2018 RD Bathurst 1000GT Information & Sign Up

[RustyDriver00]

My first race on RaceDepartment and my first one with Deltec Racing Team as well. First of all I would like to thank the organizers @Matt Le Gallez @Daiman Patel and broadcasters @Joseph Wright @Paul Glover for this cool event. I’ve really enjoyed it. Although I gave some commentators a hard time with the pronunciation of my name

I enjoyed some of the battles I’ve had. Especially with @Shawn Jacobs, we were really close for almost 20 laps or so. Almost all of the battles were very clean. Sometimes I was quoting Vettel though. (Blue flag blue flag)

I would also like to congratulate @Yuri. Because of him, we were all in a multiclass race. Outstanding performance. Too bad he couldn’t find a teammate anymore.

Thanks @Cameron Sansano and @bigcatfish80 for coaching and welcoming me in the team and @Sweet Thunder for letting me join Deltec

Agree! Had some amazing battles today and you drove excellent!

When it was 4,5,6 and 7 all running in a line it was freaking brilliant, good clean racing all round. Witchwood really made me work for it

 

[Paul Glover]

Agree! Had some amazing battles today and you drove excellent!

When it was 4,5,6 and 7 all running in a line it was freaking brilliant, good clean racing all round. Witchwood really made me work for it

It was great on the stream.

 

[Paul Glover]

Although I gave some commentators a hard time with the pronunciation of my name

This is where I struggle, big time!

 

[Pieter-Jan Claeysens]

This is where I struggle, big time!

Next time, you may call me PJ, though. Itns a bit easier I guess

 

[Paul Glover]

Next time, you may call me PJ, though. Itns a bit easier I guess

You got it PJ!

 

[jimortality]

Well I was watching this at work yesterday and although I didn't hear everything, ( I do have to do some work lol) I didn't hear anything untoward in the commentary. I thought it was lively and entertaining and enjoyed the racing. I hope the guys that were upset do race again as you were all part of a great race. As someone said in chat, drug test for Yuri!!! my goodness, I struggle to concentrate for 30 mins let alone 6 hours! Well done Yuri!

PS CAN WE START A BOBBY PENNINGTON FAN CLUB??? We loooove the accent!

 

[Simon Marshall]

Thanks to the staff and fellow competitors for an enjoyable event, I won’t say too much what I think about a team with one member as it seems petty, but it’s not a club event, would the same apply if there was a prize of a large some of money? Anyway I never ended up doing a stint, work was overwhelming me this last couple of weeks and never got the seat time to make me competitive, the Ferrari not being my favourite it was always going to be a challenge, Luckily my team mates were competitive.

I’m really disappointed in @Yuri .... but only for not peeing in his seat, does he not take this seriously? I’m sure any of us in the lead would have been committed enough to manage it.

 

[Yuri]

I'm a bit disappointed to see people say I shouldn't even have started. I contacted staff before the race and we decided a penalty for breaking a rule would be fair. I think I had a big disadvantage having to drive by myself after having 4 years of high class endurance racing it's a shame if you feel otherwise. Also the setup was made for 3 people and not just for me if that changes anything.

I for one am convinced that if @Alen Terzić would have been able to drive he would have put shame to my pace in the 2nd half of the race

 

[Simon Marshall]

and we decided a penalty for breaking a rule would be fair.

I dont think anyone is upset with you @Yuri . Its just some folks are expecting a higher standard from the organisers. I'm not saying its wrong but there is a balance between sticking to the rules and maintaining a friendly club atmosphere, some folk may have to adjust where RD sits on this scale.

 

[Yuri]

On another note, if anyone wants to try the Porsche or wants to try to learn something from the way we setup the car feel free to try my setup.

It's made to be stable into corners to brake late into T3/4, the dipper and forrest ellbow while still having a pointy car for the top of the mountain's high speed corners. I added some rake with a soft rear end to have traction out of the slow corners which helped a ton when it started raining.

