iRacing ChampCar 2021

Information about upcoming races, swap meets & shows

Moderators: MostMint, wxo, Fred32v, Basement Paul, ttamrettus

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MostMint
Posts: 2714
Joined: Thu Jul 21, 2005 12:11 pm
Location: planning a race

Re: iRacing ChampCar 2021

Post by MostMint »

Race 14 was at VIR North in the Jetta. With 3 races to go and the last FWD race, kinda figured this could be a strong result.

The practice race confirmed this. Qualified P5 of 18, was a bit wobbly at the start, but recovered to finish P4.

Between the practice and the race I was comparing telemetry with my friend Mark and saw I was putting in too much brake. I kinda wanted to firm up the pedal feel, and started working on the adjustments to achieve this. Well this uncovered a problem - my new pedals had twitchy input, and pressing the pedal to say 50% and holding it, the input from the pedal would slowly drop.

Quick research uncover there are other people having problems with their load cell in the Fanatec Clubsport V3 like mine. Grrr. This thing is only two months old. Switched back to the old pedals and did some practicing. Single lap times were the same I think I actually improved just a tiny bit.

Then the race came. I ripped off a good qualifying time and earned P7 starting grid spot. From there it went straight down hill and while I didn't crash I had an off and several slowdowns, along with inconsistent lap times and finished P17. Worst performance since race 4, and breaking a streak of five top 10 finishes. This also erased my points lead over the guy behind and we are now tied for P8 overall.

Worst part is that the parts I need are still not here and I have another race next Wednesday. I have a replacement load cell coming and a brake performance kit. The kit allows some adjustment on pedal firmness and reviews pretty much say you have to get it for these to work right. I have tracking numbers that say they will be here before Wednesday - we'll see.

Last Wednesday I did the practice race at Barber with the NC MX5. I qualified P3 out of 16. With limited practice my consistency was not good and I spun out three times including one with avoidable contact, ending up 11th. Last night I pulled out my old bag of tricks and made some adjustments which will hopefully help with consistency. I need to do better than 17th - mostly need to stay ahead of Charles K, and reasonably close to Mark K and Alex K if I want to stay in the top 10.

One last note: Fanatec won't sell me a spare load cell. Like only if it's broken. Well that is bad customer service. I'm in the endurance racing business and that requires spares. Can't see myself buying any more of their products.
[quote="Basement Paul"]Is that a mint rocketship on the hood?? :shock:
-BP[/quote]
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MostMint
Posts: 2714
Joined: Thu Jul 21, 2005 12:11 pm
Location: planning a race

Re: iRacing ChampCar 2021

Post by MostMint »

Race 15 was with the MX5 at Barber. Had a decent qualifying effort. I'm fighting to keep P8 in points I wanted a good race so put in a lot of practice. No amount of practice helped me avoid getting hit on lap 1 at the second last turn. Unfortunately the car was damaged and I had to nurse it all the way around as I was just past pit in. Filled it with gas, did fast repair and got back out. Somewhere near mid race I got to racing and after the pass I was trying to open a gap and put two off on exit of turn 1. Well I mismanaged the throttle and the car spun and hit the wall. No fast repairs left so I lost maybe 9 minutes getting it fixed. After that it was slow and I nursed it home 7 laps down in P23. Only 24 caps made laps. Worst finish since my second race ever in this league in May of last year. Ironically P9 in points had a bad race and I moved from a tie to ahead by 2 points. This race was dropped and I instead used a P17 from earlier in the year to count in my total.

Tonight is race 16. If I want to hang on to P8 I need to stay not more than one position behind Charles K unless he make it to P6 then I have to get ahead of him as the points spread between finishing positions is more than one at those levels. If Charles finish P16 or worse I will end up P8 since I have a drop race of P17 I can use if I have a bad race tonight, and his best drop race is P26.
[quote="Basement Paul"]Is that a mint rocketship on the hood?? :shock:
-BP[/quote]
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MostMint
Posts: 2714
Joined: Thu Jul 21, 2005 12:11 pm
Location: planning a race

Re: iRacing ChampCar 2021

Post by MostMint »

Well. VIR North and Barber ended very poorly. By some luck I just managed to hold onto P8 in season points going into the last race – by just 2 points over Charles K. Any chance of moving up disappeared over those two events.

Getting back into the street stock was rough. The brakes are awful – worse than I recall. Fairly quickly though I was one second faster than last year. The practice race was eye opening though, as the leaders were also one second faster! What was odd about practicing for this track was that my optimal was almost two seconds faster than my single lap best. There is some finesse in getting this car to turn I apparently occasionally had but could not repeat. Anyway going into the race I was sure Charles was going to be faster, and the only way I was going to keep P8 was if he made a mistake.

I was happy to PR with a 2:19.9 in qualifying, which ended up netting P10 start – not great. Didn’t matter though since lap 1 started off badly and I ended up spun out going into turn 7 and in P16. Totally my fault I drifted right and made contact with Tim (thank you replay). Sorry if I messed anyone up there. Fortunately the car was not really damaged so I went back to work. One by one people in front of me made mistakes and I started moving up. After not too many laps Charles spun exiting 16 and by the time he got up to speed he was 2 seconds in front of me, shifting points in my favor. He then closed in on Tim and Mark K, and eventually passed them, moving ahead of me in season points. Tim and Mark were racing hard so when I came up on them I chose to pit instead of work my way by. Surprisingly on pit exit I lost only 1 position in the standings coming out 12th.

I was a bit unprepared going into the pit. Once the pit stop cycle ended I had a 10 second gap on the car behind and had to work a while to maintain that til I guess his tires got really warmed up. During this time I figured out I short filled so I started saving instead of expanding the gap. I don’t practice this much and it is easy for me to screw up the corners by changing the entry speed and braking timing.

The next big turn happened when I passed Charles. It was an easy pass since he was stopped on pit road – unfortunate for him he sped on pit entrance. He was at least 24 seconds back when he went off the relative display so up next was finishing it out not screwing up, which included saving fuel.

From there on in it was just staying focused and maintaining the gap to the guy behind. With this long course and just 17 cars in the race I had a nice patch of open track. At 3 to go I knew I had enough fuel and switched out of saving mode. From there I finished it out with .7 gallons left over.

In 2021 I scored 334 points to get P8 for the season. In 2020 that result would have netted P5 in points. Improved pit strategy, load cell pedals, and some driving coaching from a couple of the top drivers really made a difference for this year.

Time for a break but I think before next season I’ll see what I can do to improve that iRating.

Video here - definitely lots of air time in this one for the Mostmint car: https://youtu.be/1wRtL34cW6w
[quote="Basement Paul"]Is that a mint rocketship on the hood?? :shock:
-BP[/quote]
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Fred32v
Posts: 1497
Joined: Thu Jul 21, 2005 10:31 am
Location: Munson, OH. retired

Re: iRacing ChampCar 2021

Post by Fred32v »

The MostMint #50 received a great deal of "on screen" time in this last race.
A nice come back after early trouble.
Finishing 8th in the Final points race had to be rewarding, top ten.
Fred32v
GMC Canyon Crew Cab Short Box 4x4 V6!
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