Oh you bunch of swine's. No one told me this.

Here was me struggling like hell and wondering why I could not get even close to anyone else on blackwood.

I was on the verge of giving up when, after watching some replays of other drivers, I decided to switch seats from the right to the left.

Sheesh, what a difference.

Why did I not try that before LOL. So much easier and so accurate on the racing line. The chicane is far easier to take and now I think about it, the three corners where I was losing time were all right hand corners where sitting in the left hand seat gives you a lot of confidence on the exit because you can see the limit of the exit so much better, hence you can carry more speed with more confidence.

I'm still getting low 35's, but I can now see where there is a mass of time to be gained with practice.

Dipped into the 1:34's tonight, a high one (1:34.95) but I'm finally getting to the pace I want to be at before joining the races online. I would have joined before, but I just do not want to be in everyone's way tagging along at the back.

Quote from lucaf :

We all wish Mikus gets a wheel from Santa Claus So far he is the famous & fabulous mouse driver, believe or not

Well that's good to know. At least I know it should be possible to get low 1:34's as long as I can learn from his lines and technique.

The last few corners are where I'm losing time, in all of these corners he kicks the wheel quickly into the corner whilst using a touch of brake then coasts with a smooth line.

I am doing the same coast on the smooth line but a lot later and I'm braking longer. So I need to learn this steering kick technique.

This is truly an amazing program.

I have now got into using the analysers to look at my laps compared to the WR lap of Mikus. 1:33.16

I can see exactly where I am losing time and why. I just need to figure out what to do about at least correcting the major loses. I'm never going to match any of his corners as I'm on mouse steer and he obviously uses a wheel (it looks like that anyway). But shedding the big losses will make a massive difference.

The first time I looked I realised I was using brake help, and it made a massive difference, so I turned it off. I then had to adjust the brakes to get the balance right. Struggled at first but before long had beaten my PB. My track looks very similar to Mikus until after the long straight, after that I lose a lot of time on every corner and need to find out how to correct that.

I'm now down to a PB of 1:35.36 and I'm taking at least 2 tenths off each night. I'm not driving hot laps, I'm driving a 4 lap solo race because there is no point getting a setup right if it works only for hot tyres.

This is just as interesting as far as the physics is concerned than it is driving the damn car LOL.

Never had any of this back in 2005.

Quote from MicroSpecV :

if you got 34s in old Blackwood and mid 35s now you're pretty much on par with your old self. Old BL was quite a bit faster than new BL, so the offset is kinda right between your old best time and new best.

Keep pushing though! Today in the average demo AA or MRc Gti server, a 1:35 would get you a probable 6th or 7th in a full grid quali. You can do better!

I can't seem to remember the old Blackwood, even back in 2005 I think it looked exactly like it does today.

Maybe it's senility creeping in. When did it exist?

Quote from expr :

I suggest you give LFSLazy a go, if you haven't already. While I haven't ever used it, I understand it has this feature of "split prediction" that can help you understand better when and how you lose time in the corners, and the opposite, the times when you go through a corner particularly well even if other corners of the sector mask your total time – a bit like studying your telemetry afterwards, but without all the hassle.

WOW!

Thanks for the tip, that really is an amazing bit of software. It's a massive help, I got my best time of 1:35.53 for a lap at Blackwood and can now see where I am losing time and I can try different things to see if I gain time in particular corners.

Thanks very much for pointing this out to me.

Still a long way off the 1:34's I got years ago, but its coming slowly but surely. Just a few weeks ago I could not even break 1:37.

As everyone keeps saying, its simply practice and perseverance.

Thanks to the help I got under 1:36 (1:35.88) for the first time tonight and got a not completely useless 4 lap time of 6:32.12 on Blackwood.

Still not good enough to join the races, but I'm getting there.

Sinanju, the first setup you posted is good for my driving style and I am using it now. Thanks mate. Appreciate it.

Thanks all for the replies, just got home from work after being away all week, I'll see how I get on this weekend after reading all the advice and trying out the setups.

i'm not interested in tweakers, I race fair and simply, want to be able to keep up with everyone on the servers, not beat them at the first attempt, I'm a realist and know how much practice it takes.

So thanks, I did not actually know you could jump into someone else's car, so that in itself will be a great help, seeing their lines and braking points.

Last edited by BAD_BA, Fri, 15 Dec 2017 16:27.

OK, I have been practising like mad since coming back to this game after 10 years away. My old best times used to be around 1:34 for blackwood, now, no matter what I do i cannot get under 1:36.5, even getting under 1:38 is hairy at best.

I remembered back then I struggled as well, but then someone sent me a setup that was almost perfect for me. After that I really enjoyed myself.