I don't think the setup has any special trick with it, just feels like a well balanced set to me.

 

[RustyDriver00]

One final thing I would like to say is well done specifically to @Matt Le Gallez you did an amazing job mate, and it is thanks to you we all got to take part in what was overall a fantastic event!!! Keep up the good work!!!!

Also of note, god damn you were quick on dry tyres in the wet.

Also to @Yuri what a drive!!! From qualifying to the actual pace you ran in the race was amazing, a truely mammoth performance, regardless of peoples thoughts on the driver swap, no one can down sell your performance out there, truely impressive. Congratulations!!!

 

[PaulH]

I was one of the viewers on Twitch, really enjoyed the race, the commentary team always keeping it entertaining I don't think RD would have had a quarter of the viewers without the commentators
Well done Yuri on an excellent performance for so long in the seat

 

[Fabio Cangioli]

It was my first race on RaceDepartment, let me say it was so much fun!

Thanks to organizers, all driver and teams, I had great and fair battles on track.

Being on soft tyres I had a good pace on my first stint, then Stefano had to drive as long as possible with the fuel, he was frustrated when he lost time with a double stop and go for speed limit in the pitlane, but he made a good job overall and he is on his really first races on rF2.

We also waited a bit too much to go for wet tyres, but that helped me in the 2 final stints with no splash and go needed.

Roberto and Francesco (on his second rF2 race) had some bad luck, a disconnection in the first hour did not help them either, but they had fun too.

Congrats to the podium and of course to the winner, you were on another planet with that Porsche!

 

[Will Mazeo]

Oh and btw, if we have one of these events again, it would be nice if people realised this wasn't multiclass (except for Yuri ofcourse) and normal blue flag rules apply. I felt like Vettel quite often.

Would be nice if people lapping consider the track, this one when you are up in the mountain is not easy to let people go. People lapping made it way more dangerous than it should be. Not everyone of course but a few sure did.
The most notable one was Yuri lapping in a wet track... close call when I was getting out of the way just 10 meters ahead. You guys put your own race in risk more than you imagine. Of course the slower guys will be blamed instead.

 

[Pieter-Jan Claeysens]

I also want to thank @Christian Moreau for being a class act after the race. Came in to our TS channel and apologized for an ‘exciting’ manouvre. Great attitude

 

[Jonatan Åcerclinth]

1stly, having raced (and seen Yuri race) Alen previously I can safely say that he wouldn't have been much, if at all, slower than Yuri in terms of pace.

In regards to the admin side, the one thing I would possibly suggest (as a fellow admin at another site), if this kind of situation happens in the future, make sure that you post what the decision is before the race so that no-one talks without knowing what is going on. It would seem that many are angry with 2 things, that Yuri raced on his own and that there didn't seem to be a penalty for doing so.
Now that we know that the admins talked with Yuri and they decided on an applied penalty, which equals to a driver swap (and the other 20 seconds or there about for the WC break) there is no need to be angry for the "no penalty" thing.
Now we also know that they would most likely have won on pace anyway so all is well


In terms of RMI and my own race:

Also a thank you to Daiman who came into the RMI channel to appologise for a Qualifying incident we had. That is not something I'm not used to have so that was a nice surprise

I ended up being the setup creator for the team. I tried to create a setup that would work for all of us but mainly be easy to drive considering it's Bathurst. I've raced in other 1000 milers at the mountain and once I created a setup that was quick and we retired after 45 laps. The other time I created a setup that was easy to drive and we climbed from the high 20's to the mid teens by the end of the race.

We also decided that I should start with no real reason apart from me having had the most practice out of us.

The Race got underway and the opening laps was a struggle. I couldn't find my momentum, mainly because of traffic being in the way of how I drive, and our setup weren't very quick down the straights. We had also decided on running 1 boost for my stints to try to save a pit-stop if we could.

Made a few misstakes early on, ended up on the marbles at the top and lost the position to Magnus in the ME Corvette and then ran wide and held up another driver out of the last turn which the end of it was caught on the broadcast so decided to let him by.

