Welcome to Round 3 of the RDHGP S4
Welcome back to the 2009 RDHGP S4. After a disappointing (in terms of connectivity issues) Watkins Glen event, I very much hope to get back on the metaphorical track with Round 3. It won’t surprise any of you to know that I was really quite mortified by the issues we had at the Glen, and slightly disappointed in some reactions even though I did what I could to give everyone the best possible chance of a race. I know it was frustrating, and you have my apologies, but matter how serious and pompous I make these briefings, it is still just a game. We should never lose sight of that, no matter how seriously we take it.
As it turns out, it might be the provider’s recent server relocation that was, and still is, at fault. This in turn is meaning that concurrent events might be out until further notice (basically, only 1 event per server at any one time). I will keep you all posted the status of the situation. On a slightly more positive note, the qualification laps (in both sessions) were pretty much impeccable with regard to the Inner Loop cutting.
Looking up rather than down, I personally had a better (more fun) race at the Glen than at Melbourne (mirrored by some comments I received), possibly because of the one shot quali format we ran which mixed the grid up a little. I also had some positive feedback about that from several drivers. Accordingly, I will consider that for future seasons.
With that post-mortem out of the way, we turn our attention to RDHGP’s first visit to Europe this season, in the shape of the Czech Republic’s Autodrom Most.
Circuit Notes
Most is situated in the North West Czech Republic, and it’s highest profile current event is FIA Truck Racing, and it has previously hosted round of the European Le Mans Series.
One of the more complex tracks in Season 4, it is also one of the least familiar of this year’s venues to RD in general, but one that I think will be visited often and regularly by the GTL community, as it scales so well across all car and performance types.
The first event hosted in the town of Most was a motorcycle event around the brewery in 1947, the first car event not until 5 years later. Many events, both motorcycle and car, were run upon improvised street layouts and continued until 1983, when the current Autodrom was completed. Built over the Vrbenský open cast mine, the mines contours are readily recognisable in the current circuit layout, and the grass slope favoured by spectators.
RDHGP is using the Chicaned layout, which dramatically alters the first half of the lap, to try and keep the cars together as much as possible.
The first corner chicane is a unique challenge this season, being much slower and tighter than Melbourne, guarded by sawtoothed kerbs and walled by very high - and very hard – tyre barriers.
Once through there (which we all hopefully will be as long as drivers do not get too selfish) the track opens out into a gently curved, flat out section, which ends with some tight, risk/reward esses and a downhill hairpin. The esses, if taken well, are key for a good laptime, but it is very easy to slip over into “too aggressive”, and then they will cost you dearly.
Out of the hairpin there is another relatively long straight, with a curve halfway down that will reward a good neutral setup with a great exit into the second set of esses. These mark the beginning of the climb back up to the S/F straight, the highest point on the circuit. Conservation of momentum is key here, rather than point and squirt power.
The Race Director has some notes for drivers. Please see the track map above for location of Race Direction note:-
· T1R + T2L – the first 2 corners are a very tight, fairly narrow and very well guarded chicane. This type of corner is always viewed as an overtaking opportunity, but to make it worthwhile, you’re going to need to actually get through it. The classic line is approaching on the left of the track and sweeping across the apex, while people attempting to overtake will generally go in narrower to shorten the line. The result of these two differing approaches combined with the profile of the corner means that the people taking the classic line may not be able to see people trying to overtake up the inside. Because of this the Race Director has ruled that it is entirely incumbent upon the driver attempting the overtake to do so safely, as they will be behind going into the braking zone, and be able to see the car in front. People who are hit by reckless overtaking into this zone are asked to file an incident report. This finding is only valid from Lap2 onwards.
For Lap 1, there will not be enough room to enforce this as traffic will be high in this area. Again, I will not be posing a non-overtake rule there, but also again, if you suffer from an overly aggressive, or even overly hopeful, piece of driving from anyone, you are urged report it. If people wildly overestimate the braking performance of their car, and their cold tyres into T1R, or expect people to just get out of their way (even though they have nowhere to go) and cause a pile up, you will face a penalty.
· T4L, T5R, T6R, T7L - The Front Esses. Most has the normal multi coloured kerbs that we see more regularly than the Glen’s White banks. These are deemed part of the track, but as always anything beyond the kerbs is deemed illegal. With the reduced size of these kerbs, the “two wheels inside the white lines” rule of thumb will see you in good stead. The front Esses are approached at high speed, with limited braking reference points. Because of this, it is easy to overshoot and go off track in the first part of the Esses. As cars are already manouevering at high speed through this section, and because you will most likely be rejoining near the entry for the second part of the Esses, you must make sure you re-enter the track safely. Let people past rather than trying to force your way out onto a crowded track.
Incidents, Investigations and Penalties
After round 2 there are currently no outstanding Incidents or Investigations, but there are a few Penalties being levied.
2 no-show penalty infractions are being levied after the suspension of the original no-shows:-
Simon Bacon
Stuart Neal
These will be carried until Round 6 when they will be rescinded. If the drivers have not responded by that time with remdial action, they will gain a second infraction and be removed from the League.
