Whoa... I think the whole service just got nuked... I was in a race, then with about 10 laps to go everyone disappeared off the track, and I got disco'ed. The site seems down, so I guess something's up.

Quote :

Dear our most valued iRacing subscriber(),

Thank you for your participation in the iRacing.com Annual Subscription Bonus program! We appreciate your commitment to iRacing and the development of both the service and the community.

As one of thousands of members who had an annual subscription in place as of August 29th, you are receiving a $15 iRacing credit, which can be used for content or to extend your membership. Your Annual Subscription Bonus code is

helllllll yeah!


Time to grab me the mazda and VIR

Quote from spanks :

helllllll yeah!


Time to grab me the mazda and VIR

got my $15 too!

nothing like getting a brand new track and car for $9.50 well...I guess getting them for free is better, but hey I'm the one that signed up

Odd first impression with the mazda. For the most part it drives just like I expected, but I tested it with the default setup which has probably double the DF that the aliens are running.

Also, it has lighter FFB feel than the other cars. Its somewhere in between the solstice and say the radical or skippy.

I guess the FFB is really the only odd part...other than that the thing never runs out of power and is a blast to drive. I just did like 5 sloppy laps around Laguna...grabbing a setup and heading back in

the mazda is a BEAST

seriously its like...wow I'm loving it

Just pounded my way around Infineon long for about 30-40 minutes and worked up a nice sweat...

Could only piece together a 1:30.0, but I had many screw ups and have been much faster through almost every segment lol.

for comparison huttu went 1:26.9

I would have been in the lower 2/3 of the field qualifying wise, but whatever. I can easily peel away a second at least. (not like I race enough to get my licence up anyways...)

Got mine as well! Can't decide between the Radical or the Mazda. Whatever I get will just be to tool around in, as my focus is with the skippy and the new Solstice season right now. Anyone have an opinion? The kid in me wants the Radical and the rest of me wants the Mazda for next season, but then of course I'd need a few more tracks....

Edit: Nevermind... holy crap the Radical is fun...

I think I've decided the skippy just isn't for me

Its completely unintuitive and I don't find it fun, satisfying, or conducive to good racing on the limit (in the sim...)

I think the mazda is really the open wheel experience I want, and the skippy is something very different than I thought it'd be. Watching on board videos of the skippy shows a very different car. Watching on boards of the mazda you get the same feeling as in the sim.

I don't doubt its realism...I just don't find it fun :P

I guess at some point I'll stop messing around and actually race the solstice :P For now I can't get out of the mazda for more than a couple laps.

I gave iRacing a try this week.
Got a 3 month subscription.

But unfortunately, I realized that my good ole Thrustmaster Ferrari steering is getting from bad to worst. It spike a lot when it's near the center and it's getting harder to keep the car on track with all those jerky movement from the spike.

:RANT ON:
I'm IMPATIENTLY waiting for the next batch of Logitech G25 to arrive in town!
:RANT OFF:

I can't wait to see how much better it is than my current wheel.

That apart, I really like what I have seen about iRacing so far, even with my bad wheel. Car seems good to drive (at least the Solstice is), LimeRock Park is incredible with all the small bump and cambered corner!!!

Sound of the solstice is really good. deep and throtty.

But I will stop racing until my new wheel come here... don't want to ruin my career with crash where I wouldn't have crash normally!

I think the skippy is great for learning vehicle dynamics, but can see why a lot of people want to, ahem... skip it.

Me on the other hand, I like it. Unfortunately I'm still stuck in this "did too well in the rookie solstice and now I'm getting my ass handed to me on a regular basis" thing. Seriously. I've no problem being at the back of the pack, but when there's no one else there to race with, 33 laps by yourself at Jefferson gets boring pretty quickly.

My average finish is probably 9th, but my average car number is probably 2 or 3. I can't seem to break into the 54s but can generally do high 55s all race without incident. That puts me way off pace from say, Ross J Macgregor or Josh Carr, but those are the guys winning the races I'm getting put in. I'm not learning anything from them except that they show up in my mirrors at around lap 29.

Hopefully with more time I'll be able to pick up some speed and find some closer rasing in the skippies. Either that or I slow way down...

I'm the same way Rob. I was pretty decent at Solstice Rookie, first two pages on the standings mostly, but cannot get any rythym or real speed in the Skippy. Maybe I'm too slow to keep the car "on the edge".

I think I'm going to try and get the SR up to 4.0 and go Mazda racing.

That said, I've been doing a lot of swimming, running, playing football, trying to get into triathlons, that I've not been simming too much lately. That and COD4 is still fun. Ah well, life's good

Quote from titanLS :

I think the skippy is great for learning vehicle dynamics, but can see why a lot of people want to, ahem... skip it.

Me on the other hand, I like it. Unfortunately I'm still stuck in this "did too well in the rookie solstice and now I'm getting my ass handed to me on a regular basis" thing. Seriously. I've no problem being at the back of the pack, but when there's no one else there to race with, 33 laps by yourself at Jefferson gets boring pretty quickly.

