Round 5 Sebring Int. Raceway - Thu Nov 26, 2020

Enjoyed the combo last night, but had an annoyingly underwhelming drive, just when i thought i had turned a corner with this car.

All the pre race stracker times suggested i was bang on the pace and would finally be able to give Jos, Toni and Mac a hard battle here as i was setting regular low 2:07's and even a 2:06 if i put the lap together. I got a great start and moved up a couple of positions, saw the incidents start to unfold at T1 on the inner side of track, so took a very wide outer line to avoid any carnage, only to get speared by a Lancia coming diagonally across the track to stick me into the wall and instantly lost about 10 seconds trying to get going again
Not the start i wanted, already on the backfoot, joined near the back end with about 4 other stranded cars do wonder what is the point of driving my nuts off in qually.

Anyway, for the rest of the race it was a case of put in 10 laps of good pace, then throw it away with a dodgy braking sequence, then 5 laps good, repeat brake issue and rinse....
admittedly i am using a fair bit of rear brake bias just to get the bloody boat to turn in at tighter corners, and it caused me a few moments sadly. Everytime i pulled a gap on JVD and Kirilov, whilst closing in on Mac, i would then lose 2-3 seconds with a clumsy brake moment. it was frustrating the hell out of me as i had no issues in my practise sessions. Maybe i had damage from the hard T1 impact?
In the end, though i had closed on Mac, JVD had also closed on me and i was relieved to finish the race as my tyres were now shot. Finished an un-inspiring 12th or 13th. Off to watch the replay next also see who caused the T1 chaos!
I think this K2 car should have been in Div2 from the start. Yes it has a straight line advantage over the escort and Lancia, but its nowhere near as nimble as them, and being 200bhp behind the Div1 cars just puts it in no mans land.

 

Yep, gave it everything but didn't have the tyre life at the end to catch you at the best point for an overtake. Well done for not cracking under pressure though

 

Had a lot of pressure from Stefan the entire race. He was never much more than a second off my rear bumper for over half of the race. We were level on points in the series so I knew this was a battle I had to win. For the first half of the race I took it easy trying to conserve some life in the tires. It kind of worked as only the last 2 laps were a bit slippery. Came across Phil recovering from an off and a few laps later I took over 4th place when he lost the back end and careered into the pit lane wall and disappeared into the pits. Now that's how you give up a place. Nice . Thought 4th was secure when I finally got a gap to Stefan but it was still only a couple of seconds then I saw Filip cruise up behind Stefan. Stefan did a great job of defending for a few laps but the inevitable happened and he got passed somehow. With just 4 laps to go I was 5 seconds ahead but with 2 laps to go that was gone. How the hell do these guys still do these kind of lap times on worn tires. Beyond me. My plan when Filip was behind Stefan was if he got passed and caught me I'd let him go as my fight was with Stefan in series terms and I didn't want him catching back up. But Filip caught me with just a lap to go (turned out to be 2 because of Tim's dastardly tactics) so I thought sod that he's not coming passed. But it was immaterial in the end as I think he made a mistake and dropped to a second or so behind me. When I saw a Crapi on the side of the road didn't occur to me it was Matteo and so I thought I'd crossed the line in 4th. Great surprise to see I'd got up on the podium. Saw the replay and Matteo was just 2 seconds from being safe. I guess there's a good reason not to play the time game. Tim could have easily held back and made it one less lap but in doing that extra lap he made his championship rival run out of fuel. Not that Tim would have known that at the time of course.

Well done to the winners of Div 1 and 2 and all the podiums

On to Zolder. Not my favourite track in the world but should be good fun.
Thanks to Caitlin for another great broadcast

 

As I mentioned after the race - when I released Matteo could basically match my lap times I decided to throw some tactics into the mix.
As soon as I got into the lead (Shorter ratios today so I managed it into T1 for a change ) I set to using my engine to beat Matteo about the head.
I was very conservative in the corners, taking care to always hit my apexs and nail the exits so that Matteo could catch me but would struggle to pass.
I then ensured I absolutely nailed my entrances onto the fast sections, that way Matteo would have to either run 100% boost to stay close enough to hope for a passing opportunity, or he'd have to drive on the ragged edge through all of the twisty's just to keep up.
The plan was that he'd either A. Use too much fuel and end up having to save at the end when I needed him slower.
Or B. Over use his tires staying with me so they'd be worn out at the end when I needed him slower
The M1 is carrying over 200Kgs more than the Capri, and when you then factor in the extra 200Bhp I have, you can imagine how much my rear tires hate me when I'm really going flat out. As it's lighter and less powerful, the Capri should always have a tire wear advantage towards the end of the race (At least now the tires are fixed at least), so I needed something to remove that advantage from Mr. Santini

