AC Multiclass Abarth500/Mazda MX5@Bridgehampton, Wed 25th October 2023

[Elmar3rd]

I was quite happy until the pit stop after 40 minutes. The laps were consistent and I did no big mistakes. At the pit stop, I surprisingly had problems to get the car in the rigth place to refuel. The rest of the race was more or less a mess due to some idiotic mistakes.

 

[Twoddle]

Sorry Hank for the dive bomb, i had no intention of doing that but the speed difference in the corners is so great between the Abarth and the Swift it took me by surprise. I can see this sort of thing happening a lot between the two unfortunately.

 

[Boukâh]

Fun race! nice track and nice cars, great choise Han!

Qualy was okay P9.

Race was fun! Had a nice start, picking up Swifty Beehives one by one, from 9 to 4 in a few corners, had to keep the regular top ten guys off my back. Managed fro a few laps, until a few Swifts regained their rightfull positions, and my pace was okay, but not up to the fast guys pace. I felt great though, being in the middle there . Just some small mistakes here and there, so I only had to wait for the big one to happen haha. That happened in lap 14 T3, just a tad too much to the left, spinning out to the sand bank bushes on the right... Bummer... ah well, now I got to chase Hank and Kimi in the Abarths, fighting their ass*s off, great to see. I could keep up with them in most turns, but the straight was hard to follow their speed. Tried some drafting but just not fast enough most of the time, I managed to get me one proper draft from the 500. gave me a nice laptime as well .

After pitting back to back of midfield, chasing again, great stuff, last part of the race with Rico in the mirrors again after I could only just pass him in T3 after his pitstop. I made too many little mistakes and a bigger one, that gave him the pass later on. Last lap I was able to get closer again and with one final great exit last corner and an ultimate draft on the straight, I missed the dragrace by an inch or so (EDIT: two car lenghts), haha, great racing again man!

Good stuff, had lots of fun tonight, I even managed to get my jacket of from behind the wheel
which took me most of the straight haha, but I survived and freed myself from the heat

Thanks Han, thanks guys! Nice one. See you in two weeks I think (have to move house with my oldest son).

 

[H_Belane]

That was tough with the Abarth. After a serious accident the result was gone.
Afterwards a nice fight with Kimi.

It's great that a new car is included.

 

[H_Belane]

Sorry Hank for the dive bomb, i had no intention of doing that but the speed difference in the corners is so great between the Abarth and the Swift it took me by surprise. I can see this sort of thing happening a lot between the two unfortunately.

No problem. I also didn't know how to deal with it when a Swift was nearby.

 

[Shed 17]

Terrible sorry about that. Completely underestimated the double slipstream. Was already lifting and did not react quick enough to brake there before touching one of you guys. Waited until I was last to make sure everyone had enough time. Did not noticed you quitted.

Sorry again.

Thanks for the apology Paulo, quite spectacular as Ricardo’s wheels came off and I ended up on my roof! I also got tangled up in the T2 cluster**** so my race was already over very early on.
The Swifts were so slow of the line, even worse than the Abarth. Oh well, onwards and upwards.

 

[RS242]

Sorry I pulled out guys but I think this may cover it.................................

Camera angle 10 @5.20 is worth a look too!

Hahaha we both got a lot of air on that one!
Actually created a new scenario for me: after getting back on track I felt the rush of the hunt so I've decided to put my head down and see how much I could recover.
This was a lot of fun, checking the Realtime for the next target, checking their pace doing the math of how many laps I needed to catch them. If not for the blue flags I think I could've reached David...
In the end did not make that much of a difference, give or take a position. The most important was: I had fun!

But before all that happened I did have quite a reprimandable start...

During the first lap and after the first pile-up I felt a bump during one of the corners, and I though somebody bumped me from behind, but while watching the replay I found out what really happen: I have taken out Dirk in one of the turns by completely cutting him off.
My apologies mate, I didn't see you. Should've waited for you, my bad.

Then on lap 2 I thought I could make a move on José, but I understeered on to his side.
Fortunately no big harm came out of it, but still I was clearly not on my best performance.
Sorry José.

Well, seems like Karma was watching because on lap 3 I had that "Flight Simulator" moment.

