F1 Considering Sim Racing to Test New Ideas

[Enzo Fazzi]

Well... a very small number or none of the F1 games or cars (open wheel overall) everywhere simulates the loss of downforce when close to other cars and they usually generates a lot more draft than real life, this creates close racing online.
I think the only car I saw that effect was the CART Factor/Extreme mod

I think the effect is pretty strong with high downforce cars in rF2

 

[Big_Mama]

If you implement more show elements to something you will just end up having a show. And nobody wants a show...

 

[Helmut Skrdla]

Say FIA wants to test out how a new rule change works. So they have to implement it in a game. A game takes multiple years to make and not every developer is good at programming the race rules.

I'm not active there anymore, but last I checked RF2 for example can do race rules via DLL/Plugin, which is open for modding.

Different qualifying formats, different tire/fuel/pitstop rules and designs, you could get into RF2 within a week. AC and AMS would have some limits but could also "prototype" cars that for example have more downforce or lower downforce.

The idea makes a whole lot sense because people racing online or watching online races generally have a clear opinion about what draws them to motorsports.

 

[Ernie]

"It is not that far removed from the simulators the real teams use. A lot of the F1 teams use software generated from the games industry to give a more realistic environment for their driver simulators. There is scope in that area as well, which we are exploring."​

Oh, now i know why the new 2017 F1 car has won the recent Assetto Corsa poll. Ross and his friends are the ones to blame.

 

[Marc Collins]

Speaking during the outstanding Formula One demonstration event on the streets of London today, Brawn opened up to the "massive potential" of eSports and sim racing to trail new ideas and regulations, before introducing them into the real life racing series.

Hopefully the actual quote was to trial!

If Bernie was less of a dinosaur and could actually use a computer himself, this concept could have been introduced years ago. It makes total sense and also opens the door to more innovative sim-real racing collaborations. F1 will, of course, want to figure-out how to promote themselves and "the show" in the process, but that's no different than any other race series.

Just like smart devs successfully use a beta and/or enthusiastic user audience to test new features or work kinks out of highly complex systems (e.g., Reiza, iRacing), others do not and act more like F1 has in the past. They know best; it's their IP; users/fan are secondary to the process...until things get so bad that if affects the bottom-line and then maybe wake-up to the fact that change is needed.

 

[ears]

So...he wants to implement...
- 15 min practice, 15 min qualy, 45 min race
- public server madness on race start
- restart race X times until server admin and parents are on first 10 positions
- option to kick drivers during race just for fun
- driving assist on or off based on admin sadism
- option to swear each others while driving (racial bad jokes, moms jokes, etc)
- option to park on the most dangerous areas of the track just for fun or waiting an opponent to punish
- etc, etc
.

And an internet forum so all the people who participate can go there to whinge.

 

[wowbagger]

I wouldn't get too excited. F1 has always been highly protective of it's IP/image rights. The only F1 license for the past 7 years had been sold to Codemasters, while the lawyers seemingly went after websites hosting mods for other games.

So unless the New Regime has come over all open and generous, I don't see this meaning anything to most sim racers, apart perhaps from those who play Codie's version of racing games.

Granted, it might be fun to try out new formats/gimmicks/whatever for a brief bit in that kind of game. But only as a short term distraction.

 

[bsmooth]

Problem now it seems for all types of racing is downforce, and too much of it. Just take F1 for example, it leads to all manners of little wings and winglets, and very strange looking cars. The teams put on a type of downforce accessory and then weeks or months later the F1 rules ban it. They also have so many things sticking off cars there constantly coming off and there a hazard to all other cars racing at the time.
Then theres the problems of passing other cars and being in and out of the slipstream, which cause loss of downforce.
The advancements in engines is great, but some downforce needs to come off, and actually lets the driver make some decisions, let them burn the tires off and suffer the consequences, but make passing a possibility without the aero issues.
Another example of a type of aero were Jim Hall's cars that must rate pretty high up there as far as downforce goes. To quote an article in Jalopnik
"Chaparral's ingenious but strange race cars, with their six-foot tall wings and vacuum suction motors, were first mocked, then feared, then finally banned for being too advanced."
Too advanced, almost where we are now with F1 I'm afraid,.
KISS is the way to go to make it better for the fans and drivers me thinks.

 

[wowbagger]

The problem is that people get hung up on numbers.

"These cars aren't faster than last year's cars! "

"Lap times are much slower than 2004! "

Then it becomes difficult to step back and say who cares about lap times, the racing is much better when you ditch all the aero doodads. I was watching some 07-08 races this week and the cars looked like strange little beetles. I was thinking "how could they ever let them get so ridiculous looking".

The cars this year would be fantastic if they had limited the front wings and barge board business more than they have. They definitely took a step in the right direction with the tires and mechanical grip, but they need to address the aero issue.

Of course then Adrian and Dietrich will take their ball and go home...

 

[Kakusso]

Online testing of rules could be combined with an official online F1 championship with events taking place just before or just after the real ones, including qualify and race in a true sim not in the simcade Codemasters. Virtual champions would get interesting prizes and an offer to join a real F1 team. Since the virtual candidates are a lot more than any number of candidates from normal path to get to F1, it would be easier to bring real talents to the sport. And real talents is what F1 is lacking right now. From the twenty drivers maybe only 25% are real talents.
All that would cost almost nothing to the F1 organization but would be a major drive for the sport.

