How many of you actually care about SR and ratings

Greg Carr · Feb 26, 2012

So I kind of had a rough day today as far as my safety rating and irating. I entered a race and started from pit road and all I wanted to do was cruse around and finish, didn't care if it was last place. So I ended up catching a group of cars and I stayed behind them for 10 laps and with 1 lap left some guy lost it in the grass came back across the track and t-boned me in the door. So I lost .2 of a point on someone else's mistake. So I was curious when you guys race do you care about the SR and the irating?

Glenn Petersen · Feb 26, 2012

I don't race official races. Only league/hosted races. The racing is better anyway.

Bob Luneski · Feb 26, 2012

Glenn Petersen said:
I don't race official races. Only league/hosted races. The racing is better anyway.

Ditto! I have a lot more fun racing with people I've come to know over a period of time than racing again with a random set of people with random racing "styles".

Yoeri Gijsen · Feb 26, 2012

I stopped caring about my Safety Rating long ago. There was a time when I tried hitting A4.99 and I succeeded a couple of times, only to drop back again after trying to win races or go fast. The point is, there really is no reason for me to worry about it. Sure, it's nice to have A4.99 on your license card, but not having it does not effectively prevent me from driving anything. Considering I do not even drive A-class cars, instead focussing mostly on B-class series, I really wouldn't be bothered if I lost my A-license. However, not caring about my SR hasn't resulted in dropping back to B, so I guess I can do whatever I bloody well please on track without effectively being penalised. The result is that I can focus on the actual racing and that my SR jojo's between A1.00 and A4.99 continuously.

iRating has been more of a mission to me. I've been a jojo there too:

2011 S2: 2000 - 3200
2011 S3: 3200 - 2600
2011 S4: 2600 - 4600
2012 S1: 4600 - 3600 (so far)

I've started to care less about it as well. Every time I choose a new car to do a season with, I start pretty much from zero, which means I can't "live up" to my iRating the first couple of weeks. Since losing it always goes in bigger portions than winning it, there isn't much progression. Additionally driving the GT cars in the Prototype and GT Challenge kind of makes you susceptible to iRating loss due to the small field sizes and random appearance of fast and slow drivers to decide whether you will lose massive amounts by finishing high or winning a little by being up front. As long as I stay above 2500/3000 I'm pretty sure I can compete with the top guys. Nothing to worry about, though I would like to have those 5-9K awards at some point.

Jonathan Johansson · Feb 26, 2012

After reaching b class and being able to drive anything i wanted i started worrying about my crappy irating instead

Hampus Andersson · Feb 26, 2012

After getting out of Rookie i never bothered with SR or iRating.
I knew that eventually it will go up if i just stay clean so now i´m at A 3.05 and it´s all good.
Run mostly leagues now anyways.

Greg Carr · Feb 26, 2012

I guess I don't really care about my SR but the Irating is more of what I am trying to improve. I am pretty low usually floating around the 1600-1700 mark, now I am down into the 1400s. I did a indy car race at road america, coming to take green, the lane I was in took off and the line to my inside just stayed running the pace speed. So the leader in my lane decided to slam on the brakes before he got to the start finish line thinking he would get a black flag and I ended up running into the second guy in line because he to slammed on the brakes and caused a huge wreck before we even go to the line. If I start from pit road to avoid stupid crap like that I end up finishing the race usually but my Irating takes a big hit.

I would like to find more leagues to race, I am really liking the MC league here but it looks like it might die soon with lack of participation. Any other leagues you guys would recommend?

Eric Estes · Feb 27, 2012

Along with Glenn, I run 90% hosted races these days. I'll run special events and the odd Star Mazda or Indy Fixed raced, but that's about it. That said, one league I've been interested in runs the Lotus 79 - it uses the 'official' races and sets your team by iRating - which is one thing that might cause me to try and bring it up out of the cellar.

Linus Broström · Feb 27, 2012

where do you guys find all those hosted races and league??

Greg Carr · Feb 27, 2012

Eric Estes said:
Along with Glenn, I run 90% hosted races these days. I'll run special events and the odd Star Mazda or Indy Fixed raced, but that's about it. That said, one league I've been interested in runs the Lotus 79 - it uses the 'official' races and sets your team by iRating - which is one thing that might cause me to try and bring it up out of the cellar.

