iRacing

The VW Jetta TDi had been released and it’s a pretty nice drive!

A lap of Laguna Seca in my first test session with the new car;

Spec Racer Ford

Although I’m enjoying driving iRacing’s latest addition to it’s fine stable of cars I hadn’t really intended to get fully involved in a championship so had only done one race so far at Lime Rock Park in week 2 where I managed a creditable performance and a podium finish.

Laguna Seca is a difficult track for me to resist though, I have no idea why but I always seem to do well here and it’s the location of my only 2 road victories in iRacing so far which, unfortunately, are a distant memory, the last being on June 14 2008!

Qualifying went pretty well, I managed a top 50% time which seems to be pretty good for me these days.

There were a lot of sign-up’s for the race which meant multiple splits and hopefully some closely matched racing.

Joining the race, I’m used to start at the bottom of the grid and not having to go too far up the list to find my starting position. I was pretty surprised then to have to go all the way to the #1 position to find myself sitting on pole!

My qualification time was a fair bit quicker than anyone else but I was only the #5 ranked driver so there was a good few drivers to contend with. The #1 driver, Hannu Piispa, looking dangerous back in 7th but with 5 cars between us he had his work cut out to bridge the gap.

I got off to a great start and gained a couple of car lengths to go cleanly into T1 and at the end of lap 1 I’d build a small gap to the 2nd place car who lost it going into T1 on lap 2 to leave me a couple of seconds clear.

The pack behind me was raising it’s game though and gradually started to haul me in with Peter Christiansen leading the charge.  On lap 6 he’d closed the gap to 0.5s when going into T5 I changed down slightly too early and started to oversteer onto the gravel. I managed to control it pretty well but Peter  over-corrected and went off too. For the second race in a row I got lucky after a mistake and ended up on track, facing the right way and was able to take off with Hannu still a couple of seconds down in 2nd.

The second half of the race was a tense affair with Hannu steadily taking a few tenths out each lap as they ticked down towards the chequered flag. My experience with Laguna is that passing is tricky with the first and last turns being the best opportunities so I was focused on getting a good exit from the last turn to get maximum speed on the start/finish straight to go safely into the braking zone of T1.

The plan worked! Although I got very conservative over the last few laps and Hannu got very close at the end he was unable to try a pass. I won!

A best-ever points haul 0f 104 points and a MASSIVE +84 to my iRaing, taking it over 1800 for the first time.

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A track and object comparison of Laguna Seca.

Audio is from iRacing. Real-world footage courtesy of Ric McCormick/Doug Johnson, 101 Motorsports.

I was really hoping we’d be able to race the Spec Racer Ford during the upcoming week 13 events but it’s been confirmed that’s not going to happen.

I’m not sure if it’s because the car isn’t ready or if the new build is delayed and we have to wait for that or whatever the reason, I’m really disappointed.

I think it’s really in iRacing’s interest to make any new cars available to race in week 13 prior to their introduction into a series. If it gets people some experience, that has to make the racing safer. Week 1 was pretty messy when the Silverado was introduced and I’m sure that was a contributing factor.

Anyway, onto the good news

We have the Impala COT at Talladega, that should be a lot of fun if I can get my hands on a set-up I can drive safely for more than a few laps!

But best of all, multi-class road racing involving the Pontiac Solstice, Radical SR8  and Riley Daytona Prototype and my favourite track, Laguna Seca. Up to an impressive 46 cars on track at once!

The closing speeds involved between the Solstice and the other two are incredible which I’m sure will make for some ‘interesting’ incidents. I wish SR was in place during all series in week 13 to clean the racing up a bit.

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I had the chance to hit Laguna Seca early this week in the Radical so jumped at the opportunity. Laguna is one of my favourite tracks and has generally been a happy hunting ground in iRacing.

Even though I’m in lowly division 8 in the Radical I’m having to work hard to keep in contention and missing Infineon last week means I need a great second half of the season if I’m going to get a good finish.

I was looking good in practice, putting in the 15th fastest timetrial of the week and a pretty competitive qualifying time.

A relatively small field of 14 took to the track with me sitting in 6th on the grid. I’d have probably taken 6th place at that point!

A terrible start lost me 2 places immediatly going into T1 but the 2 cars that overtook me collided and I narrowly avoided one of them to get back up to 7th. It immediately became clear the top 5 were significantly faster than the rest of us so it looked like I was in a scrap for 6th.

We were pulling away from the rest of the field and it became apparent I was slightly quicker than 6th so started looking for opportunities. After a few laps, the driver in front was getting into a rythym and increased his pace a little but not so much to pull away from me. He was a little ragged in places though and on lap 8 he took too much kerb coming out of Turn 11 and slewed across the track losing a lot of speed which enabled me to out-drag him along the start/finish straight and regain 6th albeit 15s behind 5th.

I was able to maintain a fair gap to the cars behind but I was by no means safe. Fortunately there was a major incident behind which increased the gap to 10s so I was feeling pretty comfortable at half way.

On lap 20 I passed one of the leaders sitting in the pits which put me up into 5th. The rest was pretty comfortable with a mix of incidents and back-markers increasing the gap to the rest of the field.

My first top 5 finish of the season!

91 points has put me right back in contention in my division and +49 to my iRacing has put me a shade off the 1700 mark. No incidents rounded off a fine race!

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Check out the new screenshots page here for larger versions;

http://blog.popabawa.net/?page_id=591

I love these side-by-side videos. This time the Skip Barber at Laguna Seca gets the treatment.

Who could possibly have predicted the carnage with mixed class racing like this?

Some great driving to avoid the carnage;

Only 5 weeks into the season I finally managed my first race in the Star Mazda!

I’ve been concentrating too much on the Silverado series with my very limited racing time but the lure of Laguna was too much this week combined with a really nice set-up (thanks Paul!) that I getting on with pretty well.

After limited practice, I knew I was a couple of seconds off the pace with a best lap of 1:23.3 but the desparation to get some race time in the Mazda (and hopefully some SR) was too much.

13 racers signed up with me in 11th on the grid which suited me fine with no expectation of a good result.

I lost my customary place at the start and sat in a line of 4 cars shaping up to have a good tussle when near disaster struck on lap 3 when the guy in front braked extremely early into the Corkscrew and I lost it under braking trying to avoid him. Luckily I span at very low speed avoiding any incidents but losing 10 seconds in the process.

This probably worked out to my advantage in the end as with a clear track I was able to get into a rhythm and work my way back up to the rear of the field.

A couple of retirements and a few spins left me in a fairly comfortable 9th in the end, I always like to finish higher than my expected rank (11th in this case) but more importantly, ZERO INCIDENTS for a nice +0.11 on my SR.

A practise lap of Laguna Seca in the Radical. It’s a 1:26 so not very quick but fairly smooth except for the slide into Corkscrew.

Radical around Laguna Seca from Iain Mabbott on Vimeo.