Rookie Drivers

[Decenten]

I got the game 24hrs ago and have just completed my fourth race at Charlotte in the Mazda. In these 4 races many crashes happened that shouldnt have. The first race, I got a stop go for jumping the start (my own reaction at the cars jumping due to lag). After serving the penalty, I caught up to a lap car within half a lap but whilst trying to lap this car, I got taken out due to him weaving off the racing line causing me to crash. After getting towed back to pits, I came out after 2 minutes and 45 seconds of repairing my badly damaged car only to come out behind the same car who nearly wrecked me again at the same corner doing exactly the same thing. I thought that by having the pay-by-the-month feature would allow for better racing from drivers who can actually hold a line. Honestly this is worse than the crap that happens on F1 2013

 

[Bakkster]

I just got wrecked by a guy in star Mazda driving the wrong way on the track

Rookie mistake, or driving backwards trying to cause issues? If it's the latter and you saved the replay (you should always save replays) file a protest.

 

[Chronus]

Time trial doesnt work as sr only goes up a bit at a time

Actually, it does work. You have to complete each TT without any INC's. And repeat that a few times. Unless something changed in the past several months, that's how lots of us do when we get hit by "id-io-ts" and our SR suffers.

If you have the replay, file it away. Not guaranteed something will be done about it, but it may teach the fella a lesson.

 

[Greg Woods]

Never understood how that happens. Doesn't iracing tell drivers they are going the wrong way?

 

[Bakkster]

Never understood how that happens. Doesn't iracing tell drivers they are going the wrong way?

Yes, and will DQ a driver who drives backwards too far, but you get a couple hundred feet before it does.

 

[myvracelog]

problem with ir is the masses don't act like Gentlemen. So important to get there 1st, even at all means needed even ruining all others experience on the track.

Try joining a good club or league, you will be better off. (even then, beware of the buddy system.) Also don't believe those that will tell you more money you spend by moving up the the amount of idiots will dwindle because that could not be more far from the truth.

Only difference is you will have spent more money to race against idiots. As well as feel more robbed.

So if you stick with IR look for a well structured club would be the best bet in my opinion. They do exist.

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

You mileage may vary, but I'm class B atm and I rarely find people being disrespectful on track, people are generally very careful into turn one and most won't act like d's imo. Ofc there's gonna be the occasional rotten apple, but I must have been lucky cos they are very rare to see for me.

 

[Decenten]

You mileage may vary, but I'm class B atm and I rarely find people being disrespectful on track, people are generally very careful into turn one and most won't act like d's imo. Ofc there's gonna be the occasional rotten apple, but I must have been lucky cos they are very rare to see for me.

Do you run the GT3 series. I heard that that is pretty brutal

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Do you run the GT3 series. I heard that that is pretty brutal

Occasionally, not done a awful lot of races there, but it's the most popular road series on iRacing, goes without saying it's also where you'll find most d-bags. Haven't played in a good while now but I don't think much has changed on that front.

 

[Bakkster]

Unsurprisingly, the less courteous drivers tend to flock to the most populated series. They don't want to put the effort in and just want to jump in to quick, easy races. If you have the time to put into a league, you can put it into a less popular series where most drivers are interested in making the series' community better, and have a good race more often than not.

 

[jwa]

I'm a newbie and have been racing mazda cup. after reading some of the horror stories, I've been impressed with the racing. no big turn one wrecks or anything bad, at least around me. maybe I've just been lucky. so far I haven't run into anyone. doing my best to be clean and not ruin anyone's race. so far so good.

 

[Gpruitt54]

Over the Christmas holiday I purchased a 12 month subscription to IR (iRacing). IR is currently running a 1/2 price sale on all of its subscriptions. I ran lots of laps in the Rookie Mazda MX5 Cup car. By the end of the holiday weekend, I entered my first race. I qualified 3rd. I got clipped in a 1st lap turn 3 crash. Ended up finishing 7th out of 12. For my first time out, I will accept that finish. Boy-o-boy, it was lots of fun!

