I am driving the XF GTI on the Blackwood track with the Team Inferno setup installed and i can NOT get any better than 1:36:09 no matter what i do. The harder i try the worse i get till i spit the dummy.

The biggest problem i am having is on the first RH corner after the START/FINISH line. I seem to lose most of my time on that bloody corner.

Anybody able to help me out? How can i upload a track of the line that i take?

Cheers

Kris

Just upload a replay.

A little hint: brake earlier, be faster!

Just drive a few laps in single player and then hit "2", this will prompt you for a name to save the replay under.

Then just go to to the LFS\data\spr folder and locate your .spr file there, then upload it to the forums. Uploading a replay is the only real way we can give you any hints on how to improve.

You can also try downloading and watching the WR replays from LFSWorld, though.

here is the file

Lap 3 was the best afte that i just f***ed up on that F***ING corner

http://myweb.westnet.com.au/serinam/LFS/crazynuts_BW.spr

General Hints:

Watch the hotlaps of the fast guys. See where they use more track, brake later/differently and get on the power earlier. Watch their splits and compare them to yours.

You need to be in the low 31s for the first sector if you want to go sub 1:35. A low 1:06 or high 1:05 at the second split should see a sub 1:35 time for the lap if you get the last couple of turns right.

Look at your tyre temps. Is the outside edge of the front right tyre about optimum for the tyre type - 60 degrees I think for this car? With the inside edge a few degrees hotter? That's what you need for this circuit.

Only apply power when you are sure you will not need to lift again.

Keep the car tidy - whenever it is sliding (back or front) you are losing forward momentum.

Don't lock the brakes, your braking distances will increase.

Brake at the 75m board for the first corner. Brake at the 100m board for the 'Carlube Corner' at the end of the long back straight.

You need to maintain 46mph through turn 1 and you should be hard on the power from the exit of the corner all the way through turns 2 and 3. You need to turn in early for turn 2 but ensure you don't take too much kerb. This will almost certainly end up with the car on its back waving its legs in the air

You want to maintain 64 - 65 mph for turn 4, increasing to 67-68mph for turn 5 and be accelerating early on exit all the way through the slight left curve of turn 6. For turn 7 brake as the kerbs start, use full width and maintain 63 - 64mph. The final chicane must be negatiated no slower than 67mph. Beware, your right hand tyres will probably be cold.

Somehow the link doesn't work.

Quote from bal00 :

Somehow the link doesn't work.

If you right click and SAVE AS it works

Quote from Gentlefoot :

General Hints:

Look at your tyre temps. Is the outside edge of the front right tyre about optimum for the tyre type - 60 degrees I think for this car? With the inside edge a few degrees hotter? That's what you need for this circuit.

How do i check my tyre temps in the game?

press F9.

Check if the guy whose setup you use has the same type of controller as you. Mouse drivers need a setup that has less braking power, and is more stable under load changes.

IMHO, T1 is not the crucial turn on Blackwood. It's OK to brake a little early, as long as you get the nose right for the chicane, so you can take that full-throttle and with minimal skidding.

The most important turn is the last one. If you can get on the throttle early, you'll gain lots of time on the uphill section and straight that follow. The second most important turn is the first turn of the esses (the righthander), for the same reason.

Quote :

You need to be in the low 31s for the first sector if you want to go sub 1:35. A low 1:06 or high 1:05 at the second split should see a sub 1:35 time for the lap if you get the last couple of turns right.

If you can get a low 1:06 or high 1:05, you can go sub 1:34.

Quote :

The second most important turn is the first turn of the esses (the righthander), for the same reason.

I disagree. I agree that the final chicane is the most important because you take it at 68mph and the straight after is long and the first bit is uphill meaning acceleration is slower (or you could think of it that you are on the straight for longer in terms of time)

However, in my view (and it is only an opinion) turn 2 is the second most important corner because it is followed by the longest straight on the circuit. The only reason the final chicane is more important is because the apex speed is so much higher than that of turn 2 - i.e. 68mph as apposed to 46mph. Cars accelerate slower at higher speeds so it will take longer for you to gain back that 1mph you may have lost at the apex.

In short corners with long straights are the most important on any circuit. Where two straights are the same length the corner with the highest apex speed should take priority. Uphill straights should be thought of as being 'longer' than downhill straights.

Also its worth remembering that, for a corner with a long straight after it, exit speed is all important whereas corners in quick succession can be taken faster at the expense of exit speed because there is no straight after to take any advantage of any early throttle application.

Last I drove Blackwood in the GTi was in demo on patch Q. But I believe I finally ran a high 1:32 and consistant 1:33's. Fast times are slower now in patch U, correct? Anyways, I found that my turn-in was significantly earlier than everyone elses. Such as the second "chicane" after the straight, I didn't brake and turned in way before the end of the curb where everyone else seemed to turn in at the end of the curb. Same with the final turn. I used no braking at that point as well. I took a shallower corner and just lifted slightly for these two corners.

My PB on LFSW doesn't reflect my actual PB from the last patch. That is on S2 servers and most of my BL1/GTi racing was in the demo servers.

Current WR = 1:33.12

gentle: you've got your splits entirely wrong. A low 31 and a 1:05 will give you a low 1:34 or 1:33. To drive a 1:35 you only need a 32 and a 1:07.