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 Distribution is as follows (double for the 200km event):
P1 - 25 pts
P2 - 22
P3 - 20
P4 - 18
P5 - 16
P6 - 15
P7 - 14
P8 - 13
P9 - 12
P10 - 11
P11 - 10
P12 - 9
P13 - 8
P14 - 7
P15 - 6
P16 - 5
P17 - 4
P18 - 3
P19 - 2
P20 - 1
1 point for fastest race lap (not double on 200km event)
1 point for qualifying on Pole (not double on 200km event)
Welcome back to the 2009 RDHGP S4. After a disappointing (in terms of connectivity issues) Watkins Glen event, I very much hope to get back on the metaphorical track with Round 3. It won’t surprise any of you to know that I was really quite mortified by the issues we had at the Glen, and slightly disappointed in some reactions even though I did what I could to give everyone the best possible chance of a race. I know it was frustrating, and you have my apologies, but matter how serious and pompous I make these briefings, it is still just a game. We should never lose sight of that, no matter how seriously we take it.
As it turns out, it might be the provider’s recent server relocation that was, and still is, at fault. This in turn is meaning that concurrent events might be out until further notice (basically, only 1 event per server at any one time). I will keep you all posted the status of the situation. On a slightly more positive note, the qualification laps (in both sessions) were pretty much impeccable with regard to the Inner Loop cutting.
Looking up rather than down, I personally had a better (more fun) race at the Glen than at Melbourne (mirrored by some comments I received), possibly because of the one shot quali format we ran which mixed the grid up a little. I also had some positive feedback about that from several drivers. Accordingly, I will consider that for future seasons.
With that post-mortem out of the way, we turn our attention to RDHGP’s first visit to Europe this season, in the shape of the Czech Republic’s Autodrom Most.
Circuit Notes
Most is situated in the North West Czech Republic, and it’s highest profile current event is FIA Truck Racing, and it has previously hosted round of the European Le Mans Series.
One of the more complex tracks in Season 4, it is also one of the least familiar of this year’s venues to RD in general, but one that I think will be visited often and regularly by the GTL community, as it scales so well across all car and performance types.
The first event hosted in the town of Most was a motorcycle event around the brewery in 1947, the first car event not until 5 years later. Many events, both motorcycle and car, were run upon improvised street layouts and continued until 1983, when the current Autodrom was completed. Built over the Vrbenský open cast mine, the mines contours are readily recognisable in the current circuit layout, and the grass slope favoured by spectators.
RDHGP is using the Chicaned layout, which dramatically alters the first half of the lap, to try and keep the cars together as much as possible.
The first corner chicane is a unique challenge this season, being much slower and tighter than Melbourne, guarded by sawtoothed kerbs and walled by very high - and very hard – tyre barriers.
Once through there (which we all hopefully will be as long as drivers do not get too selfish) the track opens out into a gently curved, flat out section, which ends with some tight, risk/reward esses and a downhill hairpin. The esses, if taken well, are key for a good laptime, but it is very easy to slip over into “too aggressive”, and then they will cost you dearly.
Out of the hairpin there is another relatively long straight, with a curve halfway down that will reward a good neutral setup with a great exit into the second set of esses. These mark the beginning of the climb back up to the S/F straight, the highest point on the circuit. Conservation of momentum is key here, rather than point and squirt power.
The Race Director has some notes for drivers. Please see the track map above for location of Race Direction note:-
· T1R + T2L – the first 2 corners are a very tight, fairly narrow and very well guarded chicane. This type of corner is always viewed as an overtaking opportunity, but to make it worthwhile, you’re going to need to actually get through it. The classic line is approaching on the left of the track and sweeping across the apex, while people attempting to overtake will generally go in narrower to shorten the line. The result of these two differing approaches combined with the profile of the corner means that the people taking the classic line may not be able to see people trying to overtake up the inside. Because of this the Race Director has ruled that it is entirely incumbent upon the driver attempting the overtake to do so safely, as they will be behind going into the braking zone, and be able to see the car in front. People who are hit by reckless overtaking into this zone are asked to file an incident report. This finding is only valid from Lap2 onwards.
For Lap 1, there will not be enough room to enforce this as traffic will be high in this area. Again, I will not be posing a non-overtake rule there, but also again, if you suffer from an overly aggressive, or even overly hopeful, piece of driving from anyone, you are urged report it. If people wildly overestimate the braking performance of their car, and their cold tyres into T1R, or expect people to just get out of their way (even though they have nowhere to go) and cause a pile up, you will face a penalty.
· T4L, T5R, T6R, T7L - The Front Esses. Most has the normal multi coloured kerbs that we see more regularly than the Glen’s White banks. These are deemed part of the track, but as always anything beyond the kerbs is deemed illegal. With the reduced size of these kerbs, the “two wheels inside the white lines” rule of thumb will see you in good stead. The front Esses are approached at high speed, with limited braking reference points. Because of this, it is easy to overshoot and go off track in the first part of the Esses. As cars are already manouevering at high speed through this section, and because you will most likely be rejoining near the entry for the second part of the Esses, you must make sure you re-enter the track safely. Let people past rather than trying to force your way out onto a crowded track.
Incidents, Investigations and Penalties
After round 2 there are currently no outstanding Incidents or Investigations, but there are a few Penalties being levied.
2 no-show penalty infractions are being levied after the suspension of the original no-shows:-
Simon Bacon
Stuart Neal
These will be carried until Round 6 when they will be rescinded. If the drivers have not responded by that time with remdial action, they will gain a second infraction and be removed from the League.
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 Distribution is as follows (double for the 200km event):
P1 - 25 pts
P2 - 22
P3 - 20
P4 - 18
P5 - 16
P6 - 15
P7 - 14
P8 - 13
P9 - 12
P10 - 11
P11 - 10
P12 - 9
P13 - 8
P14 - 7
P15 - 6
P16 - 5
P17 - 4
P18 - 3
P19 - 2
P20 - 1
1 point for fastest race lap (not double on 200km event)
1 point for qualifying on Pole (not double on 200km event)