 

[Strikeman]

Why not give them a standardized ground effect floor then get rid of all those extra aero pieces that fall off all the time and restrict them to have a smaller simpler front and rear wing? would that work?

The problem is that people get hung up on numbers.

"These cars aren't faster than last year's cars! "

"Lap times are much slower than 2004! "

Then it becomes difficult to step back and say who cares about lap times, the racing is much better when you ditch all the aero doodads. I was watching some 07-08 races this week and the cars looked like strange little beetles. I was thinking "how could they ever let them get so ridiculous looking".

The cars this year would be fantastic if they had limited the front wings and barge board business more than they have. They definitely took a step in the right direction with the tires and mechanical grip, but they need to address the aero issue.

Of course then Adrian and Dietrich will take their ball and go home...

 

[Kakusso]

Why not give them a standardized ground effect floor then get rid of all those extra aero pieces that fall off all the time and restrict them to have a smaller simpler front and rear wing? would that work?

Ground effect floors have proven to be very dangerous; if for some reason the car hits a bump in the middle of a turn the graund effect disappears abruptly and the car is projected.

 

[melanieuk]

Cough! Cough!
Assetto Corsa F1 Silver Stone using Marcel Pfister Mixed Reality technique.

 

[DaVeX↯]

And this is why a lot of fathers painted their first born room...green...

 

[darkelf1]

 

[Kasti]

Ground effect floors have proven to be very dangerous; if for some reason the car hits a bump in the middle of a turn the graund effect disappears abruptly and the car is projected.

Ahhh.. now I know why there were banned in F1 - FIA was forced by the mercs! They hate wing cars since 1998 Le Mans...

Indy cars and LMP`s still use this bad, bad technology.... Oh they can overtake without DRS zones... and the LMP are running in Le Mans without flying around... no that´s really a bad way of racing....

Only the mobile skirts on the old 70ies wing cars caused that kind of crash, when they got stuck in false position - but wing cars don`use that skirts since decades.

The new indy car even got massive decreased front and rearwing downforce and much more floor downforce for better races and the drivers are not unhappy with this, they like close fighting.

 

[Will Mazeo]

Ahhh.. now I know why there were banned in F1 - FIA was forced by the mercs! They hate wing cars since 1998 Le Mans...

Indy cars and LMP`s still use this bad, bad technology.... Oh they can overtake without DRS zones... and the LMP are running in Le Mans without flying around... no that´s really a bad way of racing....

Only the mobile skirts on the old 70ies wing cars caused that kind of crash, when they got stuck in false position - but wing cars don`use that skirts since decades.

The new indy car even got massive decreased front and rearwing downforce and much more floor downforce for better races and the drivers are not unhappy with this, they like close fighting.

And due to that IndyCars have been flying pretty badly, the car have kind of a hanford device effect to help passing on ovals and on road/street course they nearly can't pass without the push to pass despite being near spec cars. They added holes to the floor to stop the cars from flying and that cutted downforce too, some drivers did complain about it. It's unkown the effects of more downforce via ground effect in the 2018 cars, I guess we'll only find at the Indy 500 next year or if the car crash during the tests. You can't also forget that Indycars are slower on top speed in road courses.
LMP1 "battles" well... the cars coast a lot every lap to keep the fuel under the limit, what is also a kind of BoP. And new gen didn't fly... yet. Past gens have done that. A car won't fly every time because it has a ground effect but if it has to happen with the F1 under current rules... it could get ugly very quickly

 

[Kasti]

Then let´s get rid of all aero things and wings and have cars like the Lotus 49 or 312 or 917/512 - build with carbon chassis of today tech - they will be safe, and they have no problem with overtaking another car. And we will reduce curve speed massivly, good for the classic tracks, no need for this foolish tarmac zones. Drifting will perhaps come back. Racing back to the roots.

 

[Will Mazeo]

Then let´s get rid of all aero things and wings and have cars like the Lotus 49 or 312 or 917/512 - build with carbon chassis of today tech - they will be safe, and they have no problem with overtaking another car. And we will reduce curve speed massivly, good for the classic tracks, no need for this foolish tarmac zones. Drifting will perhaps come back. Racing back to the roots.

Less downforce and more power would be ideal but "unfortunately" this rewards talent and create bigger gaps, something quite a lot of racing managements dont want nowadays.

 

[InsaneOzzie]

Can't see why Liberty Media are looking to Sim-racing for a cure to there ill's, the reasons for the fall in F1 prominence is easy to pinpoint............Bernie "THE DICTATOR" Ecolstone.
IMHO, dump DRS, dump hybrids, reduce aero, reduce tyre choices Hard, Medium & Softs is all you need and make it so they can run whatever compound they want, increase mechanical grip, bring back fuel stops, reduce tickets costs, remove bitumen runoffs in favor of sand traps, sack Tilke, and introduce ballast. That should get some true competition back in F1 for a start, don't know about therest of you but I'm sick of one team dominating for x amount of years till new regs or tech create a change in the hierarchy. Ferrari did it, then Red Bull and now it's Mercedes.........BOP, BOP, BOP.