@slowbird: Only 4 more races to get into the chase, maybe 3 if I miss this week. Shit is getting tense :/

@iron1c: For sure! For next season, I plan to reevaluate the ratio of regular and Chase races (8+3 vs. the current 7+4), but it certainly is going to be interesting.

Oh man you guys are killing me with the changes to Sebring. I was championing hard for that track to be included this season. But now that it's been moved, it's not real likely I'll get to race it with you guys. I might have to blow off some friends this weekend if I'm going to attend it for GBGT. The one on Aug 2 for FD is definitely no good though. They're at least running it this week for the official Star Mazda series though, so there's that.

@bifflog Thanks for the link to the Indycar race from the other day. Watching it now.

@maxx77: DO IT

@maxx77: that is quite unfortunate! :( We tried not to change up the schedules too much but these darn external factors keep messing with us!

@maxx77: No problem, the first part isn't terribly exciting because of my starting SNAFU, then I run into the back of @Trace and they refuse to repair my wheel! After that you'll get some sweet broadcast camera presentation the rest of the way ;)

Yeah that really sucked what happened to your car. Looked like a really fun race too. Did you find out what happened to the car at the start?

@maxx77: Maybe I hit the ignition, but it didn't seem like it would start back up. Or the calibration got messed up.

Can't explain the pit stop though, why they wouldn't start repairs.

@bifflog: Maybe that's a bug with the car, since it's still unfinished at this point. They've confirmed that the full oval version of the DW12 will definitely be ready for the next build, with the road version still to be determined. Really hope they can get it ready in time.

Well, terrible race start to finish for me. Apologies to @hayfourzee for the contact. Seemed like it was pretty good up front, though.

The iRacing scheduled sessions and Danlisa have both been updated and now show the correct schedule.

I was struggling through practice and qualifying to regain my pace from the open practice session (I swear to god, something keeps changing between those sessions) but regained some of it during the race and worked my way to the front and had some good racing. @slowbird was faster the whole race though and it was only a matter of time before he could catch up. I could keep him behind me for ~15 laps, but with 2 laps to go he tried to go around the outside. He hadn't even completed the pass yet, he was just slightly ahead on the outside and I had the inside (my preferred line and being inside put you up on the relative ranking) for the next corner but then the caution came out and ended the race. He would've won anyway, since he probably would've completed the pass in the last lap, but had the caution came out 2 seconds earlier or later, it would've been my race. Oh well, let's go to Darlington!

EDIT:
Also I just watched the stream and whoops - seems like I totally forgot about the language at one point. Hope that didn't cause any problems, @maxx77.

Fun race! It's a bit unfortunate that the dumb orange pit cones posed a problem. Ah well, on to Darlington after the break! That should be interesting because I've never driven there before and I have no idea what to expect. Well, I expect lots of cars to scrape the wall :D

In more depressing news, the stupid dumb Chevy teams got more points this week :(

New Properly-Formatted Manufacturer Standings Chart of Chartiness

So unfortunately, I have to pick my wonderful mother up at the airport tomorrow night and won't get to run the Sebring 75 minute race. However, I WOULD like to practice with you guys. Would anybody be up for a hosted practice session tonight after the Formula Duder event? I'll invite some of the guys from my team if they're still up and around.

-Travis

I only really do the 2 hour practise sessions that we run prior to the main session, so I probably wouldn't turn up, sorry.

Speaking of... 2 hour open practise session for Formula Duder is up!

No worries. I actually didn't even notice you had cussed until I watched the Twitch stream myself. My relatives wound up leaving just as we were going green at the start of the race. If I hadn't forgotten to plug my headset back in, I could have told you guys the coast was clear. I appreciate everyone keeping the language PG rated though, other than that slip up which didn't matter so it all worked out!

