[Wally]

But the BMW M3 E92 fits into the mid-range lap times, so that would be no good as a "slow car".
"Still with dick in the GTE I was able to beat him running the z4 s1". That says it all, doesn't it? We'll have a trial race as you suggested, and we'll see how it pans out. If the BMWs are too slow, I'd scrap them and have 3x of the slowest Elises.

[marty]

The z4 s1 is ok its just the standard as it only has an option for street tyres, makes it a bit out of place I think as every other car does have semi slicks including the z4 s1. So the z4 is the slowest in a straight line with the worst cornering ability and also has tyres that are far worse then all others, the s1 being on the semi's gives it a chance against some of the slower cars but at Imola the WR times Evora GTE is 2:00.185 vs Z4 standard at 2:08.246 with tyres that also will go to pieces in half the time making it even slower after about 5 laps.

[Wally]

OK, the stock car may not fit.

[Dick Forrest]

OK, the stock car may not fit.

Except for guybrush..

[Bird]

Oooh, I like that milky way skin!

[Wally]

Based on the discussion in the personal testing thread, I have the following, which is more closely aligned to how the ballast actually worked in netKar:

Here is a range of cars that gives a good spread of average lap times (include the BMW M3 and 1M in place of the Z4s, as per Marty's suggestion). The gap shows the gap to the previous car, just to show that it's a good spacing of times, with no two cars being too similar to another (does fall off the cliff a bit with the Z4, but it doesn't matter, as we shall see). The Cumulative column shows how many seconds that car is slower than the baseline, the Exige 240R s3.

 

Car	Avg	Gap	Cumulative
Exige 240R s3	118.81		0.00
Evora S S2	119.27	0.46	0.46
Exige Scura	119.62	0.35	0.81
Exige S Roadster	119.96	0.34	1.15
M3 E92 Step 1	120.53	0.58	1.73
Evora S	120.88	0.34	2.07
Exige 240R	121.06	0.19	2.25
BMW 1M	121.56	0.50	2.75
Elise SC S2	122.31	0.75	3.50
Elise SC S1	122.80	0.49	3.99
Elise SC	123.34	0.55	4.54
Z4 E89 S1	124.83	1.48	6.02
Z4 E89	126.49	1.66	7.68

Now if we look at drivers' fastest race laps (this is from Monza), we can see how much slower each driver has to go to be on a par with the slowest (Gap to Slowest). Using that gap as a lookup into the table above, you can work out which car will make Guybrush roughly the same speed as Imperious - the Elise SC, which will slow him down by 4.54 seconds (actually leave him a little bit quicker than Imperious - but that's his payback for being skilled). Do this all the way down the list, and the lap times will be much closer. I would base it on the average of your fastest laps over the round. The baseline car that everyone would start in then is the fastest - the Exige 240R s3.

 

Driver	Fastest Lap	Gap to slowest	Car
Guybrush Threepwood [Achilles Heels]	112.324	5.66	Elise SC
Marty [Achilles Heels]	113.235	4.75	Elise SC
StanDaam [XGN]	114.332	3.66	Elise SC S2
Wally [TKO Racing]	114.469	3.52	BMW 1M
Ysu [TKO Racing]	114.611	3.38	BMW 1M
Freezer [XGN]	114.800	3.19	BMW 1M
Rob [Team MRT]	114.863	3.13	BMW 1M
cramjet [CramDick Racing]	115.277	2.71	Exige 240R
Glen73 [Projekt Rennesport]	115.294	2.69	Exige 240R
Rolz [XGN]	115.321	2.67	Exige 240R
Bacchulum [Aleph Null Ltd]	115.327	2.66	Exige 240R
Gratulin [XGN]	115.487	2.50	Exige 240R
Crimespree [XGN]	115.649	2.34	Exige 240R
Grubbet [XGN]	115.749	2.24	Evora S
Dave O [XGN]	115.956	2.03	M3 E92 Step 1
Vipergod [Team MRT]	116.236	1.75	M3 E92 Step 2
Dick Forrest [CramDick Racing]	117.784	0.20	Exige 240R s3
Imperious [XGN]	117.988	0.00	Exige 240R s3

Fine print: you have to scale this by the track's lap time - e.g. just because Guybrush was 5.66 secs faster at a long track like Monza, doesn't mean he would be 5.66 secs faster at Tsukuba, or some other much shorter track. If the next track was Tsukuba, Guybrush wouldn't have to be slowed down as much. This is what I did with the netKar ballast too.

[Bacchulum]

Now I'm confused.
What car should I be skinning?

Tongue in cheek.
It looks like this discussion is getting us closer to what we're after, ie. close laptimes.
(but I suck under pressure )

[Wally]

Now I'm confused.
What car should I be skinning?

Tongue in cheek.
It looks like this discussion is getting us closer to what we're after, ie. close laptimes.
(but I suck under pressure )

Take a punt on the 240R

[Guybrush Threepwood]

I think what you've posted just above is much better Wally.

At the end of the day the fastest guys should be nearer the front and the slower guys nearer the back but have it bunched up a lot more, which I think would be better achieved with the car combo and allocation method above.

Would it work, instead of swapping cars every race, to have only one "mid-season" reallocation?

I also really like the idea of the purchasing option Bird mentioned, although not sure how this would go in practice with shorter seasons.

[marty]

I agree with Guy as the point is not to have a complete artificial polar shift where the slower guys win and faster guys lose. Its just best to get all much closer together but still give all a fair chance for all not completly take the faster guys out of it and force them to battle at the back of the pack. Simply taking away a couple seconds from the quicler guys and giving a bit to the slower ones will make for a more competitive racing throughout.

[Wally]

Yep, the goal was always just to bunch the field up more. These things work best if you change after every round, rather than just once. It gives everything more time to level out and fall into balance.

[Bacchulum]

Having a bunched up field based on laptime will shift the focus to racecraft, which isn't a bad thing.

[Bacchulum]

I think Marty is onto something.
Studies show the average is more populated than the extremes, resulting in a bell curve:

The focus should be on a tight group of cars with larger deviation at the limits.
Maybe including unused cars as yet, room for expansion (if more aliens show up).

[Wally]

You see this too in the RSR graphs, once you get enough laps.

[Wally]

Candidate tracks and indicative lap times:


Gentrack 1 (1:44)
Nurburgring (2:20)
Castle Hill Long (1:13)
Imola (2:10)
Silverstone International (1:18)
Mugello (2:16)


Maybe throw in Spa, assuming we get it, even though a lap may be the other side of 3:00. I'd throw it in instead of another long lapper, such as Nurburgring.


I want to go for three sprints this season, each of about 15 mins duration, with 3 x 10 min qualifying sessions. That makes the overall night about the same length, and regroups the field more often for more action. You'd stay in the same car for all three races.