Close is relative, it's incredibly easy to get absolutely close to the WR at oval.
a) the times are lower anyway, so as a percentage you're further away
b) there's a lot less to do wrong and lose time on the oval compared to a track like FE Black
So in fact, you're just proving you're not very fast at all then.
no offence, but i bet you set those PB's online - the oval (with the right set) is extremely easy to get to within .1 of the WR as it's all flat out, the lines are what makes that last .1 so hard. Plus, online you have drafting, which makes a BIG difference, whereas the WR is done in hotlap mode. Alone.
And you got it wrong, the wr for KY Nat rev is 1:39.27, and everyone has nearly 10 secs off your time in the hotlap charts
EDIT - Must read the whole of thread before replying, doh!
Ages ago and the laptime says that you have made your pb before the last physics patch has been released right? I cant remember myself correctly but the wr these days was around 36.21 or so...someone help me out on this
Less tire pressure in the front tires and some other things are responsible for this loss of time.
I started racing in September 2003, and I'm still at best a midpack runner. This being said, I only have 15127Km driven, so I don't play very much. Even with as little miles as I have, I'm still pretty quick on some combos, I'm fairly good on Aston Club, no matter what the car, and I love SO1, even though I'm not quite as quick there.
Everyone is always improving, so it's taken however long they've been playing to get where they are
I keep getting better and faster because i keep learning not just how to drive but how a car runs.More you're interested in all the motorsports, faster you go. I watched Sir Jackie Stewart on youtube and it helped me to cut 1 seconds off from my Aston Nat. PB.And it helped me to drive powerful rwd cars without spinning every lap.
The thing i hate about lfs is the RWD car but i am still learning to drive them, the key is to drive alot of the lx4/6 cars when possible to be fast in any rwd car because the lx4/6 asks alot of smooth throttle action so if you can be fast in lx's car you can be 1 sec under wr on most combos
45400 Miles and still going, i s2 over a year but start playing it on a daily bases about 7 months ago so still alot to learn and improve
lol aww man, I feel like I should send you some apology chocolates or something. I'd much rather you told me I was full of crap and I should keep my mouth shut
I feel like I'm still improving every now and then, though I've only been LingFS for about 5 months. I guess I have about a month to achieve WR pace on at least one combo? I started out mostly hotlapping online, but that got too frustrating because I couldn't pause it when I got a phone call, so now I've been getting into regular ol' hotlapping. I have 46 uploaded atm. Without practicing for too long I can usually get under the benchmark (103% of the WR) with slower cars, but it's much harder for me with the fast cars.
The one combo I've practiced the most is the one that I'm farthest away from the benchmark time with - LX6 @ FE Black Reverse. I'm just over 4 seconds off the benchmark and no matter how often or for how long I work on it, I can't improve my laptime, even though I feel like I'm driving it pretty smoothly and better than before. In my opinion part of the reason for this is the kamikaze way that the WR holders go through (read: over) the chicanes in Fern Bay. I can't help feeling dirty and embarrassed every time I slam through them, but you kinda have to to be competetive. It sucks. I just can't get it right at the insane speeds that some people can. Of course, this particular combo is crazy in itself. I mean... LX6 @ FE4R... I just watched my replay and I know I've done every turn there better than that, but it's so insanely difficult for me to string it all together in one try! I have to alternate doses of LX with doses of XF and UF in order to not go completely bonkers
I really need to work on actual racing though. I always get all uptight and nervous whenever I go online, even though I don't think I've ever really done anything that stupid or destructive. Weird huh? Everyone I've seen ingame and onforum is usually really nice, yet I still have this unjustified fear of fuxking something up and being ostracized and shunned across the entire 1n7RaWe8 or something... Sounds like a personal problem lol. Truth is, most of the time my conservative driving gets me into the top 5 or so by virtue of being one of the few that actually finish ^.^
Hmm.. got the rest of the night off. I should go practice.
I totally agree with the "dirty and embarrassed" statement. It really ticks me off that driving over the chicanes is what is required to be quick around that track. It just doesn't feel like racing. It doesn't feel like a simulator.
Another example is the way that people cut the last curb in the chicane on BL1.
I would really like it if such things weren't possible. Or at least the suspension should be more damaged by such impacts, making it alright for hotlapping, but not for racing.
