RDRC S2 - Round 7 - Hokkaido Rally (30/31st May)

[Ondrej Kapal]

I have to say big NO! The last special superstage is totally mad and I really dont know where you got the idea to add it here... the first one was OK, I had wet tyres and it was almost like a tarmac... but on a dry gravel tyres it was like on ice... totally not drive able. if I loose the rally just because of this I lost 50 seconds... the management didnt make this well...

anyway, I am first in EU4, really not kidding

thanks all for the rally!!!! everyone! it was the longest and hardest I ever made, 2 hours almost... jesus, I am tired

 

[Nigel Atkins]

i think some people should practice more, after all this is a league

 

[Ondrej Kapal]

I wouldnt say that if the SSS was gravel mod... but I dont see any argument for applying tarmac rally with restriction to gravel tyres

 

[Ondrej Kapal]

just by the way, I had a lot of rounds around the sss but I didnt expect gravel tyres there...

 

[Senad Subasic]

You could've picked tarmac tires for the gravel stages. Compromise.

 

[Nigel Atkins]

the stages where posted ages ago long enough for everyone to realise they would be driving SS18 with at least dry gravel tyres on a tarmac surface and you wait till after the rally to complaine lol.

i found it a hard and frustrating stage but this is a league and it should be challening at times, i practiced with all 3 compounds of the gravel tyre, doesn`t take long on such a short stage

 

[Ondrej Kapal]

 

[Yann Laprevotte]

Am I the only who found this event a tad too long? 1h20 of racing sounds a bit excessive, especially on those slow and technical stages playing with your mind.

Okay-ish rally for me otherwise, first half was very clean, the other one not so much, several spins and 1 CFH+car stuck in 4th(fortunately 1-2km before assistance) at SS10. Not a big fan of those stages otherwise, they feel really frustrating, too slow for my taste.

 

[Eckhart von Glan]

not my best night I'm afraid.
checking the weather before the start I was quite happy, had expected worse.

s01 just one minor off when I totally missed a call
s02 three small offs, one of these I hit a tree sideways, temp warning afterwards and co-driver door missing
s03 rally can be sooooo brutal: did an ok run till the motor dies on me (remember that lil crash in s02?) with all of 200m to go, downhill so I let it roooooooll. The car stopped in its tracks about 15m from the finish and the morons clapping and waving never even bothered to give me a wee shove (made a mental note to crash into them next time round) DNF

s04 one 180 degree spin, rest okish
s05 two offs and a gearbox warning that certainly set my nerves on age after what had happened earlier
s06 gearbox made it to the finish but my nerves were a little frayed indeed
s07 what misery, stuck in the red and white 5 bloody times

s08 felt like a good run, still about 20 secs slower than the other players?
s09 one visit to the woods early on f.. up the steering, later missed a call and found a river I had never found before (probably the same one Warren found himself in), bad run and car utterly broken afterwards
s10 just nursed it home

s11 my first totally clean run of the night, felt good
s12 same river again at 1.9km from finish, pacenotes must be very dodgy there
s13 missed spectators narrowly early on but game decided I had hit them, later a nice flip unfortunately straight into another group of bystanders, felt like a cold blooded killer
s14 not my best run - but what the heck

overall another great event, too bad I was so unlucky on s03, never quite got the concentaration back after that. thx RD and admins for another fun night of gaming. No points scored this time for sure.

 

[Ondrej Kapal]

the stages where posted ages ago long enough for everyone to realise they would be driving SS18 with at least dry gravel tyres on a tarmac surface and you wait till after the rally to complaine lol.

i found it a hard and frustrating stage but this is a league and it should be challening at times, i practiced with all 3 compounds of the gravel tyre, doesn`t take long on such a short stage

I am sorry I didnt know you are practicing England covered by gravel with tarmac tyres and Finland covered by snow too...
I just look at the list of stages and I practice them, there is no need to use not suitable tyres for casual human. Why? There isnt written it is gravel mod. Why gravel tyres then? I am pretty busy because of end of semester and I dont have time to play with not reasonable compounds, there was no NOTE about the change from normal to weird mix.... if there was a note about that the SSS will be with gravel tyres I would shut up - was there? No... and I just have enough after 1 hours and half of racing just to discover that the last stage is total fail

 

[Senad Subasic]

I am sorry I didnt know you are practicing England covered by gravel with tarmac tyres and Finland covered by snow too...
I just look at the list of stages and I practice them, there is no need to use not suitable tyres for casual human. Why? There isnt written it is gravel mod. Why gravel tyres then? I am pretty busy because of end of semester and I dont have time to play with not reasonable compounds, there was no NOTE about the change from normal to weird mix.... if there was a note about that the SSS will be with gravel tyres I would shut up - was there? No... and I just have enough after 1 hours and half of racing just to discover that the last stage is total fail

I don't understand where the problem is. Stages are listed, services are listed, surfaces are Normal unless stated otherwise. It's all there, and it's all been there for the past 3 weeks.