For the first corner, brake a little before the kerb and turn in around 52mph, you can keep full throttle since this is an FF and just use steering to control line and speed, aim to get near the inside (but don't touch the kerb) and keep at least 45mph throughout the corner. The following chicane is very important - you need to drive it very smoothly, taking full advantage of the kerbs and changing direction for the second part of the chicane _early_, keeping your steering input as minimal and smooth as possible so the tyres never squeal and you keep building speed throughout the complex. You should be shifting into 3rd just as you change direction and 4th pretty soon after you exit the complex.

As everyone else said, brake early. Braking early then getting the turn right will only cost you a very small amount of time compared to a WR lap. Braking at the same time then messing up the turn will cost you way more time. You CAN brake at the 75 mark for T1, but unless you're aiming for a WR you really don't want to try. Same with the turn after the long straight, you CAN brake past the 100 mark, but it's a lot easier to brake a little bit before it and give yourself a nice large margin of error for the corner, only costing maybe a tenth or two in time.

I never made it down to 1:33 yet (hotlap 1:34.19) but I can drive 1:34s quite consistently in races when I'm warmed up.

The last turn is always the most important because you have to drive it really well TWICE if you want to make a fast lap!

guess i'll just keep at it.

I am finding that the car setup is not level with my capabilities. It just understeers everywhere and that's where i lose most of my time. The fastest lap i did yesterday was 1:36:09 with the Team Inferno setup on the car. To do that time i was doing 32 and 1:08 on respective corners.

When i had a look at the tyre temps i found that the Left Hand side tyres were warmer by about 5-10 degrees on the inside compared to the Right Hand side. This is obviously due to the greater Right Hand turn on the track. Maybe i just need to keep practising. In total i've done about 50 laps in the XF GTI to get me down to 1:36:09

I'm also wondering if i am aiming too high as it seems in the Q version of LFS the car is actually slower than in the version where the WR was set.

Quote from CrazyNuts :

If you right click and SAVE AS it works

Nope, no worky. Just tells me "file not found". Are you sure the filename is correct(speeling/capitalization)?

That's odd....i just downloaded it from work. No errors what so ever.

EDIT: How big should an .SPR file be? Coz mine is only 10kb in size. Seems a bit small for a replay file.

Quote from bal00 :

Nope, no worky. Just tells me "file not found". Are you sure the filename is correct(speeling/capitalization)?

Link should work now. Had the wrong url.

Slow in, fast out. It's all about using the track, braking points and keeping good lines. I don't know how many thousand laps I've done with the XFG/BL1 combo, but it took me several months in patch Q to finally reach the 1.31 laptimes. Oh the good old days... Patch U unfortunately made it not so fun anymore to drive that combo. Real shame really.


But you need a lot more than 50 laps to be really fast. Practice, practice and more practice.

So what you're saying is that my time of 1:36:09 with the U patch could be quite reasonable?

Quote from AdamW :

gentle: you've got your splits entirely wrong. A low 31 and a 1:05 will give you a low 1:34 or 1:33. To drive a 1:35 you only need a 32 and a 1:07.

No I haven't. My best second split is 1:06.4 and my best time is 1:34.8!

Sure maybe I could have gone faster in the last split but clearly I didn't! In addition my car is heavily biased for right handers on this circuit (lots of neg on left front tyre, not much on right) so I am slow at the entry to the final chicane.

Get your facts right before you tell someone they have theiir splits totally wrong. How do you know what my splits are? You don't do you! Lets face it, I'm the only one that's gonna know them.

Er, that lines up pretty much exactly with what I said. If you'd driven a 1:07.4 split you'd have driven 1:35.8. OK, getting a 1:07 from a 32 is a bit tricky (you need to be a 1:34 driver to do it, I guess), but still. You don't need a _low_ 31.

Low 31 and 1:05 second split is basically world record pace, which is why I pulled you up on it. Go to one of the alien servers and watch the guys who drive 1:33s every lap - those are the splits they run. This guy's only trying to improve on a 1:36.09, and he can do that without driving a 1:05 second split...

Quote from CrazyNuts :

So what you're saying is that my time of 1:36:09 with the U patch could be quite reasonable?

Yes, for a beginner it's not a bad time at all. Watch the hotlaps of the fast guys and try to use their lines and braking points. Don't worry about cornering speed, that will come when you get more confident of the car and how it handles. A low 33 lap now equals a 31 lap in the previous patch, and a low 34 lap equals a 32 one. And that takes some time to achieve, so don't expect immediate success. Besides, in the previous patch the tyres had much more grip, so I think it's actually harder now to be really, really fast.

Watched the replay now. Small things first:
-Turn off throttle cut on upshift in the player options. This will help your straight line speeds.
-Do not clip the grass before the first turn. You get dirt on the tires on the left side and that means your car will be all over the place while braking. With clean tires you could brake much later and harder.

The real problem is your turn-in, however. You turn in too early, so you find yourself at the inside of the corner but your car is still pointing virtually straight. That means you have to slow down much more to make the corner, and that means you exit too slow.

Before a corner, go all the way to the outside without touching the grass and stay outside as long as possible. When you turn in, do it _decisively_. Any meter you drive without using all available grip, you're wasting valueable track-width you could be using to rotate the car.
Also, make sure to use the outside curbs before the S and the last turn.