rFactor 2 and McLaren - World’s Fastest Gamer!

[Skandepik]

its a real shame they made this open setup - people who have had years of training in simracing and the murky world of setups will have such a huge advantage.

The setups should be closed to select the top 20 drivers. And for the race, opened. That's my point of view anyway.

 

[Skandepik]

is there any official track limit rules anywhere?

As far as I know, no. So stick with the cut track system, I guess.

 

[bwana]

The comp itself will find the fastest drivers weeded out from the best sim hackers ( not all the fast pilots will enter either ) Top 20 will no doubt have some alien fast drivers ..and the vetting after these events are finished will soon split the above mentioned groups . I've put down times purely out of interest to what pace lm at by comparison to the community nothing more , never expected to go anywhere near top 50 . A more honest grid would be great but while people can find ways to cheat they will , its in people's nature( or some at least).. I have a time to aim at of mid 59's , if l do that as an old fart part time simmer l will be happy ..

 

[Emery]

Factoids fresh from the competition:

• Median lap time (half the people above, half the people below) is 2:01.75 for 854 entrants (was 713) .
• From 2:01 to 2:03, there are 246 people (28.8% of total).
• To be in the top 10% of total entrants, you need a 1:58.62 or lower (was 1:58.78).
• 39 people (was 28) are in the 1:57s (4.6% of total).
• Top 20 are 1:57.30 to 1:57.66, about a 0.2 second decrease.

 

[SPASKIS]

is there any official track limit rules anywhere?

FIA rule is ambiguous as I claimed and it was proven considering the replies after it several posts before in this thread. It doesn't specify when a tire is out of the track in order to be able to properly determine if a car has always two tires on the track. There hasn't been in FIA a smart enough person to do it yet.

 

[Kelju_K]

Define "perfect setup".
First off, we are talking hot lapping here, not race pace, the two can be very different in my experience.
For hot lapping it's as simple as it's ever been, get the car to rotate as fast as possible and disregard tires overheating.
It could mean an extremely pointy front end pulling the car by the nose and leading it through the corner or it could mean bumping the brake on entry and holding the slide with the throttle so barely any wheel input, depending on car (or corner) you should be able to decide which of the two is appliccable.
Some people just aren't into this style of driving.
Pissing against the wind won't get you a date on a dry day.

today i wasn't able to improve almost at all. ari kept giving me setups that had more and more mechanical grip, to the point there was too much of it for me, it had become very soft and my inputs were too much for it. my hands simply were not silky enough for it.
i need harder, maybe less grippy but easier for me to drive setup. setup that forgives me my mistakes to a higher degree, and relaxes my driving a bit.

so is there a perfect setup? no, but for you, and your skills there is optimal. i firmly believe in that.
one must just accept that it may not make you as fast, as someones who is quicker in his reactions, and who's inputs are more precice.
that setup for you is optimal for what you can do with the car. so one, could basically call a setup that's optimal for himself, perfect.

tomorrow is a new day. i know now what the maximun mechanical grip (or at least close to it) is, and to achieve it you need to have very loose car. car that is too loose for my hands. now i have to let some of that grip go, and accept that i cant take as much out of the car that someone better than me can. my goal is still to get even 2:00 and tomorrow i go after it again. i think i have a chance to get there if i find my sweet spot in the setup. the "perfect" one for me.

 

[SL1DE]

Not only track limits but the simulator's physics flaws as well. You'll never see those brutal lap times differences amongst real race drivers or even amateur but reasonably experienced kart racers (not with the same cars). It's basically a matter to exploit the software weaknesses as the "football" players do in FIFA series (some of them are even paid to inform EA how they cheat to score). This is the why I can't see no point on those time lap contests. I bet some money some of those magic drivers would suck at a basic rental go-kart racing.

That's racing, I guess. Exploit the interpretation of the rule book to gain an advantage, if you can get away with it.

 

[patchedupdemon]

The setups should be closed to select the top 20 drivers. And for the race, opened. That's my point of view anyway.