Whenever I started pulling too far ahead (more than 1 second) I would reduce boost to 80% to cool off my tires and save some fuel - this also allowed Matteo to catch back up and gave him incentive to try and pass me. When he got too close I would just go back to 90% boost and the odd spurt at 100% on the straights just to clear some air again and make him try harder!

I'm still amused by Caitlyn having the wrong camera for my mistake at around the 15 minute mark and assuming Matteo's pass was an easy clean one - what was missing from the broadcast was my catching a front wheel under braking into T15 (Gendebien bend) and snaking over to the wrong side of the road while catching the slide. I had no way of making the turn so went straight on, which left me in an awkward position - an attempt to re-join had a high risk of my entering the track on the racing line just as Matteo got there - but simply cutting it was also a pretty big no no as I would gain at least a second by my best guess from the short cut and a better line onto the main straight.
So I hung out left in the outfield instead until Matteo got along side and then rejoined behind him on full boost, I knew I could re-pass with ease on the straight and there would be no question of gaining an advantage during my shortcut.

I have to say that had I known the extra lap would have knocked Matteo out completely then I would have hung back enough to finish a lap earlier - my championship would much rather have Matteo finish 2nd than Laurent

Great racing while it lasted Matteo - you WILL get your revenge in 2 weeks as Zolder is not going to be a strong one for the M1.
Well done to Laurent and Paul for the Div 1 podium spots, and to Toni, Jos and Mac for the Div 2 seats.


Mark, I'm going to put a video together for you to show one of your problems in the K2 - It's much faster than the Div 2 cars but you need to turn it on the brakes and throttle - watching the replay you're cornering while coasting. With a diff that tight the car can't hope to turn decently - the first time I drove my track car with the 2 way fitted (That thing is bastard-tight track spec) I nearly fell off track while following the marshal car on the first lap as I just tried coasting through a corner as if I had a road diff.
Arguably your big problem is that you're going too slow into the turns. Not braking into the turn or powering out is allowing far too much traction across both rear wheels, which only slows you further as you then can't turn.
My diff - just like the diffs in the Porsches - just locks up HARD in that situation and produces incredibly heavy understeer. It will only turn happily on a balanced throttle when the plates stay apart, or when using body roll/weight transfers to force the car to rotate around it while locked.


To complete the comedy picture of my personal 'lesson' for anyone who wants a laugh:
it was a very wet day at Oulton Park, so everyone had to follow the safety car for 2 laps at the start of the day to get an idea of the conditions before we were let loose.
I nearly under-steered straight off the track at Cascades (Literally the 1st corner after leaving the pits) at about 40 Mph and only stayed on in the end because I pulled the handbrake and then drifted out of the corner - Naturally this made me look a proper tit as we were meant to be taking it steady/safely
Ironically, when on the limit that diff is the single best mod I have ever fitted. f****** horrendous on puplic roads though - honestly, welded diffs are comfier and quieter in comparison. As are wooden tires I suspect...

 

The Baby Porsche can't match the K3 and other bigger cars, it's true, except maybe on some smaller tracks like the Vallelunga club, Magione, Norisring or Betonschleife. But that's also Capri's and then Celica's territory. The "Baby" Porsche is definitely a Division 1 car but that's because it's from 1977, when it dominated the division 1 field. First and foremost because back then they made the majority of Division 1 cars besides some entries from the 934, Carrera RSR, Pantera, Celica etc. Winning continued in 1978. Only after that came the younger but bigger brother hahah the K3. So the small 935s winning days were over, although they were still pretty much close in the top pack with the K3s in 1979 and the new Division 1 Capris in 1980 (that Capri came from winning 1979's division 2, but now into division 1 with bigger engine and added Venturi tunnels underneath the car for extra grip). And even then, some real teams with smaller budgets I guess, still ran that Baby Porsche.

