The basic point is this, once someone is in the draft and pulls out to pass its already too late to block. I will make multiple line adjustments on a straight for one reason only, to break or prevent a draft. Once a draft has been caught its already too late to block safely. If someong intends to pass there really is nothing you can safely do to prevent it. Defensive driving and blocking are two different things and need to be addressed seperatly in my opinion.

Here is a tip, write the author and explane to them how you feel in a constructive way, if they are like the one I contacted then you may find yourself writing an indepth review as a guest author.Which reminds me I need to finish that article....

Simple solution. Disabe the Display Name altogeather, and force people to use their registered account name. Will end the problem right away. Maybe as a small field to append a prefix and or suffix to the registerd name as an option for team and other afiliations.

At some point I would like to see drag and aero cacluated on the fly for the entire car. A car sliding sideways has a different profile to the wind then a car driving straight ahead in to the wind. Simbin said they modeled thin in to the GTR2002 mod and asume it also made it in to GTR but its was still built on an less then stelar physics engine.

The issues I think most people have with a system like this is that if you start to give servers too much control over who can enter the servers you quickly get a seperation of skill levels, which can lead to closer racing but also makes it more diffacut to advance in skill as you rarly get the oppertunity to run with people better then yourself which I feel is the best practice and training you can get.

The other potential issues is that every server admin will want to provide the best conditions for their guests, which will cause them to slowly drive up the minimum speeds and thus create a situation where there are 75% of servers catering to the top 25% of drivers and only 25% of servers catering to the other 75% of the drivers, or something similar. In the short term it may be an improvment but in the long term may do more to hurt the comunity then help it.

At least in my opinion.

BlueShaun, I wrote that as if in a GTR, the FZR to be exact, and I can run 36s there with my current set. Its not ment to be so much a guide to the perfect line or speeds, but rather as a representation of what it might feel to drive that track. I was only trying convey how I feel running that track, nothng more.

Quote from gunja :

That would be the rule on the public roads and normal traffic driving but i dont agree that it's the case in racing. You have to know that the driver behind cannot always anticipate some wreckles stunt that you may pull to prevent him to overtake.

I have to disagree with your here. If I am being causous on the start to avoid running the guy in front of me over or to make sure I have a clean line through a corner and you hit me because you failed to leave yourself room for errors, how is that my fault? I do agree that if you are trying to ever take my before the turn in point and I do not have room or time to block you then trying to do so is not a good idea.

Since some people seem confused by this thread I have added a little explination to the start of the story. I hope it is now clear.

As you cross the start finish line you stay to the center of the track until you are past the pit egress lane, you never know when some unaware hotshot will come blasting out of the pits forgetting to check their mirrors. Once certain it's safe, you set up as far to the left as you can in preparation for the first turn, a gut wrenching blind right hand sweeper than drops off to the outside The corner approaches fast and there are few warnings, you go with your gut and toss the car to the right just as you crest the slight hill. You find your reactions were a little late and are a little wide but a slight lift of the throttle to tuck the nose in followed but a return to full throttle puts you on a perfect line for the exit.

Powering out of turn one you slide over to the right edge of the tarmac keeping the throttle pegged until the last moment, then quickly drop two gears and brace for the entry for turn two. As your speed drops to 120mph you throw the car to the left towards the apex letting the car drift down to 114mph before powering out and running all the way to the right edge of the tarmac.

You grab fifth gear as you blast around the gentle rising right hander that is turn three. As you crest the hill the track starts to drop away and to the left. You eyes linger for a split second at the wall beyond the grass before you dive to the left hugging the inside edge of turn four. You slowly modulate the throttle to keep the nose turning and to maintain speed as the G-forces try and throw you off the track to the right. As the corner starts to open up you drift right and drop a gear.

Darting back to the left you lift just enough to get the nose turning as you dive back to the right, in to the apex of turn five. Checking you line to ease back on the gas as to drift wide to the left praying you don’t run too wide and drop a tire on to the grass, like the poor soul in front of you did a few laps back. You heart skips a beat as you feel your left rear tire toy with the edge of the tarmac, but hold your course and are rewarded as the car settles on the very edge.

Maintaining your line you drift back to the right as you steel a glance at the still fresh skid marks which disappear off the track heading out towards the wall. You snap you attention back to track, grab the next gear and dive back to the left as the track falls yet again. You feel the car get light as the track drops away through turn six, but you keep the power down as you know the grip will be back in moment, as you drift wide to the right as the track climbs back up.

Just as you crest the top of this little rise you catch sight of the rumble strip to your right and get on the brakes, drop a gear and slide back to the left the first apex in the turn seven complex. You hit the first apex late allowing you to power straight to the second and run your right side tires up over the curb. As the car starts to settle you dive hard for the last apex hard on throttle, the tires screaming in protest, but that hold their grip and you have a few moments to relax, at last and you grab the next two gears and rocket down the short straight towards turn eight.

As turn eight looms closer you line up on the right and count down the distance. Just before the 150 meter maker lift of the gas and work down through the gears to third, making sure to drop all your speed before the tune in point. Easing back on the throttle you make for the apex on the left which drop away quickly. You feel the back of the car start to step out and ease the power back, adding a bit of counter steer to settle it back in line.