This competition is not really all about speed,they want someone with setup knowledge,there's no point in being a simulation test driver,if you can't identify handprint problems due to setup.

 

[patchedupdemon]

I'm not taking part in this due to time constraints,but I will say this,unless your set up is way way way off,you're not going to find 2 secs,unless there's an very unrealistic setup hack at play,in tin tops aero doesn't really play that much of a role on laptime,unlike open wheel formula cars where from high to low downforce can be 3sec plus a lap on some sims.
The biggest laptime gain comes from the line your racing,and pedal and wheel inputs,corner speed and braking,later braking isn't always faster,some corners you have to brake earlier but lighter to carry more speed,trail braking and threshold braking all mixed into one lap.
In iracing there are definitely wheel rotation,ffb and setup hacks that the tops guys use,that's why they are consistently 2-4 guys in every top split that are 1-2 seconds faster,I haven't been here long enough to work out of rf2 has these hack.

 

[David O'Reilly]

One nice tool is replay office.
Overlay your lap with a fast one and you can see where the other driver is making speed vs you.
I did it yesterday. Even by the start finish line I was 5kph down due to a poorer exit of final corner. T1 I didnt use enough track (2 wheels on os kerb needed).
Every corner but 2 my apex speed was down.
My next session I found 1 sec. But still haven't broke into 2:01s.

Then I went into single player and used the transparent trainer.
Found .60 sec.

All the while tweaking sets.

I hope today to get 2:01.xx.
EDIT: Now at 2:00.9. (Sunday )
EDIT #2 Sunday afternoon. 2 tweaks to set and I have 2:00.25.
Means I jumped 300 ppl today from a lowly 550th to 255th. Tommorrow is target sub 2:00.
I spend a lot of time on setup, but its got me max 2 sec and prob more like 1.5. The rest is talent and practice imo. These top guys are aliens. That's why simracing is so great, equal cars!

 

[Christos Segkounas]

I can see the problems with the setup and cutting situation, both very complex and I have no magic solution to offer, there's always something getting in the way of everything apparently.
I'm sure S397 now understand the importance of incorprorating rigorous automatic cutting detection in such competitions.
A fixed setup isn't too much of a great thing either.
So even if this is about a job for a real F1 team, the limitations of mainstream simulation technology are all too apparent.
After all is said and done though, I'm sure the finalists will all be extremely talented individuals, there's no getting around that.
Sim racing though offers you a chance I never had in a world where money talks and bulshit walks.
Any of you can go race at a high level league and get your hands on those "magic setups" and gurus, if you have the talent and inclination.
At the end of the day, no team will invite you in if you can't drive.
If you are going at it on your own then may have to accept that is not the best way of going about things and not complain.
I understand that downplaying talent is a useful self-defence mechanism but I've been around long enough to know better.

 

[Josh.H]

FIA rule is ambiguous as I claimed and it was proven considering the replies after it several posts before in this thread. It doesn't specify when a tire is out of the track in order to be able to properly determine if a car has always two tires on the track. There hasn't been in FIA a smart enough person to do it yet.

For Formula 1: "Drivers will be judged to have left the track if no part of the car remains in contact with it and, for the avoidance of doubt, any white lines defining the track edges are considered to be part of the track but the kerbs are not." From section 27.3 of the Sporting Regulations.
Not sure about the rest of the world but this rule is the same for events run under the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport.

 

[SPASKIS]

For Formula 1: "Drivers will be judged to have left the track if no part of the car remains in contact with it and, for the avoidance of doubt, any white lines defining the track edges are considered to be part of the track but the kerbs are not." From section 27.3 of the Sporting Regulations.
Not sure about the rest of the world but this rule is the same for events run under the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport.

This is substantially changing the definition since the concept of two tires remaining on track does not even appear in it. However, , it does clarify that slightly stepping on the white line is considered that the tire is in the track.

