[Advice Needed] How do I go through the corners faster?

[acrox999]

Hello RaceDepartment.

I recently this week started playing Assetto Corsa for real and I must say I'm having a lot of fun with it. I've always loved racing games but I'm a very slow driver and simracing is like a whole different league for me.

Upon many laps with the Nissan GTR GT3 on Imola I figured that I could actually go through the corners with much less braking and simply controlling the throttle. But still, I'm not used to it as I've always been playing it very safely and applied a lot of brake, making sure that I can go through the corners as safely as possible.

Now here's the goal that I have in mind, on some corners, I could go much faster and setting a whole new record. One thing that I noticed is that I might also be kind of slow in giving response towards the corners, especially during entering them. I seem to enter them at a much later time than I should, forcing me to apply more brakes to stay on track and effectively slowing me down.

I have a full clip of my replay of my fastest valid time, which was 1:51.91. I'd very much appreciate it if any of you could point out how I missed the crucial lines and how I should control my braking and throttle better. Not everywhere, just the most crucial that I'd benefit the most to improve my technique would be enough.

That's my biggest achievement throughout my whole simracing experience. Making a lap with a GT3 car smoothly. Somewhat. And of course, with the help of the game's racing line.

My goal is to improve my technique which will of course leads to better times and results. I did my best to improve my technique but as I go faster than I did in this video, I simply crashes the car all of the time.

Anyway, I appreciate any inputs and criticisms. Thank you very much! I will do my best to improve myself.

EDIT: Oh yeah, what about my shifting? It's really terrible right now IMHO.

 

[acrox999]

First if you drive gt3 cars w/o abs, try lowering brake pressure on setup. Im using G27 and most gt3 cars i setup runs on 94 brake pressure, so i can fully step on the brake pedals w/o locking the wheel. Next is adjust brake bias, then try one lap. Then adjust your braking point every lap, try also learning how to trailbrake.

I can't drive without ABS, I don't feel safe without it. Even with it turned on I still my car locked a little. In the Setup menu I see that some cars have many levels of ABS. I've never really touched it nor did I ever mess with any other settings except for the tire types and pressure (Thanks, @Giovaneveterano! ) but perhaps I should look into it as well later. I'll have a look at the brake pressure as well and see what I can do with it. I'll try to give trailbreaking a read as well tonight.

My advices from what I've seen:

• SETUP: most people say setup is not important, I say it is. It lets you be comfortable with the car, you'll go faster as a result. Activate the Kunos "tyres" app, put it in one corner of the screen and drive 3 laps with decent speed, then go back to pits and adjust tyre pressure until all 4 tyres have the correct pressure (green numbers on the tyre app. On GT3 cars is around 25psi if I remember correctly). There are up to 2 seconds gain between wrong and correct tyres pressure.
• RACING LINE: from my experience the most time gained is on throttle. The earlier you can go on the gas, the more time you spend at higher speeds. You attack all the corners as late-apex: good speed at the entry, too much at the apex, too wide at the exit and you have to go on the throttle with the steering wheel rotated too much. Braking points are correct, but stay on the brakes just a little more to fully rotate the car into the corner and gently go on full gas as soon as you passed the apex. TCS helps.

The tyre tips was very helpful. Just this morning I had a few laps with the Alfa Romeo 4C at Imola (before I went out again), I didn't know about that and I was just wondering, "Why are the tires not green yet?" I can't feel the car gripping to the road. The temperature just refuse to go up even after many laps. And just before I got home, you posted this. I tried it straight away on the Mazda RX-7 Spirit R. That certainly did the trick. Not just the pressure, I then tried the Street90s tires. The car felt much more responsive with it and they were able to gain temperature as they should much faster on the track. I've only been playing on road tracks tonight, however. I have yet to try it on actual tracks and see how it works. I will have to try it some other time to get more understanding of it.

