Porsche 904 test @ Donington GP / Interlagos - Thu 10th Sept

[Stuart Thomson]

Servername: RACEDEPARTMENT.COM
Class: Porsche 904 (download)
Track: Donington Park GP / Interlagos
Conditions: 15.00 race time
Practice: 20 min
Qualification: 10 min
Race: 15 laps
Notes: Click here to read the password and golden rules!

 

[Steven Palmer]

Donny: Had a race long battle with Glen which was fantastic, swapping position a few times and never much between us time wise, then on the last lap while in 3rd and sight of the podium looming I went way too defensive for the chicane, which left me way too slow down the straight, then braked too late and finally topped it off by pulling another gear pirouetting and letting Glen and Stuart through, gutted. Was a great race though on a track I like :good:

Interlgos: Just couldn't get to grips with the 904 around here. Maybe more time practising and finding a set up that suits me and it might have been a different story, but for me the 904 was horrible on this track.

Overall I'm on the fence about the 904, but that's not the car/mods fault just I think I need a lot more time in it to offer an opinion on it.

Cheers all

 

[Stuart Thomson]

It would be interesting to put it head to head against the Alpine, but I have a feeling it would be quicker.. Maybe something like Healey or Elan would be suitable?

Honestly, I think the 904 is quite deceptive. I suspect because the 904 is relatively benign in its handling, it can give you the impression that it's on the slower side.

I just checked the times for Interlagos, and most peoples quali were over a second quicker than Tusto's pole time during the league in the Healey (Sam's was about 2 sec quicker), in fact most peoples average race laptimes were also quicker than the Quali pole in the League, which itself was nearly a second clear of the rest of the field.

My best race lap time was about 3 sec quicker than my best laptime (quali) during the League race.

In a brand new car, with limited practice, I'd say that's a fairly startling difference.

 

[Nigel Atkins]

not to bad a night for me, had a few technical problems at the start with the game and TS which cut my intended practice time down.

was having a nice race at donno till i lost it at mcleans, then during practice at interlargos i had to put my lad to bed, then got a phone call and missed the start :at-wits-end:

 

[Stuart Thomson]

glad you got it up and running Nige :good:

Next time, if you let us know you'll only be a little while, we can extend prac for a few mins.

 

[Nigel Atkins]

glad you got it up and running Nige :good:

Next time, if you let us know you'll only be a little while, we can extend prac for a few mins.

thanks m8, i kind of lost track of time. i would have made the race with just putting my lad to bed, and i would have told the guy who rang me to go away but he owes me money, and hes supposed to be bringing it today lol :desire:

 

[Nigel Atkins]

ps. still got an issue with TS, no one can hear me speak when i fire up GTL, but if i minimize the game it works ok again

 

[Stuart Thomson]

Weird on the TS front

Unfort I'm no good with that stuff.

 

[Nigel Atkins]

yeah very strange, but i`m sure with some teccy help from the wizard i`ll get it fixed :good:

 

[Matt Crouch]

Spent most of practice still moving my seat around, going out for half a lap, moving the wheel etc. but I finally got an ok seating position just before quali. Then got an OK lap in quali, near the back but in the same second as the majority.
A couple of laps I held on but failed to keep up for longer than that. and spent most of it on my own, only seeing other names at the hairpin. Near the end of the race I finally started to catch Nigel after his mishaps, got very close but not close enough .

Second race I was more in the rhythm, decent third place quali. Good start... until T3 where I completely missed the 100m marker and went all the way on to the run-off, came back on with only one person behind me. Fairly soon caught up to Glenn and Stuart and managed to overtake both for 3rd . Led them round for a while, but I clearly didn't have the consistency as a small touch of kerb-related power oversteer sent me off in a mini tank slapper in to the wall. Cost me around 10 or 12 secs so I lapped on my own for the rest of the race to take 5th

p.s. car was good. Muchos fun to drive

 

[Ulli Haus]

:snail:Last night's race once again proved that things never go as you expect!

When reading this, be aware that up to the solid line below, there may be some "*****ing" :messed: however, the second part doesnt :victory:

1) Donington: I knew this track from chasing the Elan through it numerous times... and I quite liked it. Thus, I was looking forward to running it with the Porsche. 1st time on this track with this car and I downloaded Sam's setup right away (cause I was a little late to practice and Sam's setups always helped me to hit good laptimes). Wasn't so thrilled with the car's behavior when accellerating out of a turn... wheel spin most of the times. Since I knew I was short on time, I was impatient and kept going back to the garage and altered Sam's setup. This went on like this until I changed so many parameters that I had my own perfect setup which would then provide me with the utmost pleasure imaginable throughout the race (keep this in mind when I come to this part
Perfect start.... maybe a little tooooooo perfect as our server thanked me with my second stop & go penalty as I let of the clutch a little too early.