Holding the counter steer a moment longer then needed starts the car rotating back around to the right as the apex for turn 9 approaches. Using subtle inputs to the gas and wheel you keep the car rotating until you perfectly aligned for the apex. You power out running out the very edge of the tarmac on the left. You hesitate a second as you pass under the bridge and let the left front tire touch the grass. Pretending it never happened you dive back to the right for the second apex that opens up to the fast complex that lies ahead.

Charging fast out of the second apex of turn nine you drift left through turn ten as you grab fifth gear. Hard the power the whole way to slide back to the right for the apex of eleven and ride the curb all the way through finally roaring out of the exit grabbing sixth gear as you bear down on the final turn.

You push out to the right and watch as the end of the rumble strip flashes past, time to start dropping speed. You stand of the brakes and drop through the gears to third. As you speed drops to dive down to the left in to the first part of the corner bleeding off speed as you go. At the apex you gently ease back on the power as you test the grip, and the back tries to step out but you reign in. As the car settles in to place you bring the power back up and rocket on to the front straight.

Finally you have a moment to relax, so you try and calm you heart as to grab forth gear. You feel the pressure in your chest relax a bit grabbing fifth gear as you fly past the pit entrance. You see the corner ahead and slowly move back to the left in perpetration for that gut clenching first turn. You grab sixth as you cross the start/finish line you nerves tensing, only 60 more laps to go. Then out of the corner of you eye you see a shock of color to your left as the pit lane ends and you realize you just crossed over in to the pit egress lane. You heart stops, you try and move back to the right as you stand on the brakes, but it’s too late and the next thing you remember is sitting in your twisted car, while the poor guy you just ran over is screaming at you in a language you do not understand.

Welcome to Westhill International Raceway.

Last edited by Gimpster, Tue, 16 Aug 2005 16:36.

Simple awnser, Don't cut corners. Dirt happens, embrace it or drive an AWD.

I do not know why every one still thinks the FZR is the car to beat. While it is true that is is a litte faster on the hotlap charts is is a much more diffacult car to drive ont he edge. Touching the grass in a corner or under breaking and its all over, not to mention it can't run R2s for more then a few laps befor they are melting. The FZR has the same HP, Less Torque and a peak power 2k RPMs higher then the other cars yet uses 20% more fuel. It weighs the same but eats tires at 150% the rate of the other cars. The only situation where the FZR has an advantage is in a short race on an open track & on the hot lap charts. In every situation its has more disadvantages then the other cars.

The NAL, ESL and other leagues are starting to prove that the FZR is not all that great, but it is competitive. The XRR is the base line as the XRT was before it. The FXO is just like the RB4 and is a little low on power but once we have varying weather it will come in to its own and trash the other cars. Scawen has always maintained that the classes were being ballanced fr longer races not sprints. I think the FZR is easier to drive well with int he performance envelope, but once you start approaching the edge the other two are easier to handel. If that was not the case the top drivers in the leagues would all be driving it, but they are not. They are in the XRR.

Smith,

Very cool app. I am in the process of trying to put togeather a new race series for the LFS comunity. One thing I have identified that I would like is a tool to track qualifying across several different servers over an extended period of time and to track the race progress and results as well. Idealy I would then like to display this data in real time to a website. I have no experance in programing or website building and juct wondering if this could be done? If it can some pointers or a susggestion of who might have the time, energy and willingness to do it would be great.

If I do that how on earth am I going to use my DFP and map keys to the wheels buttons?

Avih, I understand that problem quite well. Living onthe west coast of the US and working until 8pm leaves me with few options as far as occupied servers go and this is not an request to alter that. It is a request that server admins provide us with the limited choices on any given server and that there are servers out there to cater to all the different racing prefferences. I have no problem joining an emtpy server, but often I can not even find an empty server with the cars I would like to race. I can and to change the setting ou one of our servers to mach what I woudl like to race but since the servers are in Norway few if any racers will join then since thier pings will be up between 200ms & 250ms for most US and Canadian racers.

Why is it just a problem for people to setup servers that offer somthing different then the same old All cars, FO8 or FOX servers that have become all too popular. I reciently starting driving the LX6 again and I am loving it. It has been vastly improved since S1, but last night there was only 1 out of 270 servers that had the LX6-RAC-FZ5 combo as the option. That is the problem Scawen asked us to help him correct, in support of the new search tools he gave us.

When the P2 patch was released Scawen asked that the server admins please specify one or two classes of cars for their server.



Guests : please do join empty hosts - people will join!

Hosts : please don't allow all cars, if possible.



This request was to make it easier for people to find the race they want to participate in. A large portion of you failed to notice or do not care to make finding a race easier. In LFS S2 we have many classes to choose from but when go online to find a race I find maybe a half the server running all cars, which translates to every one running FO8s. With 270+ servers out there in the community there should be enough servers to have at least a five servers running each class, some running a few classes and some running all cars.



It’s on us to make the experience better for every one. They constantly listen to our wishes and build in many of our ideas, I think it's time we did the same for them and do as they ask.

Edit: This is the wrong sub-forum, please move the thread as needed.

Last edited by Gimpster, Thu, 11 Aug 2005 18:47. Reason : Spelling.

We are a group of racers who help each other get faster on the racetrack through mutual encouragement, the sharing of techniques, setups & advice, as well as by just being fair and clean on track. We encourage all of our racers to strive to be come CRC Certified drivers and fully support the CRC.

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