I was finally able to settle into the race in 14th position after around 12-14 laps and put my head down and started to lower my lap times into the 2.06's that I should have been running since the start of the race.
Slowly I started to close in on the guys in front as their tires started to go and my own were starting to get into the zone. I've always seemed to be decent on the tires and it seems to be the same here. At the same fuel level Roy were reporting having 65% left on the tires I had 76%

Towards the end of my 1st stint I had a nice little lap time battle with @elkrack2 and I closed in about 8 seconds in the last 6-7 laps before I pitted.

For the 2nd stint I felt that the Mediums I had decided to fit for the opening stint hadn't worked the way I had hoped to decided to come home to where I live and fit the Hards. Came out of the pits in 12th or 13th I believe and put my head down as I had @Bobby Pennington and (I think) @bartolaf Bart Zweerink who were battling and I wanted in on the action.

A few laps later I had passed Eduardo who I think ran just a bit too long and I witnessed a very forceful pass by Bart on Bobby and tried to take advantage of it which was also caught on the broadcast. It was a "let's see if he leaves me the room here" but backed out when I saw he wasn't going to do so, it's not worth a crash in the 2nd hour of racing.

Worked on Bobby for a couple of laps, holding back a lot over the mountain as to not run Bobby off the road. Finally the chance appeared when he had a lackluster run out of Forest Elbow and I was able to put on one of the bravest moves I've succeeded with, thanks for leaving me room on the inside of the kink Bobby and I think I left you enough room on the outside so all good. A really nice battle there mate, yet again!

Sadly Bart had scampered away in the meantime so I settled in to my grove once again and slowly pulled away from Bobby but lost a few tenths every lap to Bart and CO ahead of me but I knew they were most likely running a higher boost setting.

Towards the end of the 2nd stint we were discussing weather I should do a 3rd stint. In the end you heard on the broadcast what the reasoning was and as I had Hards on I went for fuel only and exited the pits with the phrase "Now **** it" as I had settled in tires and a head start, entering the pits in 5th and coming out in 7th which was very nice.

Took it a bit easy in the very early laps getting to know Boost 2 with the car and then got my head down and without trying were running very comfortable 2.06.9's with full fuel and then even more comfortable putting the car into the high 2.05's as the fuel were burning away, I'm in the beliefe that I would have been close to the 2.04's on low fuel with worn Hards, I just love Hards on race cars. I started out in rF1 racing the Touring Car Legends Ford Mustang GT so that may explain why I feel home on Hards, that car can only handle Hards in Racing situations AHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA....

Sadly, as I were going hell for leather and with about half my 3rd stint still in the tank, the rain came and we decided as soon as the rain went from 5 to 6% in-game that it was time to switch tires and that we may as well switch drivers as well, so in Daniel went, sadly in the trickiest conditions I've seen in rF2 so far.


Sadly Daniel had troubles with his wheels, it disconnected twice I believe and not giving him the feedback he needed for the conditions. He did a great job keeping the car alive thorugh without major damage and was able to hand the car over to RMI Big Boss Roy who did a brilliant job closing out the race for our team, climbing from 18th to 14th through consistency and a bit of good tire strategy

All in all, a very enjoyable experience and I look forward to racing you all in next years RDLMS along with my RMI mates

Big thanks to the organisers, broadcasters and massive Kudos to the lappers and lappees for behaving well, Yuri for his impressive run, in RMI we were saying it was unbelievable, and all those I had battles with, Bobby in particular

 

[Bobby Pennington]

PS CAN WE START A BOBBY PENNINGTON FAN CLUB??? We loooove the accent!