IR gets top marks in my opinion for the way it rewards and penalizes drivers for contact with other drivers and off course events. I feel this model prevents drivers from using their cars like pumper cars. Or does it. My holiday racing went very well and the other drivers seemed like they wanted to be there for racing. I hoped this is the way it is all the time on IR. From what I am reading here, not everyone comes with the same attitude. Yes/No?

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Over the Christmas holiday I purchased a 12 month subscription to IR (iRacing). IR is currently running a 1/2 price sale on all of its subscriptions. I ran lots of laps in the Rookie Mazda MX5 Cup car. By the end of the holiday weekend, I entered my first race. I qualified 3rd. I got clipped in a 1st lap turn 3 crash. Ended up finishing 7th out of 12. For my first time out, I will accept that finish. Boy-o-boy, it was lots of fun!

IR gets top marks in my opinion for the way it rewards and penalizes drivers for contact with other drivers and off course events. I feel this model prevents drivers from using their cars like pumper cars. Or does it. My holiday racing went very well and the other drivers seemed like they wanted to be there for racing. I hoped this is the way it is all the time on IR. From what I am reading here, not everyone comes with the same attitude. Yes/No?

I feel that most people do, and I've had the same experience as you have, I really really enjoy the racing I get with iRacing.

 

[Bakkster]

In general, the worst experiences are the lower splits, since the worst drivers make their way to those grids. Outside of that, there are always going to be crashes (it's racing,it happens) but it's still some of the cleanest pickup racing you'll find anywhere. It won't beat a league for cleanliness, but it's definitely more convenient.

 

[Bernd Graf]

I would stick with it. iRacing is generally rewarding if you've got nerves of steel. Most of us just want to get out on track and have a blast regardless of mistakes,but iRacing's game philosophy kind of prevents this early on. Try as best you can, read all you can about performance driving, and iRacing should become fun as you leave the rookies behind.

 

[Thomas Wilen]

Theres some great threads on the iR forums about surviving and getting out of Rookie low splits. Theres a comprehensive list here you can reference: http://members.iracing.com/jforum/posts/list/1354827.page#2946101

 

[Fritz Anker]

Theres some great threads on the iR forums about surviving and getting out of Rookie low splits. Theres a comprehensive list here you can reference: http://members.iracing.com/jforum/posts/list/1354827.page#2946101

Wow. Thanks for this. Just joined yesterday taking on a 2 year deal for half off. Best value so thought why not. After getting a handle on well, everything took to a gaggle of MX-5 Cup Rookie races last night. And so far pretty clean. Saw some contact but that I would think is inevitable, and nothing that looked egregious. Finally found where to qualy ending up 2nd on the grid in my split but was turned around in turn 3. Clawed back to 5th and made a move on the inside to get 4th with the door being closed rather late... But, it has been great fun and easy to get racing. I have to hand it to IR, though. This is the closest feeling I've had to actually being out on a track.

Definitely will look at the optimal FFB settings too. Been an AC fan for so long, just don't yet have the road feel in IR yet. ...and as long as I can stop thrashing my tranny or blowing my engine thinking I can shift like an F1 car - things are looking up.

 

[Thomas Wilen]

Once you're done with the MX5 i can recommend the SRF (Spec Racer Ford) series for a fun car, nice driver community and clean (ish) racing. Usually very door to door racing in the top splits, which you will be in above 1500IR or so. The lower splits can be a bit of a carnage, but D4.0 and up licenses are allowed so that is expected, and the car can be a handful to drive fast if you don't bother to practice.
It's an open setup series, but don't let that discourage you, the top drivers and others put together and share setups and track guides for each week if you're not into setting cars up yuourself. I recommend checking out the SRF forums.

 

[Decenten]

The solstice is also very easy to drive and get out of D class

 

[Fritz Anker]

Once you're done with the MX5 i can recommend the SRF (Spec Racer Ford) series for a fun car, nice driver community and clean (ish) racing. Usually very door to door racing in the top splits, which you will be in above 1500IR or so. The lower splits can be a bit of a carnage, but D4.0 and up licenses are allowed so that is expected, and the car can be a handful to drive fast if you don't bother to practice.
It's an open setup series, but don't let that discourage you, the top drivers and others put together and share setups and track guides for each week if you're not into setting cars up yuourself. I recommend checking out the SRF forums.

