Very good post Becky, I agree with all of that, although I had to really think about it, because it comes so naturally to me now that I do those things without even realising I am doing them. I also agree with the braking part, when a car is close behind me I never jump on the brakes heavily, and I have been taken out by people that do that.

Im actually learning alot from these "How To"s Becky, there should be a compilation soon!

EDIT: yeah i was ignorant, now i could understand the third part better. (thats because im a mouse driver at the moment, so (for me) either the brake is ON, or OFF... lol)

Quote from Becky Rose :

where the combined velocity of a pack of race cars could very well be in excess of mach 2.

i quite distinctly remember being accused of 'pseudoscience'.

you're making this too easy, becky.

I'll like to thank you Becky rose, for helping me with the turn one. I find now that the game has gotten much easier from now on.

Here is something that helps me, I approach the first turn with a completely different racing line than normal, so I'm away fro the rest of the racing pack and I can manoeuvre The first turn much easier.

Again, thanks for the guide. I deeply appreciate it.

I get scared when there are lots of cars near me, because on some servers, other cars seem to behave in a jerky fashion online and jump around a bit sometimes. If i am fairly near the back of the grid anyway i will pull onto the grass and wait for 2 or 3 seconds to let T1 sort itself out!

The guide is actually pretty usefull. I never thought about the brake force before but after reading it last month I do brake a bit earlier but just a bit so the brake lights go on and then a bit later brake full force. Nice guide once again.

My tip to survive t1

Try to drive carefullly and try to predict what the others if i think tey wil be very careless and nooby.
Just brake early let them ovetatake u and let them screw up and u are safe

How to survive T1 depends on where you start on the grid. If you're starting from the first rows then you can aim for the inside of a slow T1 (like Blackwood). There's a chance you can get away from T1 before the rest of the pack arrives.

If you think you can't get through T1 before the mayhem arrives, I'd go to the outside keeping my eye on any cars starting from the back closing in too fast. This way you can estimate the cars affected by the soon-to-happen crash and have time to react, usually brake and let the crashed cars fly past your car's nose. Or you can try to accelerate and maybe avoid the crash that way. If you manage to avoid T1 accidents, then you should prepare for merging into the pack for T2 (if there's a corner right after T1..). This can be quite tricky on Blackwood.

If you start from the last rows, you could try going wide on the corner entry, and then hit the apex very late. This is a way to pick up a few places if the mid pack people have gone into T1 a bit too fast, there's some room on the inside lane. You can achieve a decent exit speed this way.

This is how I plan my T1 driving on public servers, where you really need to be cautious and assume people are there trying to hit you instead of trying to survive the corner. On some tracks there's a long enough straight for the pack to merge into a single file. On those tracks you'd better aim for the most inside line, although you need to check your mirrors every now and then..

Quote from Huru-aito :

How to survive T1 depends on where you start on the grid. If you're starting from the first rows then you can aim for the inside of a slow T1 (like Blackwood). There's a chance you can get away from T1 before the rest of the pack arrives.

If you think you can't get through T1 before the mayhem arrives, I'd go to the outside keeping my eye on any cars starting from the back closing in too fast. This way you can estimate the cars affected by the soon-to-happen crash and have time to react, usually brake and let the crashed cars fly past your car's nose. Or you can try to accelerate and maybe avoid the crash that way. If you manage to avoid T1 accidents, then you should prepare for merging into the pack for T2 (if there's a corner right after T1..). This can be quite tricky on Blackwood.

If you start from the last rows, you could try going wide on the corner entry, and then hit the apex very late. This is a way to pick up a few places if the mid pack people have gone into T1 a bit too fast, there's some room on the inside lane. You can achieve a decent exit speed this way.

This is how I plan my T1 driving on public servers, where you really need to be cautious and assume people are there trying to hit you instead of trying to survive the corner. On some tracks there's a long enough straight for the pack to merge into a single file. On those tracks you'd better aim for the most inside line, although you need to check your mirrors every now and then..

I think you method is usefull and very good but blackwood is moderatly safe compared to t1 at FE gold, Fe gold R, and almost al the fernbays
When alot of driver on the server who dont realy pay any attention
ferbay is just certain t1 death.

So at T1 at any fernbay combo i alsways brake early let the other pas and most og the time tey acttualy crash
I think this becaus aalmost evry turn at Fe is a potential killer

very good advice!

Trouble is that there are many "bad drivers" out there, maybe an excesive emphasis on "fast laps" and winning at all cost. Of course I race on DEMO servers (let's hope I can get S2 soon).

Where I usualy race it depends a bit on who is in the race, "good drivers" and there is no problem. "Bad drivers" and crashes begin even before T1. When in doubt I find that the best way is to stay at the back of the pack.

Somehow I find that the current stadistics system (LFS WORLD), who by the way do a great job, encourages accidents (not on purpose, I'm sure). I'll try to explain myself:

I've noticed that if you retire before the race ends it's actualy as if you hadn't been in that race at all. also if you "wisely" go taking out slower drivers in front, instead of cleanly overtaking them there is no record.

Not sure what can be done about "taking out" instead of overtaking. As it would need someone to supervise.

But it may help if all participants in the race figured in the stadistics, because many times there is a full grid at the start, you finish 4th and you end up being "4th out of 4". DNF should be listed in LFS World. And if a race restarts those that pressed restart should get a DNF too. The same as those that "shift+P" or "shift+S" before the race ends.

Then we could have a "nice" list of those with a higher DNF percentage. Just an idea, but you can bet that a fast PB with a high DNF percentage won't look that good anymore.

By the way, yesterday We had some very nice races where no one crashed at T1, or later on. Maybe sometimes you got stuck behind a good but slower driver/car and it was difficult or imposible to overtake, but it was a very nice series of races.

How to? I know - Close your eyes and scream "Ahooooi! Stallion" , with some luck you crash everyone and with even more luck you end up in right direction and has survived T1.

That's what I do, most time's it actually work quite well, and then I gain some positions too. I advice everyone to do the same.

the CTRA severs count your yellow flags the you caused and then give you a percentage. they give you alot more stats too which help you guage what kind of driver your competitors are. this is the summary for me:
David Hegarty, from Ireland, has competed in 127 races and driven 1,002 laps since the launch of the CTRA X-System. In this time, he has caused 116 yellow flags, which is a ratio of 11%. This is a good yellow flag ratio.

David has won 25 races and reached the podium, in second or third place, a further 31 times in 127 races, while retiring from an additional 32 races. This means David has completed just 74% of the races in which he's participated. During those races, David has achieved a healthy 18 fastest laps. David, who races for A Touring Car Team, is currently ranked 1,633rd internationally and 15th in Ireland. He does not currently hold any lap records. more info