Oh noooooooo. My accent must be worse than I thought. I try not to sound too Southern, but I guess I just can't disguise it enough, but I've found a solution

Thanks for the mention. I love hanging out and doing this stuff with all of you

 

[Paul Glover]

totally agree with @Celtic Pharaoh . today having to listen to this commentating in a negative way and then to have a member @Celtic Pharaoh and @JoelK ridiculed who i have found to have the greatest respect for others and true ambassador's of sim racing have also made me decide i am no longer interested in department

As being the co-commentator and a big fan of @JoelK if any of my comments offended him then I apologise, that's is never my intention. He is a valued member of this community and we have had many jokes together in AC club races. He has helped me countless of times. I just try to call things as I see it.

 

[Paul Glover]

I was one of the viewers on Twitch, really enjoyed the race, the commentary team always keeping it entertaining I don't think RD would have had a quarter of the viewers without the commentators
Well done Yuri on an excellent performance for so long in the seat

We talked some absolute rubbish yesterday, by the end we were a tad delirious!

 

[Celtic Pharaoh]

First of all, I appreciate the effort the staff and the broadcasters have put in. I also agree with the criticism towards the broadcasters.
On the other hand, I couldn't disagree more with the things said about Yuri in the winning car. I happen to be on the same eSports team as Yuri's teammate, Alen and he was genuinely planning to race. I know Yuri tried to find a replacement up until the formation lap. It's not like he intended to race this by himself when they signed up. Furthermore, driving a 6 hour race alone, in mixed conditions, has as many advantages (the ones Tariq mentioned) as it has disadvantages. Fatigue, not being able to check laptimes to know what tires are best etc etc.
Then the argument that was mentioned in the stream chat that Yuri gained 30 seconds by not having to do driver swaps; João and I spent 12 seconds in the pits (if you don't count our meme at the end). We were actually planning to do just the one driver swap at first. Which would only be 6 seconds. I'd say this makes Yuri's 10 second penalty fair. And finally, I was on Discord voice with Yuri and he ran off to the bathroom on his first pitstop. Lost him about 30 seconds.

Not much to say about our race. Me and João spent a little bit of time to make a setup that felt alright to drive but didn't do any in-depth testing regarding fuel and tire strategy. After my first double stint on mediums, we were in third. João had some issues and lost time. When I got back in the car just after the first shower started, I made up quite a bit of time, I've always enjoyed wet weather racing. I also made the move back to slicks at the perfect moment and gained more time back. However, I got over-confident on the thin dry line and started hitting wall after wall and eventually, the car was so damaged I was 4,5 seconds down on my pace and started making more mistakes because I was annoyed with myself and the crappy setup I made with 20 laps practice
Still enjoyed the whole event tho!

Anyway, thanks again to the staff for setting this up!

Oh and btw, if we have one of these events again, it would be nice if people realised this wasn't multiclass (except for Yuri ofcourse) and normal blue flag rules apply. I felt like Vettel quite often.

I would recommend that you revise your mathematics before questioning my logic. Yuri made 6 pitstops, each driver change in a pitstop takes 5-6 seconds, so when you multiply 5 seconds * 6 pitstops, provided a driver change occurs at every pitstop, you get 30 seconds. And if it turns out a driver change takes 6 seconds, then it would be 36 seconds.

What you failed to understand was that I questioned the organisers' decision to permit Yuri to race when it states in the original post:

Driver swap mandatory.
Each team needs to perform at least one (1) driver swap in the course of the race.

Like I've said before, Yuri did an amazing job to go as quick as he did in qualifying, to qualify a whole second faster than everyone else and to follow this with his ridiculous pace and consistency over such a long period was impressive and definitely very special. He did an amazing job that very few would have the mental fortitude and endurance to achieve.

If you ask any of my team mates, they will tell you that I've always said to them that Yuri was going to run away with this and he did.

And in regards to your comments to blue flags, every driver had their own race so before you think "get out of my way" consider that other teams may be in a close battle with others. You're not the only one on the track.

I'm not going to engage further in conversation because quite frankly, I don't really care about what happened anymore and made my mind up already. Rules are either applied or they aren't and in this case, they weren't. Simple as that.