The swift is quite fun, and looks like a more balanced alternative to the Abarth when compared to the Civic. I still miss that engine sound though... I wonder what happens if I replace the Swift sound bank by the Civic or the alternative Abarth? I'll give it a try and report my findings.

Track was fun, very enjoyable and with a lot of summer vibes!

As usual great racing all around the board, it's good to see everyone improving so much.
Congrats to the podiums, thanks to Han for hosting it and I will see you in the next one!

Cheers!
- Ricardo

 

[Elmar3rd]

During the first lap and after the first pile-up I felt a bump during one of the corners, and I though somebody bumped me from behind, but while watching the replay I found out what really happen: I have taken out Dirk in one of the turns by completely cutting him off.
My apologies mate, I didn't see you. Should've waited for you, my bad.

No problem!
And anyway ... it makes no sense to wait for the official "leader from behind".

 

[Shed 17]

I still miss that engine sound though... I wonder what happens if I replace the Swift sound bank by the Civic or the alternative Abarth?

I tried several alternatives to the stock buzzing bee sound and eventually settled on the Ginetta Junior which seems to work nicely. the Caterhan 420R has a nice sound that also fits this car.

 

[stigs2cousin]

For me it was a good end to a terrible day, thanks for that.

After a very lively start where I gained undeserved positions I then slowly pissed them away with small mistakes.

Which seems to be the theme for Bridgehampton, its really tempting to take a nice stroll through the countryside.

After a while things reversed when my pace first took up a little including new PB and then stabilized so I could capitalize from the small (ish) mistakes my other racers where commiting.

in the end I can´t comlpain about the result ( but of course i still do ).

Thanks han for organizing and all for a fair but eventfull race.

Does anybody know a (good) coach for AC to get out of this slump??

(A hint for the new people here:
most find it helpfull to join a trainings session on the practice server and "to ride onboard" with a more experienced racer.
Join the server, presse "Drive" once and return to Pit.
Than go to chat window and klick on the name of the driver you want to sit in.

DO NOT PRESS "THE BOOT" SYMBOL behind his name, this will kick him from the server

Also most drivers here will give hints and offer help when asked nicely)

 

[Kek700]

I got one place more than I deserved. The fight with Allan gave me time to ponder the reality, I did not have the pace of Jason and Fulvio. That left me with me having to barge my way past Allan, risky. Then he would have slip streamed me on the long uphill section.
So I waited for a gift, never came, oh well, very good race for me with or without the gift.
I have been giving the Nissan Primera a practice, that car is like most FWD cars, worse than most, it is never goes where your intend it to, the swift takes you by surprise, every bit a FWD, but it actually goes we’re you want it to go.
All the race I could never get used to that, continually surprised me.

 

[stigs2cousin]

So once they get the diff of a shopping cart right and you still complain?

Time to lear a new trick, you experienced driver

 

[Boukâh]

Does anybody know a (good) coach for AC to get out of this slump??

Not for AC but ACC; the alpha testing for trophi.ai AI lap comparing, realtime training the turn of a lap, nice trailbraking output, etc. Nice new tool to focus on the good and bad things in driving. Works with iracing and acc for now. You can sign up at trophi.ai or driver61 I believe.

If you actually find a real human coach Carsten, please let me know

 

[davejevons]

That was good fun

It’s been a while since I drove the Mazda so nice to be back in it. No practice during the week meant I was relying on memory for lines which wasn’t great. Fortunately it came back in the last few minutes of quali.

Some good battles battles along the way. not crashing meant i did okay for me, despite not being quick.

as well as the noise I found the lights of the Swift very dazzling when they came up behind you. Maybe it’s just me but the glare made it hard to tell where they were going - although I guess the engine noise fixed that.

As per Carsten and Bouke, if there is an AC coach out there you have 3 new clients! As far as I can tell everyone teaches on ACC or iRacing. Maybe ACC would be close enough?

 

[davejevons]

If not for the blue flags I think I could've reached David...