Same song as last time .......... :fwd: (waving at all the "ghosts" surrounding me cause I was ALOOOONE AGAIN :victory


About Me, myself and the Porsche (incl. my own little setup):

I did a great job MEEEESSSSSIINNNG UUUUUP SAM'S work :freaked-out::freaked-out::freaked-out:
I had no idea that one could create a setup that makes you struggle at any time and in any situation of the race! I could't keep her steady, not on a straightaway, not in corners, not anywhere! I had no grip or whatsoever... the car was sliding, no matter how fast I was going. I kept loosing control when lifting, I kept loosing control when acc. out of a corner, and as I said even on a straight line. This car was everywhere but where I wanted it to be:neutral:


This was the first time (since I joined the club races) that I had no fun at all. Regardless of how much desire I had to leave the race due to my ****ty setup, I forced myself to hang in there since I caused this myself and might as well suffer the concequences. Frustrating experience on the track I used to like so much. Yet, I knew that this wouldnt 've been that way if I hadn't created my own magic setup (in a hurry).


2) Interlagos: This time, I did not change a thing on sam's setup. Did my laps only to discover that my times were way off the average lap time! Since my frustration was still present from Donny, I decided to switch to Auto clutch and using the SW 4 shifting as well. And my laptime improved right away by 2 seconds. Unfortunately I was still not near your guys average lap time. I then kept combining clutch, shifter, SW shifting ... at random on the track. The most difficult part with all set to manual was the entry into the chicane right after the finish line. This incline (or was it decline) and short distance to brake (in order to achieve a decent laptime) was what caúsed me most of the troubles when ruinning all set to manual.

However, I drove the race most of the time with auto clutch and flaps shifting, which did not seem to improve my driving either since I wasn't used drving like this. :neutral:


All in all, last night's race experience left me behind with lots of frustration and desperation doubting my skills which I thought I had acquired.

_____________________________________________________________

This morning, I took the Porsche 4 a spin again (since I did not want to believe that I was such a lousy driver, a thought which last nights events had established). I used the default setup, and even with the default setup, I was 3 seconds faster than my fastest laptime at Donny last night (I had a 1:53.400)! :victory::victory::victory:

But, I am still not content with what happened there last night! On the other hand, I regained my faith and got rid of most of last night's frustration. :fwd::victory:


What is it about these two tracks??? Are they quite technical, or what might it be that unlike most of the other tracks, where I was able to join the field while racing, on these here, I was laps behind!?

 

[Matt Crouch]

Donni is a pretty hard track to get the line right. I felt like I must have been driving a different car for most of it because I just couldn't keep up even though my line didn't seem too bad (until I caught up to Nigel when I took every opportunity I could to mess it up) (and I was using sam's setup)

 

[Stuart Thomson]

Please vote on the "Save the 904" poll

 

[Sam J Simpson]

The 904 is now one of my all time favourite cars for GTL, the first version to come out wasn't I hasten to add, too slow, the car needs to be driven hard to get the best out of it, time off the throttle in corners will send you/me wide but get on it early, and progressivly, and it will fire out of a corner like a goodun.


Race 1 at Donington was excellent for me, Knut had the beating of me on single lap pace but because of his sound probs I was able to take the win easily in the end, as Matt has already said though it is a track where mistakes, even the slightest, can loose a whole lot of time over the lap. Knut was quicker some places and I was others which meant, until he lost sounds, we were less than a second apart the whole way round, hard race until then.

Race 2 at Interlagos was where I thought I'd struggle a bit, again it's a track that amplifies tiny mistakes into huge gaps and I am not really comfy round it but the 904 let me get away with any wee faux pas with relative ease, my bigest mistakes were over-braking into corners and getting a bit squirrely on entry. The fast uphill double apex right hander in the middle made up for it though, full 4 wheel drift through it almost every lap had me grinning like an idiot, managed to keep Knut at bay, it wasn't easy, by about 1 second for the majority of the race and won by a 2+ second margin, with our best laptime being rediculously close it made the win so sweet.

Thanks to Stuart for the organisation and Knut for the close company :victory:

Sam

 

[Ulli Haus]

Now, when I read my post again,

I feel like apologizing 4 all this whining! ​

This event reminded me that I still have a long way ahead of me (also because I want to keep using the manual settings:male-fighter1
and that patience and practice is crucial.

You guys are great and have helped me lots of tímes already to improve my driving skills. I will keep it up and do my best to learn from the masters :highfive:

Thank You :smile-big:​