My average finish is probably 9th, but my average car number is probably 2 or 3. I can't seem to break into the 54s but can generally do high 55s all race without incident. That puts me way off pace from say, Ross J Macgregor or Josh Carr, but those are the guys winning the races I'm getting put in. I'm not learning anything from them except that they show up in my mirrors at around lap 29.

Hopefully with more time I'll be able to pick up some speed and find some closer rasing in the skippies. Either that or I slow way down...

Maybe this will help, it's an earlier lap of mine: 54.732 I think: http://blip.tv/file/1218951/

I know there are youtube vids of Luke Mclean out there, but the guy is so damn fast that it might only help when you're at the point when only bending the rules of physics can get you faster times. Getting a 54 can be achieved relatively easily by having the correct line, being smooth and having your break points within reason. I dipped into the 54.5's by braking later at T1 and the final corner, but apart from that and some added smoothness there's not much more to it I think

Oh yeah, a lot of practice

EDIT: nevermind.

Don't want to spend money just to try it out for a month.

thanks for the vid Jertje. At least from that vid, I can see more clearly where I am losing time compared to someone fast and why.

Here's a vid of a crash on the last lap of an oval race that I narrowly escaped.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0yHMDaTUfE

LOL That was damn close :P Nice one :P

im starting to get desent times in the legends car, but i still suck so bad in the solstice

iracing hurts my checkbook

just ordered one of these gizmos today...the guys on the forum absolutely love it.

http://leobodnar.com/products/DFPG25conn/

I've wanted a new pedal set for ages, but I'll never afford a $400+ pedal set...and this thing will up the resolution of the g25 pedals from 256 to 1000...so thats quite awesome.

People say they're gaining tons of consistency, later braking in the heavy braking zones, and some people are picking up good chunks of time...and no random loss of calibration anymore

the mazda is pretty damn rewarding

I just ran a 1:21.6 after feeling like there was no way to go any quicker than 22.x...obviously the guys in the 20's are just cheating.

Really though, I'm pretty happy where that puts me in relation to the qualifying times...but more important is I still have yet to actually race any more to raise my license level

Daniel I think you're an iraceophobe or something :P

Quote from spanks :

iracing hurts my checkbook

just ordered one of these gizmos today...the guys on the forum absolutely love it.

http://leobodnar.com/products/DFPG25conn/

I've wanted a new pedal set for ages, but I'll never afford a $400+ pedal set...and this thing will up the resolution of the g25 pedals from 256 to 1000...so thats quite awesome.

People say they're gaining tons of consistency, later braking in the heavy braking zones, and some people are picking up good chunks of time...and no random loss of calibration anymore

so how does this work exactly?

It takes the low resolution analog signal from the pedals and ups it to high resolution digital through USB and goes around the Logitec drivers.

You gain about 4x the sensitivity and a smoother more linear pedal (what the people on the forums say), and it will hold your calibration forever.

Ever notice when you start up iracing sometimes your brake pedal goes to 100% when you barely touch it? This thing fixes that. Some people get it during races too...I'd be upset about that lol.

Quote from Jeroen :

Daniel I think you're an iraceophobe or something :P

but I love it so much

I think the races are just a tad long for me however, and its really pretty exhausting to run 30 minutes under that much concentration. I've raced karts and I drag race, and a 30 minute race in iRacing is right up there in the amount of concentration required...although drag racing crams 30 minutes worth of concentration into 11 seconds lol.

Also I'm pretty obsessed with my lap times...I don't think of myself as a hotlapper, but I think I might be one without really knowing it :/ I just love trying to squeeze every last inch out of the track...and usually when I sit down to drive I just practice for a bit.

Does it also work for Logitech Formula Force Ex? The connector looks similar. I think my pedals have 2 axes

Quote from spanks :

the mazda is pretty damn rewarding

I just ran a 1:21.6 after feeling like there was no way to go any quicker than 22.x...obviously the guys in the 20's are just cheating.

Really though, I'm pretty happy where that puts me in relation to the qualifying times...but more important is I still have yet to actually race any more to raise my license level

Tried Silverstone Int yet btw? I'm trying to get some benchmarks to go by

I got the subscription last night and working on getting the legends car around SB... down to a 18.1 time. So far it's pretty cool, although still like LFS better

Quote from Jertje :

Tried Silverstone Int yet btw? I'm trying to get some benchmarks to go by

sadly I don't have silverstone

I have quite a bit of the content now, but am still missing a lot of the additional tracks.

I like this game so far. I like that whole concept of pickup practice/qualify/race at specific time.
I mean, I know I’ll be getting clean and close racing with other good driver that respect you and won’t pull a kamikaze move on you. And so far I never had less that a race with 12 other racers, which is the maximum in the rookie class I’m currently running in.

I’m struggling to get more than a few racers on anything else than CTRA1 server outside of peak hour in LFS.
You won’t be getting a bozo driving with his KB either. (I still don’t get how people can play LFS with mouse or keyboard; even if they can be pretty fast mind you)

I would suggest anyone who likes LFS to actually give iRacing a try. You will be amazed with the racing physic!! At least I was. Even the solstice is fun to drive!