/1163145433888080002
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2847960101

Hi again everyone
<@&1056325939962839081>

Tomorrow is race day!

The first race will commence practice at 19:00 Paris time. Practice will last 15 minutes and will also determine the starting grid for the first 10-minute race. There will be a 5-minute warm-up between practice and race to allow time for latecomers, to grab a drink, comfort break etc. This pattern will be repeated for all 5 races which will run one after the other.

The Name of the server will be:
HSO Fun Event

And the Password will be:
DocSlappy

As this is a race for HSO racers, the driving should be of the normal firm but fair and friendly style we are familiar with. As these are short races just for fun though, there will be no damage or penalties, and no setup tweaking. I will also tolerate a bit more in-game chat than usual but don’t go mad with it. Also, is it possible for someone to set up the usual HSO discord voice chat for those who want it?

And finally, here are the details of the final cars and tracks to be used tomorrow.

The cars to be used for the last race are the 1937 Grand Prix machines. These will be used in the last of the 5 races tomorrow. They are a handful.

I do recommend making sure you have the tyre and wind noise options set to normal or high on the customise screen for maximum immersion.

You need to download the mod for this car and use rf2’s content manager to install it. The link to the download page is below. If anyone is wondering why I didn’t choose the vary latest 30s GP mod, it is because it still feels a little broken to me. This seemed a more reliable option for tomorrow.

The remaining tracks for tomorrow are all available on the workshop. They are Willow Springs International Raceway, Crystal Palace, and the Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in Darren Land. To be on the safe side, those who have raced on Crystal Palace before, should check and disable any HSO versions they have. We will be using the Steam Workshop version.

I’ll let you know later tomorrow, which cars will be used for which tracks...

https://forum.studio-397.com/index.php?threads/grand-prix-1937.52286/page-6 make sure you scroll down to get version .524)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2859849673
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1560025749
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1885152462

Welcome to Race Day!

@HSO Updates
With the start of practice for the first race just over 4 hours away now, I can release the full itinerary for the event.

Race 1 will be the HGT (Corvetter, Porche, etc) around Canadian Tire Motorsport Park.
Race 2 will be the Trans AM Golden Era cars around Willow Springs International Raceway
Race 3 will be in the Eve F3 Historic Community Pack around Toban (but note we will be using the short layout)
Race 4 is the ‘Nash Dash’ around Crystal Palace.
Race 5 is the 1937 GP machines around old Spa (but note we are using very old Spa – the 30s version with two hairpins – turn left at Eau Rouge and Stavelot is now a hairpin).

Good luck everyone and have fun!

Just over an hour to go now...

Hopefully, see a few of you on track soon

Also, the server is working fine except it won't automatically switch tracks. So, at the end of each race, you will be disconnected. Then you have to rejoin the server again, which will load you into the next track and race. It's not a problem, just something you may not have been expecting.

Hi All
Results from Saturday:

Some rough and ready race recaps:
https://youtu.be/PD2_MEPwVOA

https://youtu.be/ETG5dYd1ExE

https://youtu.be/7MvCe4fRt1k

https://youtu.be/lZJuWds-hXA

https://youtu.be/NS0yrr4WrRU

All the results with a 9, 6, 4, 3, 2, 1 point scoring system applied.

Congratulations to Niklas, Lari and our 'Little Star' winner Petr



https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Ctei9QJj9To57bqMNkPrDlqFQ36-n9duHsFyDQ3Z3lI/edit?usp=sharing