 

[Ondrej Kapal]

In every other league, if there is some (lets say) special corner where you should have take more attention, it is noted in some track guide (for us it is the first post of this topic).. you can see it everywhere, even in RDHGP... it was here too for some special stages, for example SSS where arent pacenotes in description was noted they arent there, so we have to practice...

THIS mix you choose is unusual too, so it would be fair to mention it that the tarmac stage will be on gravel tyres - I am all the time expecting this kind of communication to guys who have less time or are stupid or arent that brght to realize. I expected when is listed tarmac stage I will have tarmac tyres, I was counting on it and practicing due to it with tarmac (wet/dry) tyres...

I am hard against but if you will provide some similar stage with similar conditions this is thing to change... but the best is exclude them all

 

[Warren Dawes]

i found it a hard and frustrating stage but this is a league and it should be challening at times, i practiced with all 3 compounds of the gravel tyre, doesn`t take long on such a short stage

Actually Nigel, it did take me a long time, I spent more time practicing / testing this Stage than all of the others combined. :tongue:
I tried all compounds, multiple set up changes, but nothing seemed to get me anywhere close to the car handling with tarmac tyres. Eventually, I gave up practicing etc and just decided to crawl around it and try to finish it.
I suspect that it may have been a bit better to drive a smaller S2000 car here, but the larger WRC 08 car was a real handful, especially when you only need to breathe on the throttle and it leaps away on you. This was one time when a good hydraulic / variable handbrake would have been handy, but for me it was a case of repeatedly tapping the handbrake and trying to gently slide the rear to get it around most of the turns. To make that worse, with wet gravel tyres, it was indeed like driving on ice. Maybe there was a suitable setup for this one, but I never found it.

Just to make it even more of a challenge, I had to drive SS14 with damaged steering, it was a nightmare but somehow I finished it.

 

[Dariusz Swiderski]

... the first one was OK, I had wet tyres and it was almost like a tarmac... but on a dry gravel tyres it was like on ice... totally not drive able.

I find this very strange, wet gravel ok and dry slippery

I didn't like the tarmac stage too but Nigel and Senad are right, it is clear to know you would have to drive it with wrong tires from the info post. Unless you didn't even tried the stage before and then it come as a surprise it was a tarmac surface. It was for me with my practice run but then i knew what to expect when it mattered...

 

[Rick Bamford]

I've got to admit I am suprised by the reaction to the Portugal SSS and the tyre choice. It is a hard stage yes, but in real life it is run with gravel tyres and I didn't think there was an issue with doing it here.

 

[Warren Dawes]

I find this very strange, wet gravel ok and dry slippery

It must be something to do with the tyres supplied with those fancy French Citroens then. :tongue::tongue:

 

[Dariusz Swiderski]

Actually Nigel, it did take me a long time, I spent more time practicing / testing this Stage than all of the others combined. :tongue:

As soon as i tried this stage i knew nothing will work so didn't waisted any more time on it. Its such a short stage you ain't going to gain any significant time there, its just better to tiptoeing it..

 

[Rick Bamford]

.


Here in Australia if the rally is classed as a GRAVEL rally you have to run GRAVEL tyres, even if the stage is ALL tarmac. It is the same as in the Monte Carlo, some times you have to drive on snow and ice with tarmac tyres, thats rallying.

I am listening to what everyone is saying and I guess i won't include this type of situation again even if i think it is the right thing to do.

 

[Nigel Atkins]

I am listening to what everyone is saying and I guess i won't include this type of situation again even if i think it is the right thing to do.

ok maybe SS18 wasen`t the best chouise for running gravel tyres on tarmac, but please do use this kind of stage surface mix again, its adds a bit more reality to the event.

 

[Norman Biscuits]

With respect, I did quite a lot of practice for this event, but I just ran the stages off-line on Normal.
This issue wouldn't be obvious to anyone who hadn't taken the time to run a mock rally beforehand.
Neither did it occur to me when looking at what was facing us on the posted itinerary.

To be honest, the first time I realized what was going on was when I was looking at the weather after joining the session - I didn't even consider tyre compounds before that point, which, obviously is my own failing. Noted for the future - though, as posted above, flagging this up for peoples attention might have been helpful.

Naturally, I drove what I was given - I'm just saying it didn't feel like it belonged in this rally. Embedded in the middle of all this high speed, narrow twisty gravel was some "comedy option" super special on completely the wrong tyres. It ruined the flow of a great event.

But it's just an opinion.