I also just realized that I can use the brakes to "throw" the car to get inside a corner at a faster speed without losing grip. I don't have perfect understanding of that yet but I'm sure I'll get it with more practice. I think I have watched a video by EmptyBox explaining about the same thing. It's what I've been meaning to learn, I'll just watch that video again then!

For now, I'm really tired though. I went driving on a 20+ KM track for a few times today with the RX-7. I also had a race with the AIs at 90%. I can keep up with them somehow, with the AI strength ranging from 90-100%, I just don't fully memorize the track yet so I can't complete them at all.

 

[Brandon Wright]

I can't drive without ABS, I don't feel safe without it. Even with it turned on I still my car locked a little. In the Setup menu I see that some cars have many levels of ABS.

GT3 cars run with ABS (and TC) in real life anyway so if you're trying to be realistic you should have ABS on. But you can adjust it to be more or less aggressive, I believe pressing ctrl+a will cycle through the various levels.

 

[Mr Deap]

I did a guide on steam. Could be few misaligned tips by trying to make it simple. It's based on tire temperature for doing car setup. Easy to understand for player who don't have a clue about car setup.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=912315488

 

[BhZ]

I'm starting to believe that many here didn't even watch @acrox999 's video... Some of you are giving him advanced advices that he won't be able to use at the moment. Let's get him started, then you guys can teach him how to be the new Senna...

 

[Eric Rowland]

more downforce, more right foot......

 

[Kasti]

@acrox999

Breaking witout ABS means: break degressive and use stutter breaking if there is slippery surface or your tyres are worn down/overheated loosing grip.

When starting breaking push brutal(only if breaking down from high speeds, example Monza chicanes)- the car is fast and the wheels are turnin with many revs.. you want to decrease as much as you can.
Getting slower, especially in the last meters you to pull yor foot back, touch the pedal more softly. If your hear the tires blocking, give them free a moment(so they can rotate again) and break again with lesser pushing down the pedal. (the ABS does the same, automatically) .

Degressive breaking is also good for ABS using.. you can use lower ABS settings causing a later break point(this is what you want to win).

Pushing the car with the breaks into turn is quite ok for modern cars with ABS, decraisng the understeer when doing this. Be carefull when doing it without ABS. Keep in mind, they tyres have a limited level of grip they can give you. Steering and breaking together means you have divide this level... lowering your corner speed. One cause of understeering, especially when getting in the corners is:breaking to late und to hard. The front tyres are no longer able to support you with more grip you need in this situation and the cars starts going straight on. "Bad car, it understeers alsways, i can´t steer... often caused by the driver( especially on 60es and 70es Prototypes ).

And than there are other factors like camber, stiffness of springs and dampers, tyre pressure, riding height... but don`t care about them for now, it is advanced works.

Better you practice, for breaking down from high speeds in very slow chicanes i recommend Monza.

Feeling down after some laps is quite normal, you aren`t already used to keep up the high level of concentration. Try to recreate for a glimpse on long straights.

 

[acrox999]

GT3 cars run with ABS (and TC) in real life anyway so if you're trying to be realistic you should have ABS on. But you can adjust it to be more or less aggressive, I believe pressing ctrl+a will cycle through the various levels.

I was a fool once very long ago when I thought realistic was having ABS and TC turned off. About the setting, in the game it says "lower values will give more intervention" or something like that. Does that mean lower the ABS value = stronger ABS?

I did a guide on steam. Could be few misaligned tips by trying to make it simple. It's based on tire temperature for doing car setup. Easy to understand for player who don't have a clue about car setup.
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=912315488

That's very helpful. Thanks a lot, I'll keep this guide open the next time I start the game. Just wanna mess with the tire settings first a little so that I don't carried away and keep focusing on my practice. But hey, knowledge is knowledge and they're good to have.

I'm starting to believe that many here didn't even watch @acrox999 's video... Some of you are giving him advanced advices that he won't be able to use at the moment. Let's get him started, then you guys can teach him how to be the new Senna...

It's alright, really. Thanks for looking out. I'll apply what I can first and keep the rest in mind for the future.

more downforce, more right foot......