Are you looking at the "Classic Team Championship" that Frank Herfjord runs? That league looks really cool. The Radical, Lotus and the Skippy are the only cars that I don't own at the moment for road cars. The Lotus looks fun but I don't know how many people race it so I never picked it up. I am really only concentrating on the official Prototype and GT Challenge (fixed) series at the moment. I am in division 4 so I am kinda far down on the rankings but I want to finish in the top 25 overall. I am racing the fixed indy car series to try and get max Iracing credits this season so I can get the Cadillac or Motegi when they come out.

Linus Broström said:
where do you guys find all those hosted races and league??

There is the "hosted'" option on your main Iracing screen, that brings you to all the available hosted sessions at that moment. I am guessing most leagues have there own forums away from the Iracing forums. Here on RD they have a multi class Corvette and Ford GT series going on right now. I don't know if its still open to sign ups or not because we have already done 2 races. I like how RD has setup the race, where you race only the ones that are in your league. The Classic Team Championship for the Lotus 79 looks like you use the official race as your league race so you could get other people in there that are not part of your league.

Yoeri Gijsen · Feb 27, 2012

The Lotus community is quite friendly and so is the general attitude on Lotus servers. Herfjord's championship runs on Saturdays. The official series are on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. I posted a graphic in the iRacing forum showing official races per week from last season. It should give you an idea about participation and when to race.

Here it is for 2011 S4

Marc Good · Feb 28, 2012

During Rookie and class D my main concern was SR, although I had some nice races with side by side battles - but in close situations most of the time I backed up to not gamble with my SR.

It is not that important to me anymore, but still I very much care for SR and iR. To me it is what makes me actually practice before entering races.. the only time before iRacing that I practiced that much before races was during leagues. Online pick up races were so much just for fun, that I picked a fun car/track combination and hopped in. Not that I was a danger to anyone - but I never was on the pace.

Today I still don't have time to practice enough and I don't concentrate on just one car, so I'm still slow.. but at least these two ratings are nice incentives to at least participate in nice fields with close racing.

Xosé Estrada · Mar 8, 2012

I care about iRating, but not to the point I race the races or series where I know I can win more, I just race what I like to.

SR I only care to be in B class to be able to race the GT & Prototype.

Bram Hengeveld · Mar 8, 2012

I don't give a damn about my irating to be honest and the same for my safety rating since I became A licensed. Just trying to have fun while on track (or off track

)

Greg Carr · Mar 9, 2012

So I thought I would be sneaky and get above 4.00 with my SR. I was at 3.97 so I did a tt and got it up to 4.46. Then I entered my race and got 8 incident points 4 came when I bumped the car in front of me after he spun in the chicane at Spa, and my SR fell to 4.26. I don't think I will be above 4 for very long

.

Yoeri Gijsen · Mar 9, 2012

You can generally suffer 4 incidents per race even at around A4.00. It's a very, very long way down to B, so you'll really have to try if you want to lose that A-license.

Greg Carr · Mar 10, 2012

Yoeri Gijsen said:
You can generally suffer 4 incidents per race even at around A4.00. It's a very, very long way down to B, so you'll really have to try if you want to lose that A-license.

I don't see myself falling down under 2.00 that is a long ways down:oops: . I am going to work on my iRating and see if I can get it above 2000 by the end of the season. The series I am racing are the HPD/Corvette/Ford Gt (fixed), Indy Car road (fixed) and the F1. The F1 I like a lot but I am not comfortable in a crowd with it yet so I start from pit road, next race I will start on the grid. Indy car I race just to get my participation credits and the Corvette I am racing for points and hopIng to win my division.

Linus Broström · Mar 11, 2012

i dont care about my SR as long as it stay well clear of 2.00. at 1.00 i've heard u will drop a license level so that's why. (dont know if that is correct though)

my iRating i do care about since that is what decides what kind of drivers u go up against in ur next race. but as long as i keep them good finishes coming there is nothing to worry about. but the iRating is what keeps me going even if i have to spen some 10 minutes in the pits for repairs.

Greg Carr · Mar 12, 2012

Linus Broström said:
i dont care about my SR as long as it stay well clear of 2.00. at 1.00 i've heard u will drop a license level so that's why. (dont know if that is correct though)

If your SR drops below 2.00 at the end of the season you will be dropped down a licence. If it falls down below 2.00 just get it back up before the end of the season and you will be fine.