Now I think I am in the same position, struggling with setups that are simply unstable for my driving style. I have tried all the ones in the setups section but they are mostly too unstable for me.

Can anyone send me a reasonably fast setup for a mouse user, something that I can try?

I'm no car mechanic and I have no clue how to tweak one myself.

I know it's a bit of a cheeky ask, but have a heart, I just want to at least be able to keep up with everyone else and have fun.

Mouse steer seems to be OK. Not perfect but its not bad.

Quote from SyDias :

Good post, as I was going to make the same one...

Havent played since 03' and looking to get back into this game! Took me awhile to dig up my account too.

Maybe we should race each other for a while, until we get back up to speed.

Quote from bishtop :

hello as stated above Press N until see names at the bottom right side and you will notice a green S which you click and save then select in the pit or if you give me the name of the racer if i see them before you do i will upload it for you


MRc bish

Thanks. I can't remember the name, just wanted to know if anyone was kind enough to send me one again.

I asked to join and deliberately kept starting at the back of the grid to keep out of everyone's way. They were all lapping in 1:33 to 1:35 and I was only doing 1:37, but I learnt a lot by simply going around the circuit with others so I appreciated it anyway.

Still need to get my times down though. It's a great server, fair and fun racing and as long as people like me keep out of the way it is nice to see that players are tolerant of slower drivers.

Back again with another question.

Someone in the [MRc] GP TrackGTI server felt sorry for a returning driver struggling to get back up to speed and sent me a setup.

Unfortunately I had no idea how to actually receive that setup.

Can someone tell me how to retrieve it in game, or retrospectively if possible?

Thanks.

I can see what people mean about tyres. Way back then I managed to find a setup that was almost perfect for my driving style, now, all the ones I try do not give me enough front end grip and I suffer from understeer massively. So I find I need to brake more and that is where I am losing a lot of time.

Since the settings I used back then are long gone from the site, I'll need to try to work them out myself.

It's good to see that my account and some stats have survived from way back then, but I played this sim for well over a year and only two days racing stats seem to have survived. So I guess a lot of data was lost on the server from way back then.

Can anyone suggest a server to join where I will not be ridiculed too much and allowed to race my own race? I'll try to get my times down before joining, but once I do it would be nice to join a crowd tolerant of slower drivers. I avoid contact if I can and always let faster guys through.

Thanks for the reply Twiny. Actually I'm using mouse for steering. I think I used that before way back then. I know it took me quite some time to get lines right, back then (and only then) did I get times down to where I could enjoy the races. I suppose I just need to do the same again.

I'll practice until I'm down in the 1:35 times before I join races, otherwise I'm just an obstacle to everyone else.

It's still a great sim though. Challenging as always.

Interesting. I'm looking at some stats I had for 04/09/2005.

I could get 1:42 for the first lap and I could get a 1:34.6 for a lap back then, so I was not terrible at least.

I'm going to persevere and practice for a while. But if I can't explain why I am 4 seconds off for the first sector I might just give up LOL.

I know a lot has to do with setup. I tried a lot of the setups in the files section, and not one of them allows me to get anywhere near a 34 second first split on the first lap.

Watching the good racers, on the seconds lap their times are around 30:30 for the first split. I can do 31:50. So I'm a second off pace there, I have no problem with this and can see how this can improve with practice.

But on the first lap their split times are 34:40, and I only get around 38:50 no matter what I try, so how am I so far off on the first split on the first lap when I am only a second off on the second.

How is it possible for my first lap times at the split to be 4 seconds off the pace at the first split?

I'm taking the right lines, giving it all the gas I can give it, but I'm 4 seconds off the pace.

I really do not understand that at all.

I used to play this back in 2005-7, then there were very few players getting lap times around 1:33 at Blackwood. Most players were playing from their keyboards and getting times anything from 1:37 to 1:42. The good guys were there (that could do 1:33), and we let them go off out front. But the really good racing was in the pack between the rest of us all around the same times.

Now I suddenly found the site again and recovered my log on. Really surprised to find the game still here and still going strong. So I watched a few online races and now it seems that almost all players are getting times around 1:33 to 1:36.

The best I could manage back in 2005 was 1:37, after some small practice that appears to still be the best I can manage.

So what has happened, have players simply become more serious, is everyone now using gaming wheels?

It's a pity, because with my lap times there is no way to compete with the current players. And I have no idea how they got those times then, and still have no idea how to get those times now (Using a keyboard).

Back then almost all players used the keyboard, just a few had wheels, but the racing was really good.

Are there still keyboard players that can get into the 1:33's and is it just practice, or should I simply not bother trying to get involved again unless I get a wheel?

Thanks for your comments.

Last edited by BAD_BA, Sun, 26 Nov 2017 01:07.