That FD race was totally amazing, I really didn't think I'd be able to finish so high after missing qualifying and not being warmed up, but the intensity of the race warmed me up real quick. I feel kinda bad about locking up behind @Trace on lap 7, I thought you were going to go defensive and Slowbird was coming up my inside :( Glad you still got a half decent finish in the end. Lots of fun trying to get past @hayfourzee, real bummer that you crashed out. I'm glad I could actually contribute more than single digit points for Team AUSBOMB, I think we're definitely in the hunt for second place.

Also, are there still plans for some Sebring practice in the next little while? I'd be keen since I'll likely be doing some practice by myself anyway some time in the next few hours.

@sebw I'm down if you were wanting to practice. I don't know what all of the fuel restrictions etc are though.

-Travis

@travis_mihm: OK, I'm hosting a session now, hopefully I haven't fucked up any of the settings >.< It's called GBGT Practice, you''ll find it on the Hosted Sessions page soon

Edit: I think I broke iRacing....

Edit 2: Seems to be working again, hosted session is there

5 races in and I have yet to finish a race without facing the wrong way, and all but once had to go in for repairs. Is it just bad luck or can I not drive properly?

I've been thinking about taking advantage of the current 50% off of new memberships thing they have going on and getting a year subscription to this and maybe joining y'all, but I'm really new to simulation racing and only got a wheel like two weeks ago (a Logitech Driving Force GT, for the curious) and the rep this game has for being a really intense simulation is slightly intimidating. The main thing tripping me up is that I'm really worried I'll get this and join all of you people and then somehow crash and ruin everyone's race or something. Am I just being a worrywart? It looks like a lot of fun from what I've seen of it, though.

Another thing I'm concerned about is that the Driving Force GT doesn't have a clutch pedal and I can't really afford to get new pedals or anything at the moment. Would I be okay without a clutch pedal or is it necessary to do well in this game?

@alien_balls: A bunch of us started iRacing in this league; myself included. It is a great place to learn. I'd say that once you feel comfortable doing laps and feel in control, you should definitely join us. You won't ruin anyone's race as long as you're careful, and we'll help you out. No need for a clutch pedal either, most of us don't have/use one, and lacking it doesn't put you at a disadvantage.

Don't be intimidated by this league. ;)

@alien_balls: All skill levels are welcome! It definitely does take some time to get the hang of things, but practising/racing with us is as good a way as any to get up to speed. We're pretty open to any questions and such that you might have. We have 2 hour practise sessions before every race.

Don't worry about not having a clutch. A lot (most?) of us don't even use one.

@thesupernatural: There is a huge difference between racing and lapping. Judging by most of the comments you make around here and while we're in sessions, I think you're putting FAR too much emphasis on numbers in a list and not enough emphasis in learning and understanding what must be done to cross the stripe without incident after 22 laps.

Since it appears important for you (and most of the rest of us!) to judge your performance and see numbers improve, try gauging your time on a 20 lap run instead of just your best lap. Most of the time when I'm evaluating a setup change or a line change for myself or a team member at BAM, I'm looking at the improvement over a race run and a session optimal, not an improvement in a best lap figure. Looking at a split delta on your screen and trying to fight the track for more time corner-by-corner is the racing-equivalent of swingin' wild in boxing. It works much better to start out with a very easy to drive setup (higher downforce, more ground clearance, less caster, softer shocks), get a benchmark racing line down, and then get used to running however quick that setup and racing line pair is, lap after lap, until there's no more fuel left. Once you can do that, you can change your line through ONE corner at a time, do setup adjustments ONE setting at a time, and watch the time melt off the chart.

Is anybody interested in a little racing line exercise for this coming week? With Season 3 coming, I am pretty much spending every available moment running paints, getting admin stuff squared away etc for my team, and I could use something else to focus on. It's a little labor-intensive and you'll have to put a good amount of effort into it, but I have a driving school-ish program that I've been developing for 2015 for my team, and I need guinea pigs. If anybody wants to learn about how to make/evaluate setups and shave those tenths through a bit more systematic approach than the usual "Well lets try braking better than I did last lap", I'd be happy to share.

