AC [US SERVER] GP2 @ Mugello - Monday, August 11th

[JeffL]

Holy cow sat on the couch to rest for a minute, good night. Just woke up, really sorry guys hope your having fun.

Family member going in for surgery tomorrow, so the abarth race is up in the air for me, crazy week.

 

[Chris]

Thanks guys, that was awesome!

These cars are a hoot because of the tyres. The rate at which they drop off means you really have to drive strategically. Loved every minute of it!

 

[Chris]

@Fred Locklear

Almost shut my eyes on that one! Phew!

 

[Chris]

Schumi-Barrichello:

 

[Ryan Ogurek]

Wow... that was brilliant fun!

 

[Justin]

The races definitely delivered. Great fun.

 

[Ashley Cowan]

Yeah very good event and well organised dealing with the need accommodate the tyres.
Afterwards I gave up AC to pursue other interests. I went cold turkey.
Only lasted for 4 hours. Man the F1 car at Mugello is fun and a lot of work. Driving hard like Ryan said helps but I think I still need to find 3 seconds..

 

[Michael Young]

Yeah very good event and well organised dealing with the need accommodate the tyres.
Afterwards I gave up AC to pursue other interests. I went cold turkey.
Only lasted for 4 hours. Man the F1 car at Mugello is fun and a lot of work. Driving hard like Ryan said helps but I think I still need to find 3 seconds..

While driving hard can give you that satisfying flying lap, I don't 100% agree that driving hard is better. Driving at around 90-95% of your potential is the way I like to approach things. I mean like my lap times weren't stellar, but the amount of time you save by not spinning makes up for not having supersonic laps. Also another note that with rhythm is that your driving just flows, and you end up stringing faster and faster laps the more you get comfortable.
Like for example today, all my lap times were above the 1min 35s in the race but by being consistent you just end up in a better race position just from others mistakes.

 

[Ryan Ogurek]

Yeah just to clarify when i say they harder you drive the better it goes, I don't really mean to drive it on the ragged edge. Just that the more you push it, the better the car responds. The trick is to do that and manage to stay in your comfort zone. I think thats why I am so much faster with these cars than others, I am just more comfortable with it and i can tell how hard I can push it. Usually I'm struggling just to keep my line.

 

[zAmboni]

I was kinda frustrated in the first race. Twice the car spun on me without really doing anything. I wasn't hitting the gas or brake, the back end just went out (probably like Chris did after the first turn in the one race). The second race went much better. I increased the tire pressure a notch and maybe that helped, or it may just have been the extra grip. I did bobble a couple of times and that cost me ...of course it had to happen in a place where I went WAY off the track and couldn't immediately rejoin.

In the second race, I sorta went conservative to save the tires, but I really don't think that helped because even with my version of conservative driving I am probably trashing the tires! With all of the stuff that happened in the back, I actually thought I had a lot more distance to the ppl in back. Next thing you know, I started to see Chris in the mirrors! I held him off for a couple of laps (ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED!), but he got me in the main straight. I moved over a bit because 1) I knew I couldn't hold him off forever, and 2) I didn't want to have a massive crash and end up in back .

After Chris got by, I kinda went a little conservative again to see if I could stay in second, but somewhere in the mix there, I forgot how to drive the car. I was all in the wrong gears and then caught a little grass and then next thing you know second was gone .

It was fun afterwards messing around with the other cars. I can undertsand what Ryan is saying about driving the cars harder, because I felt if I could just go a little bit faster, the downforce would kick in and I could get through some of the corners faster, but I could never do that right. The Ferrari was a pain in the ass though.

 

[Ryan Ogurek]

I'm finding that the F14T is almost as fast as the W05... but it is soo much scarier to drive that fast that its a total mind game. I can manage to get good times going race pace with race fuel and med tyres, but as soon as I try to go for a hotlap, that little voice of doubt springs up in my mind and causes havoc.

 

[Ashley Cowan]

Without writing a novel I guess the "inspiration" I took from Ryan on driving hard is epitomised by Mugello's Arrabbiata 1 & 2 (Double Right hander round the back)
You may recall Top Gear when Richard Hammond spent a day driving lower formula cars and eventually built up to the F1 car. They said to him that he could not drive the F1 car hard enough to have it work for him (tyres and brake temps).

I can't remember my gearing but you can take the corner in "say" the top of 4th gear with the tyres at 85 degrees and feel on the edge. Oooor you can go hard in the preceding 2 corners, have the tyres at 102 degrees, bury the right foot to gain downforce and take the corner mid 5th gear and be really on the edge.

With that attitude you probably gain 0.6 secs in lap time... but most importantly you gain so much satisfaction.

Then Chris's favourite mantra of practise allows you to do that same thing at 90% concentration like Michael is saying.

 

[Ryan Ogurek]

Arrabbiata usually accounts for a huge time gain or loss for sure, in the F14T I am taking both 1 and 2 in 7th gear, full throttle almost the whole way. First time I pulled it off it gained me 1.5 seconds.