Yeah, it seems like a quick fix could be just to set an object - like a cone or tire - closer to the tarmac so that you'd get a "hotlap invalid - object" if you cut it. But even with something like that, it'd be an incompatible patch so I'd imagine if it were fixed it would be a bit more sophisticated than that. Hrm.
This is true, because you need to learn the cars completely before you can try and be a insanely fast driver. Not necessarily be a setup guru, but you do need to know how the car acts with certain setups, and what makes a loose setup or understeery setup so fast. Some people do have different driving styles, but trying to master the dificult car(s) over and over again is how I started to become faster. I'll explain:
Like sinbad said, trying one car/track combo will get you to realize your pace, and actually master many aspect of control with a car. When I started out 3+ years ago with LFS, everyone of course wants to try the faster cars. Some say this is bad, but if you can learn how the car drives, and start to improve from practice every single day, every single lap, it will all pay off. When S1 came out, I tried all the cars, but I had a serious liking to the LX6, which was the fastest car in the game in terms of speed and handling (before MRT came out). I loved the car so much, but was so frustrated with how difficult it was in S1 (slippery), I had to learn it some way or another. I just practiced with the car at Blackwood and Fern Bay a lot, and then started to get into rallying it to practice throttle control in the dirt. It made me so precise, and so accurate over time, that I was really starting to pick up pace in S1. I then was fairly quick in a lot of the other cars, and I became a fast learner for whatever config I tried.
It was then that I wanted to try and beat some World Records and I went for a fairly easy one with BL RallyX Rev I think it was, in the RB4. Flotch held the record, but I tried to beat it regardless of how fast his time was. Many nights were spent trying to get faster and faster splits, and then I learned to be fluid and consistent from this. I started to get faster splits than Flotch, but would panic from excitement and lose good times. From that I learned to be calm and focused, and went on to beat his time to get my first ever world record. Flotch went on to beat it by a tiny bit, and as much as I wanted to try and recover that world record, I went on to other attempts and got SO4R WR with the LX6. Once the MRT came out it was just too easy for me, and I was pretty good in the MRT. Was dueling with a lot of fast drivers, and those were my best memories of LFS to be honest. Just being alone and practicing/learning with a car for several weeks or nights really gives you an edge over other players.
Then once you have a very fast pace, learning to drive well against other drivers online takes a while, since you need to learn to make smart decisions, and predict many things that can happen in a race. The only thing I'd recommend to someone wanting to gain experience, is to never give up. Break some sweat overnight with a car that you just HATE, and learn how-to drive it from head to toe. After you've mastered so many aspects of the game, it really does get quite easy to become fast. The amount of distance you have under your belt really doesn't completely account for your skill of driving fast. But the desire to be better, run countless hours trying to learn and beat other players, that is where anyone can improve if they just put their mind to it. Set some goals, and you can surely become a fast driver. This of course doesn't take a few months, it does take some time to become a better driver, but it really pays off if you devote your time for the game. Then you will just be an uber-fan of LFS, and that is why people trying LFS for the first time could give LFS such a hard time when saying it is "crap", because they don't put forth the effort to truly understand how nice it feels to be fast.
Kev, i think that the best way for improving your driving is to open Analyze for speed, open the WR lap Raf file, your lap raf file, and check the differences at x0.25 velocity
Then, After that you have understood what are you doing wrong, try to correct your errors (and prey for a good time lol )
Imho is better to understood first the track, then to change the setup
edit: ops, was reading the kev's thread and thought was this, but it's the same lol xD
If anybody who saw further up in this thread my PB's I said my FOX KY2R PB was 1.55.something.
Well i've just been On another server which ran that.
My PB is now 1.48.65.
So, in conclusion, aero physics improvements in patches also increase your speed.
The problem with that though is it also increases everybody elses so really your still as crap.
oh boy... you are 10 sec off the wr... why do you post this things??? that pb is reallly bad in my opinion... great conclusion, didnt got that until now...
off topic: i think this forum has a lot of unnecessary spam... oh well
Probably only a few hundred miles, but I'm still 7 seconds off the WR for the XFG. I tend to avoid the XRT for it's rather twitchy handling. Either I plow into the fields or I end up facing the wrong way.
I started out mostly hotlapping online, but that got too frustrating because I couldn't pause it when I got a phone call, so now I've been getting into regular ol' hotlapping. I have 46 uploaded atm. Without practicing for too long I can usually get under the benchmark (103% of the WR) with slower cars, but it's much harder for me with the fast cars. 