I'm still not accustomed to these terms when people say about the right foot and stuff. Can you elaborate it a little bit?

@acrox999

Breaking witout ABS means: break degressive and use stutter breaking if there is slippery surface or your tyres are worn down/overheated loosing grip.

When starting breaking push brutal(only if breaking down from high speeds, example Monza chicanes)- the car is fast and the wheels are turnin with many revs.. you want to decrease as much as you can.
Getting slower, especially in the last meters you to pull yor foot back, touch the pedal more softly. If your hear the tires blocking, give them free a moment(so they can rotate again) and break again with lesser pushing down the pedal. (the ABS does the same, automatically) .

Degressive breaking is also good for ABS using.. you can use lower ABS settings causing a later break point(this is what you want to win).

Pushing the car with the breaks into turn is quite ok for modern cars with ABS, decraisng the understeer when doing this. Be carefull when doing it without ABS. Keep in mind, they tyres have a limited level of grip they can give you. Steering and breaking together means you have divide this level... lowering your corner speed. One cause of understeering, especially when getting in the corners is:breaking to late und to hard. The front tyres are no longer able to support you with more grip you need in this situation and the cars starts going straight on. "Bad car, it understeers alsways, i can´t steer... often caused by the driver( especially on 60es and 70es Prototypes ).

And than there are other factors like camber, stiffness of springs and dampers, tyre pressure, riding height... but don`t care about them for now, it is advanced works.

Better you practice, for breaking down from high speeds in very slow chicanes i recommend Monza.

Feeling down after some laps is quite normal, you aren`t already used to keep up the high level of concentration. Try to recreate for a glimpse on long straights.

I've been meaning to understand how to brake properly on cars without ABS. Also, you're right about the "breaking too late and too hard" part, I noticed that I almost always do that, especially when I missed the braking point. I'll keep what you said in mind and try to apply them in my next practice.

 

[Charmin]

I was a fool once very long ago when I thought realistic was having ABS and TC turned off. About the setting, in the game it says "lower values will give more intervention" or something like that. Does that mean lower the ABS value = stronger ABS?

ABS on 1 is the maxiumum help and the highest value is the minumum help

I'm still not accustomed to these terms when people say about the right foot and stuff. Can you elaborate it a little bit?

With more downforce you can accelerate earlier

 

[Michael Hornbuckle]

If you decide to start slow and simple here are some laps around Magione with the pedal app open so you can get an idea of how to get around the track. (default setup with no changes whatsoever) I'm far, far from alien pace so hopefully you will be turning quicker laps than me soon. Good luck!

----------------
If any of you alien/guru types see anything blatantly wrong with my lines or whatever let me know..I want to go fast too!

 

[Eric Rowland]

I'm still not accustomed to these terms when people say about the right foot and stuff.

 

[Kristian Maynes]

We're both on the same timezone, lets have an online session. Its better than driving alone.

 

[acrox999]

ABS on 1 is the maxiumum help and the highest value is the minumum help

With more downforce you can accelerate earlier

Ah, I see. Thanks a lot!

If you decide to start slow and simple here are some laps around Magione with the pedal app open so you can get an idea of how to get around the track. (default setup with no changes whatsoever) I'm far, far from alien pace so hopefully you will be turning quicker laps than me soon. Good luck!

----------------
If any of you alien/guru types see anything blatantly wrong with my lines or whatever let me know..I want to go fast too!

Magione seems like a fun track to practice.

We're both on the same timezone, lets have an online session. Its better than driving alone.

I was actually having a little fun with R3E today. Gotta do some work now though. Maybe anytime you are going online you can PM me (and other GMt+8 players as well) and I'll see if I can make it.

 

[Kristian Maynes]

I was actually having a little fun with R3E today. Gotta do some work now though. Maybe anytime you are going online you can PM me (and other GMt+8 players as well) and I'll see if I can make it.

I have server setup in Barcelona with Audi TT VLN. I'll be online by 10pm onwards, search for acserverph.ml on server list.