 

[bwana]

This is substantially changing the definition since the word tire does not even appear in it.

Defines the track and a car shall always have at least 2 wheels on track

 

[SPASKIS]

Defines the track and a car shall always have at least 2 wheels on track

Not in the quoted paragraph. According to it, one single tire touching a white line would be enough to be considered legal.

 

[Lazza]

I spend a lot of time on setup, but its got me max 2 sec and prob more like 1.5.

Generally unless the setup is obviously 'broken', it would be even less than that. It can be both demoralising and encouraging at the same time when you spend hours and hours and hours tweaking setups to gain 3 seconds, then jump back into the starting (even default, if it's not silly) setup and get within a second of your very best time. That's been the case with cars I've spent a lot of time in.

I've seen people struggling with their setup, give it to a much faster driver, watch them go nearly as quick as they were with their own setup while saying it has too much / too little oversteer/understeer. And the other way, people (generally) think setup is key, get a faster driver's setup, struggle to stay on the track while eventually getting to about the same time they were, and then have some suspicion they didn't get the real setup because it didn't take seconds (or even tenths) off their laptime.

Track limits is an eternal debate, but a lot of the people complaining (publicly or not) that others are exceeding the bounds, probably haven't looked at their own replays and seen that they're not only not exceeding the boundaries, they aren't close to them a lot of the time.

 

[SPASKIS]

In order to judge a setup to be faster you need to drive with it for several times in consistent times.

A 10 lap stint should be enough for a race setup. If it is hotlap setup you would probably need even more attempts with each one in order to properly determine setup influence. This is because the variability and risk of errors when driving on the absolute limit is clearly bigger.

In order to account for how much difference the setup makes, there are statistic tools (ANOVA...) that can easily provide a magnitude and reliability of the conclusion considering the amount of samples used. Minitab is probably the most used tool and easier tool for doing this análisis. Using not only total times but sector times will increase the quality and conclusions of the analysis.

For the WFG combo I would expect 1,5 seconds improvement compared to DEFAULT setup.

 

[Will Mazeo]

Sorry but this "whine of the losers" (no offense intended) is getting really annoying here and on Discord. People whine about setups being open (like really... why a prize being a deal to be a simulator driver would have this option locked? ffs), people whine about imaginary track cuts. Cant you just accept your own skills? I'm into 2:02 and nothing will make me faster, not even an alien setup. Good lord people... grow up! Legit 1.57.3 lap from this guy http://devbot.enterprises/share/2017-08-06_01-22-22.mp4 stop whining. You got his pedal imput and lots of info you need, copy his lap
I can't wait for this to end lol

 

[David O'Reilly]

Generally unless the setup is obviously 'broken', it would be even less than that..

There is some "late mail" on this-
Sun morning-somewhere in the UK...
I have been stuck at 2:02.3s for about 60 laps.
One of my FSR team mates who is particularly good at sets, shared a set with me.
My first hot lap was 1 sec faster, within 5 laps I had 2:00.93 sec.
Thats about 1.4 sec improvement on a set I had been tweaking quite a bit (version 7 or 8).

So I have now have to disagree with (or update) my previous opinion! and subsequently yours Lazza which pains me as I have great respect for your knowledge.
BTW I know what you mean about going back to a previous set and being as quick or quicker. I call it sanity checking a new set, so often all the lappage makes you faster and you are faster with the original one. Always worth going back and checking.

I can reveal that the set was more oversteery than mine but controllable in a slide.
Another of my team mates is in the 1:57 bracket with that same set. So we can safely say from here on it's about skill!.


I am loving this event, such a great eye opener and learning curve.
PS: dont stop buying my set up guide its still really good (just lucky my team mates collaborated on it).

 

[bwana]

Not in the quoted paragraph. According to it, one single tire touching a white line would be enough to be considered legal.

Josh H races here in Oz IRL , Id guess that's from an Aussie CAMS site or similar and is a clause referring to track boundaries. You may find the next clause states the 2 wheels bit