Will definitely check it out. I actually messed around with the car in a test session at Lime Rock. The thing is a beast. Had a hard time at first trying to manage the balance - amazing turn in, but the back end was really nervous. Ended up getting the handle of keeping the back end more planted by tuning out my inner wimp by keeping the throttle down and being very gentle on the wheel. But it was a lot of fun to drive. I can imagine it is a real blast driving w2w at 9/10ths.

I'm definitely more a driver than an engineer. I know the basics but typically end up detuning the car had I just left it alone. Good to know they don't hold them closely.

 

[whaletail]

I got the game 24hrs ago and have just completed my fourth race at Charlotte in the Mazda. In these 4 races many crashes happened that shouldnt have. The first race, I got a stop go for jumping the start (my own reaction at the cars jumping due to lag). After serving the penalty, I caught up to a lap car within half a lap but whilst trying to lap this car, I got taken out due to him weaving off the racing line causing me to crash. After getting towed back to pits, I came out after 2 minutes and 45 seconds of repairing my badly damaged car only to come out behind the same car who nearly wrecked me again at the same corner doing exactly the same thing. I thought that by having the pay-by-the-month feature would allow for better racing from drivers who can actually hold a line. Honestly this is worse than the crap that happens on F1 2013

I'm getting ready to run my first Mazda Rookie Cup tonight, and in preparation (beyond reading/watching every conceivable resource) I've tried to readjust my entire mindset, and focus almost exclusively on being the most effective defensive driver I can possible be.

Although I may end up forgetting my entire gameplan the moment the lights drop, my intention is simply to avoid incidents, from 1x off tracks to 4x contact. To avoid focusing on lap time, I'm going to disable the delta bar, and enable the relative position (F3) box. Hopefully, I won't even be aware of my lap times until post race.

I'm even debating starting from pit lane, to remove any possibility of ensnaring myself in a T1 cockup.

Instead of the typical plug n' play multiplayer racing experience, I'm trying to view iRacing as a longterm, career-like experience. To that end, my time in Rookies is but a means to an end, and the perfect opportunity to learn as much as possible. I couldn't really care less if I win a race in the next 10 weeks, as my specific goals beyond SR
are pretty explicit: 1 - learning to drive smoothly; 2 - driving as consistently as possible; 3 - learning how to practice as effectively as possible; 4 - learning how to develop a proper racing line, establishing proper brake, turn-in, and throttle application markers; 5 - developing the muscle memory to consistently hit those marks; and lastly, 6 - earning the respect of other, more experienced members, learning as much as possible from them, and getting the hell out of Rookies. Hopefully, I'll then be able to begin using telemetry (through iSpeed) to find some lap time, begin to really develop my racecraft, and eventually compete for wins. For now, my biggest competitors are the myriad bad habits I've unfortunately learned all too well.

It probably helps that I'm not at all preternaturally fast (1:01.9 at LRP after 3 days of pretty committed practice) and can't expect to win any races worth winning until I actually learn to drive properly. Were I actually quick now, I doubt very much I'd be thinking of much more than the moment, and I'd likely be quite the on-track menace.

Abstractions aside, from a practical standpoint, I recommend watching Scott Hanley's 3-part "Surviving Rookies" series on YouTube. In addition to persuasively communicating that WE ARE AT FAULT for any avoidable incidents (and 98% of all incidents, including being hit from behind etc, are avoidable), he highlights the mindset and skills underlying defensive driving, and demonstrates both very effectively.

Although the concepts seem obvious, and the skills second nature, I learned more than I would have ever expected from the series. Moreover, everyone bemoans the rookie racing experience precisely because so few inexperienced racers are actually able to drive safely. Worse still, too many of us think we know, and can do it all when we really can't, and look to blame others when our problems are staring back at us in the mirror.

Sorry for the wall of text, but your complaint is an absurdly common refrain on the iRacing boards, and the solution lies not with everyone else, but ourselves.

Any incident that could've been avoided is your fault.

Henk