I kind of regret again that I didn't find out about SRO earlier while voting was on for this series. Otherwise I would suggest a bit limited mix of DRM mod cars without having to worry about such performance differences. I'll probably put something in suggestions for next season, so if people are not bored or put off by DRM already, take a vote.

 

I’d vote for another season of these cars they are a handful but still love driving them and seeing them in action out of interest is the mod team planning on adding more models to the range?

 

Well, that's a question for only Dennis to answer. Haven't got the slightest idea about new car models and I'd love to see some cars to be at least reworked into a next years successor like 1981 K3 and Capri for example, which in my opinion wouldn't be too hard. Or division 2 Capri from 1979 which was the first Capri turbo by Zakspeed that came into DRM. I messed around with some data and kind of made one on my own. But my actual involvement into making this mod or DRM group in general is zero. In fact that beta-testing is an accidental out of the blue, and short one time affair last summer, just before the latest 1.3 patch came out. I'm sure other people were involved, and more so, but I don't know them lol Prior to that beta test, I already had a good number of laps and online DRM races under my belt. All those previous DRM races, I ran with a couple of cars, mostly with the Ferrari and Escort, Toyota not included. In a couple of those races, we were joined by Dennis. Only later I realized he was a dev actually. So earlier this year I got in touch with him to talk about the mod a bit. But I can tell you Dennis is not sharing much until it's out, and it's not because of language barrier lol

 

I should stop giving driver of the day, shouldn't I? XD

 

Absolutely not. That's worth at least as much as the championship points for finishing on top XD

 

No. One of three members of the DRM MODDING TEAM current work for Automobilsta 2. It takes about 9-12 months to develop a new car and we found no time to do this job. Maybe we will bring the Capri for the Div2, but that is not yet certain.

 

Well... as I mentioned before showing that interesting link with some DRM cars info and photos, DRM was a drivers championship so it had an interesting points system. Division 1 and Division 2 weren't racing directly, but would gather points separately over the championship in their own divisions. So the one with the most points at the end, won the championship overall. Of course, it probably can't be shown with the way the website works.

But if we look at the points like they used to, @Tim Muttram and @Toni Talvitie have got a close battle coming to the last round in Zolder.

 

I'm on for that as extra incentive for the next round
All though unless Jos or Mac can beat him then he might well pip me - I really don't expect a win at Zolder!

May the best driver with a name beginning 'T' Win!

 

That's the plan Tim

You've just given @Toni Talvitie an extra incentive at Zolder... I was hoping he was going to play conservatively to secure the div2 championship and that would remove one of the many contenders for the win... I hope Zolder is the track for the Escort

 

I think it will be - the straights aren't very long at all and it's full of braking zones and tight turns.
This is Ford country! (and Toyota I suspect )

 

Oh no

 

Luckily I dont have to fight against Tim on this.
That beeing said I never count champ points. I go with next race on my mind only.
This is mostly due to my work and usually miss race or 2 in series atleast.
Driver of the race...not really. Had free run where others didnt. Could have taken it on Nords where got pole with a lap that I had big crash while doing it and in race, due to unlucky lagNcrash, had damaged car whole race and came 2nd. Or Brands where punted out in T1 in start but finishing podium and catching leaders whole race.

 

Can someone please post the full race replay?

 

Bit of a late race report.

The Thursday DRM race ended a packed racing week for me with 5 races in a week time I ended up skipping one of them, but that also meant I didn't have much time to practice. So I was on pretty much default setup, but that seemed to be working quite okay around here.

Qualifying was difficult as I was unable to find a lap without 'traffic' and held off before the last turn on several laps. In the end I pitted and was able to do 2 fast laps. P3 with 6 tenths down from the leaders, I could have been closer for sure but not sure if I could have challenged for pole.

Race start went well, Matteo ran wide and I was able to overtake only to run wide myself in the next turn (which I did every time in that turn when I was on cold tires ) and Matteo took the position back. I saw they were fighting hard at the front. I expected them to be boosting quite a bit in that fight so I thought I would sit back and spare my boost and see if I could come closer later in the race and boost at that time. That did not really happen. Matteo did ran out of fuel due to his boosting as he explained so I was able to take that position to finish P2. Once Phil had an incident it was a very lonely race with Paul finishing 50 seconds behind.

It was great to see John taking the pole in div 2! Too bad there were incidents once again at the start... Great win from Tim and Toni!