-Travis

Open practise for GBGT is up for the next 2 hours. Come get your night-time on :D

IT'S GO TIME! GET READY FOR ABOUT A HUNDRED SLOW SPINS IN THE DARK :D

Thanks for the encouragement, everyone. I went and bought a year's subscription today, but I think I'll wait until I can point the car in the right direction for a full lap before I join the league, which hopefully will be soon!

@alien_balls: Good for you man! Feel free to join the league and come to the practice sessions and warmups for the races, if you don't want to do the race that's cool but you might as well come get to know us, we're a fairly chatty group.

@sebw: Okay, what the hell. I'll fill out the application right now.

Tomorrow I leave for a full week, won't be at any of next weekends races just so everyone knows. Hopefully they go well :)

@travis_mihm: I'd love to participate but I'm not sure if I have the time to really dedicate to it. What sorta time commitment are you looking for?

@noryia: What we'd be doing is following the approach outlined here (You can actually click this now since I apparently forgot how to link correctly), but on track and in TeamSpeak. Might be worth while to just get together some time and do a little two hour test session. I'm probably going to start doing this with whatever series my team picks as a focus point for Season 3 on iRacing; it's looking like it will either be the Global Challenge, World Sports Car Series, or Star Mazda. But we could also meet up separate from that, not a big deal to me.

I wrote that article quite a while ago for the first or second race I ever did in Formula Duder haha. Fitting that I will be returning to rewrite that article after running with you guys again! I'll update that write-up with new info, working pictures, and a few thoughts and ideas I've found in the last year.

-Travis

@travis_mihm: I just notice that you're leading the Formula Duder points despite missing a race. Total domination!

@travis_mihm: I would be up for this type of session. I enjoy time attacking a course but that usually comes after lots of slow laps and then breaking down the track section by section. Sharing the information and just general discussion is super helpful.

Random question... is there somewhere that has a breakdown of what will be in the next iracing update? I am digging all around on the official page and I can't find anything. I saw the post about driver swap and Phoenix but I assume there is a more detailed breakdown. I just don't know where to find it.

Thanks in advance!

@c0braje7: Start with here .

@travis_mihm: I'll check it out tonight.

So who is running the Indy 500 this weekend?

@khann: HERE. /raisehand

@iron1c: Have you done qualifying yet? I'll be running probably tonight, but maybe tomorrow. Just gonna use the iRacing provided set.

@khann: No, I haven't (unless my qualifying time from the cancelled Indy500 counts, which I highly doubt). What do you mean by 'running today', qualy or the race? Because I believe the first race is in about 25-26 hours.

I'll be using the iRacing provided 'basic' setup as well (not the advanced one). It's gonna be more about survival anyway and splits get decided by qualifying time, not iRating (at least that's what they announced for the last one), so it should be pretty close anyway.

@iron1c: I meant qualifying. Also, it seems like this set may be a better option than the baseline. Matt Orr seems to think it's fine for the race if you just increase the gearing at the top end, too.

@khann: I'll look into it after I wreck this Gen6 at Indy right now.

@khann: I'll be running it, put in a qualifying time tonight, plan to run 2 PM EST on Saturday.

Should be interesting ;)

It looks like they actually did carry over the qualifying results from before:

Note that qualifying times from the May 2014 Indy 500 will be carried forward so if you posted a qualifying time previously that will count. You can also continue to try and better your qualifying time if you want to do so. If you didn’t previously qualify you can do so during the new qualifying sessions.

@slowbird: Oh hey, that's neat. Now I don't have to spend 5 minutes qualifying, which sounds easy enough but I still haven't done it yet.

I dunno if it's the weather config or what but I'm really having a lot of understeer at Indy. Buried it into the Turn 1 wall a few times in practice =/

@bifflog: That was a spot most folks had problems with last time.

Yeah, I would recommend getting used to lifting in turn 1, at least for most of the race. I think moving the weight jacker to a positive number can help, but might make you scary loose in other situations.