Welcome to the Race Department Historic Grand Prix Season 4 (RDHGP S4)
The RDHGP League staff welcome you to the 2009 RDHGP S4. Some of you we welcome for the first time in this league, while to some we bid a welcome return.
We have moved up a class from last year’s GTC65s, and are using a selected field of 9 cars conforming to the FIA GTC-TC-76 specifications & regulations. The season will run over 8 races, 7 races over a distance of 100km, plus the season finale over a distance of 200km on the world famous Circuit de la Sarthe at Le Mans in its 1977 configuration.
The 100km races will be run on alternating Thursdays commencing 29th October 09, with the season finale running on Saturday 20th February 10. There will be a Christmas and New Year break after round 4 on 10th December 09, with round 5 on 14th January 10.
This season, we continue with our policy of travelling the globe to some of the world’s finest circuits, keeping to a strict one race per country policy. We will be driving in 8 countries across 3 continents, all with hopefully a unique challenge to present to our drivers, and so allow the extremely varied vehicles to shine as the circumstances allow.
While by its very nature, the League environment is more competitive than the Club environment, please remember what makes the GTL Club so unique – our consideration for all other competitors at all times. Let’s try and carry this tradition of clean, fun and considerate racing over into a League environment. It worked well last season, and I will be demanding the same level of sportsmanship and courtesy this season. I would expect people to wait for someone they have taken off, even if it was accidental. In addition, if anyone has a problem with another driver, I will be just as hard on the person with the grievance if they do not adhere to the guidelines.
As with last season, discussions about laptimes - even if it is to say what has been achieved with an uploaded setup - is forbidden. Turning up last season and seeing roughly who you would be battling against only added to the anticipation, so we will keep this rule in place for S4.
Circuit Notes
Australia’s Albert Park was re-opened for racing in 1996, the makeover including a complete resurfacing, making it one of the smoothest tracks on the calendar. It is an ideal opening venue, as it is fast, relatively simple to learn, without any overly difficult or awkward corners. The downside to that is that you may have to wait for mistakes to allow a clean overtake – and I expect all overtakes to be as clean as possible.
In our 76 cars, we will not be troubling Michael Schumacher’s track record of 1.24.125, set in his 2004 Ferrari, and maybe Stirling Moss’s original circuit record of 1.50.000, set in 1958 in a Cooper Climax, is still outside our scope of performance, but I expect some very fast, close racing, with the relative car performance differences on various parts of the track making the gaps very much a variable to give some interesting challenges and battles.
For some this is the first RDHGP event, as they missed the Testing event, and so I would hope that they use the Practice session to the maximum to assess the difference in braking points and acceleration performance across the field. I won’t be too impressed at people wiping out swathes of competitors because they under- or over-estimated their own cars braking performance, or the cars around them.
The Race Director has some notes for drivers. Please see the track map above for location of Race Direction note:-
As this is round 1 there are no outstanding Incidents, Investigations nor Penalties.
Please remember, the League staff will only review incidents if they are reported to them.
No report = no review.
Please try and remember the incident reporting guidelines: review, cool off, review again. Only after following the above process, and if you are convinced you still need to report it, should you let the League staff know. Please give as much information as possible during the report (time of incident, drivers involved etc.)
Any accusations or complaints aired in the Chat during or after a race will mean a penalty levied on the person complaining or making the accusations, even if a subsequent official complaint gets found in their favour. I simply will NOT tolerate any post race finger pointing.
Liveries
You have chosen your car and livery already, and you must only drive your chosen car at any time during an RDHGP event. Every driver has a unique livery in this season of RDHGP.
Scoring System
I have extended the points distribution method down to P20 (75% distance completion required) so people can fight for some points no matter where they are on the track, and hopefully have a season long battle with people around them in the League.
The RDHGP League staff welcome you to the 2009 RDHGP S4. Some of you we welcome for the first time in this league, while to some we bid a welcome return.
We have moved up a class from last year’s GTC65s, and are using a selected field of 9 cars conforming to the FIA GTC-TC-76 specifications & regulations. The season will run over 8 races, 7 races over a distance of 100km, plus the season finale over a distance of 200km on the world famous Circuit de la Sarthe at Le Mans in its 1977 configuration.
