FPS increase on race restart

I'm only on a 5870 so I'm struggling a bit for fps, and Ive noticed something a bit strange.
as an example on the back of a full grid at monaco my fps is about 24-25, if I wait for the race to start then press escape and restart race my fps is now 33-35, which is quite a big improvement at such low fps.
Ive tried this on a few of the other tracks and get the same increase in fps when I restart a race.

Anyone else noticed this ?
any ideas why ?

I initially thought it was to do with plugin initialization or something but I removed all plugins and results are the same

 

I did get better FPS when I restarted a race but only with very old ATI drivers.

With newer and latest driver I get the following.

When the game first came out if did an Alt-tab to desktop and back to the game I got a doubling of my FPS but the downside was more stutter and FPS would reduce to single digits after a few laps.

With the last version I get full FPS and no stutter unless I alt-tab to desktop and back then I get half my FPS.

I hadn't changed GPU Drivers so it must be something in the game that changed.

 

Have you checked you gpu speeds after alt-tab, i think gpu is not going to 3D speeds after alt-tab, it stays maybe in 2d speeds after?

 

Yes I checked the speed before and it's fine.

 

Maybe when you restart, textures are still fully loaded.

 

thanks for replies though I,m still not sure why it happens.
I'm running 12.3(latest) ati drivers but behaviour was consistent with older drivers too.
Don't think it's anything to do with loading textures as they would have all been loaded in the practice session that preceded the race ?

 

Sry, my quote is meant to you, have you checked gpu speeds after alt-tab, you see them with afterburner very easily.
Somehow it feels after alt-tabbing your game is not fullscreen maybe and your ATI is running 2d speeds.

 

sorry missed that, no problems with clock speeds here.
I'm not alt/tabbing out simply hitting escape the second the race starts and then selecting restart race, gives a fps increase every time for me.

 

also my experience on that...
same videocard...amd 5870 not related to driver...
i'm on catalyst 12.3 whl.
at race restart got 10/12 frame plus