The 100km races will be run on alternating Thursdays commencing 29th October 09, with the season finale running on Saturday 20th February 10. There will be a Christmas and New Year break after round 4 on 10th December 09, with round 5 on 14th January 10.
This season, we continue with our policy of travelling the globe to some of the world’s finest circuits, keeping to a strict one race per country policy. We will be driving in 8 countries across 3 continents, all with hopefully a unique challenge to present to our drivers, and so allow the extremely varied vehicles to shine as the circumstances allow.
While by its very nature, the League environment is more competitive than the Club environment, please remember what makes the GTL Club so unique – our consideration for all other competitors at all times. Let’s try and carry this tradition of clean, fun and considerate racing over into a League environment. It worked well last season, and I will be demanding the same level of sportsmanship and courtesy this season. I would expect people to wait for someone they have taken off, even if it was accidental. In addition, if anyone has a problem with another driver, I will be just as hard on the person with the grievance if they do not adhere to the guidelines.
As with last season, discussions about laptimes - even if it is to say what has been achieved with an uploaded setup - is forbidden. Turning up last season and seeing roughly who you would be battling against only added to the anticipation, so we will keep this rule in place for S4.
Circuit Notes
Australia’s Albert Park was re-opened for racing in 1996, the makeover including a complete resurfacing, making it one of the smoothest tracks on the calendar. It is an ideal opening venue, as it is fast, relatively simple to learn, without any overly difficult or awkward corners. The downside to that is that you may have to wait for mistakes to allow a clean overtake – and I expect all overtakes to be as clean as possible.
In our 76 cars, we will not be troubling Michael Schumacher’s track record of 1.24.125, set in his 2004 Ferrari, and maybe Stirling Moss’s original circuit record of 1.50.000, set in 1958 in a Cooper Climax, is still outside our scope of performance, but I expect some very fast, close racing, with the relative car performance differences on various parts of the track making the gaps very much a variable to give some interesting challenges and battles.
For some this is the first RDHGP event, as they missed the Testing event, and so I would hope that they use the Practice session to the maximum to assess the difference in braking points and acceleration performance across the field. I won’t be too impressed at people wiping out swathes of competitors because they under- or over-estimated their own cars braking performance, or the cars around them.
The Race Director has some notes for drivers. Please see the track map above for location of Race Direction note:-
- The Start / Finish straight is wide, with scope for manouever, and a relatively long run down to T1R. This, coupled with the disparity in car performance off the line, may mean that this is seen by some people as a good opportunity to make some cheap places. I would hope that we are all calm enough to realise that you can only lose a race in the first corner, and not win it. I will not be posing a non-overtake rule there, but people who charge in recklessly and ruin other people’s races will be penalised – whether there is an incident report filed or not.
- T1R, T3R & T11R are guarded on the outside by gravel traps, and so drivers recovering the tracks will need to be aware and vigilant of race traffic.
- T10R is the second half of a set of fast Esses – two wheels within the white lines on exit at all times.
- The Pitlane Entrance is on the outside of the penultimate turn, and people may choose to pit for damage repair, so all drivers should keep 2 wheels within the white lines unless pitting.
As this is round 1 there are no outstanding Incidents, Investigations nor Penalties.
Please remember, the League staff will only review incidents if they are reported to them.
No report = no review.
Please try and remember the incident reporting guidelines: review, cool off, review again. Only after following the above process, and if you are convinced you still need to report it, should you let the League staff know. Please give as much information as possible during the report (time of incident, drivers involved etc.)
Any accusations or complaints aired in the Chat during or after a race will mean a penalty levied on the person complaining or making the accusations, even if a subsequent official complaint gets found in their favour. I simply will NOT tolerate any post race finger pointing.
Liveries
You have chosen your car and livery already, and you must only drive your chosen car at any time during an RDHGP event. Every driver has a unique livery in this season of RDHGP.
Scoring System
I have extended the points distribution method down to P20 (75% distance completion required) so people can fight for some points no matter where they are on the track, and hopefully have a season long battle with people around them in the League.