You would have done. I got lucky with blue flags and lost little time whereas you seemed a bit more unlucky And it gave me enough buffer. Well done for fighting back though; you were definitely faster

 

[gearwhine]

Coach? the best coach i could think of is right beside you. Old Keki 700 could teach you everything you need to know about driving on a sim.
There you go Ernie, a new career being forged out for you.............seriously.
P.S. just remember my 10% finders fee

 

[eN1xes]

great race on my side starting with practice saw the entire r3 group flying and i was doing 43 so i went on the pit to make some modification but with only 3min left i had to use the qualy for testing i was looking for a place for invalitating the lap while remain in a good laptime and i found a place luckly my best qualy lap a 41.8 knew that was hard anyway i choose to have a more dynamic race, told myself worst thing can happen is probably end up on the podium but i was strangely confident about p1 even if i was feeling my car a bit more slow than some of my opponents of the same class. race start i was laughing seeing the r3 getting smoked on the start by the mx5/abarth quickly realizing that was my chance to p1 knowing that Jason,Ernie and Paul was about to get blocked in a battle with them found my way around top 8 very fast and enstablished my pace, in the first stint probably 2 cars weres faster than me but after the pit with more practice of the lines i was feeling unstoppable . well done to Jason for the fast lap . Congratz to Allan for p2 and Ernie for p3 . thank you Han as always for hosting and add more and more variety to those race's . (sorry if I probably got some word wrong in english not my first language)

 

[HF2000]

I had a great race in the Swift last night. Lots of nice battles with a very forgiven car. I don't think that the Swift is faster than the other two cars but I simply make less mistakes with it. My PB with the Abarth is about the same as with the Swift and overtaking is much harder because it doesn't have that top speed.

But it's a joy to drive and it's great to be able to follow the Mazda's in the turns.
Probably the nature of the track will be decisive which car is the best for me. I wouldn't pick the Swift on LeMans of Monza.
But these differences makes it very attractive to organize some small championships with different kind of tracks so you have to decide which car will be the best overall.
I hope we can find a good rwd alternative for the Mazda also.

But for now, congrats to the podium and thanks all for joining.

@Jemima puddle duck Nice debut, Annie! You did great in dealing with the blue flags! Please don't be disappointed about you pace. Apart from the aliens we were all 2 to 4 seconds slower when we started in this Abarth/Mazda events. I think that by learning from the replays in other cars you can quickly gain 2 seconds. Another advice is to join the voice chat during the race. Hope to see you next time.

 

[Kek700]

First I have been thinking about this teaching thing from the above post..

First you do not have to be quick to teach, I found this with golf, all were top class players, none could teach above and beyond a video lesson, come to think of it, mostly not as well.
Mainly like everything in life you cannot teach individuals in most sports by following a procedure. We are not born equal, you have to teach to individuals ability’s and limitations.
It is usually the easiest thing in the world to teach the talented, but it is an real achievement to teach lessor gifted souls to get better. ( I don’t think I am in that class of teacher, I am a great critic, but not so good at the doing bit )

Most think you have to be a Fulvio, some , not everyone, they think you do not know what you are talking about. In my case that would make sense.
You get this with setups, they take the fastest setup and think that is the best one, the chap at the back of the field may have the best setup for an ordinary driver. Because it has not got the fastest time attached, they ignore it, yep, I am guilty of that too.

The first advantage I have is l am not quick by any stretch of even my imagination. I have had to learn how to drive over a number of years at even my meagre pace. ( still get thrashed by the Rotter aliens )
The second advantage I have is I know why others are quicker, but I have not been able to
actually package it into a definable package that can be understood and interpreted. ( it is still an educated guess )
You are born with skill, either mentally or physically or if you are really very lucky, both, I am definitely not talking world domination, just for every day success, not really sure what that means, you don’t have to have a medal for that, that I know.

Thirdly I do not know if I can teach, I would be more surprised than any one if I even had a modicum of success in that department. I tend to be a dog with a bone in most things in life, not sure that converts well into teaching, without pissing the poor recipient off.

But if some fool wants to chance it, I will give it a go, you will have to decided who want to take the chance. I can donate a bit if time on the practice server and discord, if I don’t have any back ground noise , I can survive and hear on discord, okay. Just

Two stipulation, first, sort out who goes first as a test case to see if I can actually achieve a end result. (I do not hold out much hope there)
Second, when to sail passed me in a race , say thankyou .

You decide who the first test case is. I prefers a one on one test case, if all fails, I can then suggest Rasmus.
Rasmus is so well organised, precise, Thinks everything out in an easy to understand formate, is smart , articulate, quite gifted as a driver in a normal way, in fact, everything i am not.

Is anyone Is silly enough to take it up, then I am willing to give it a go, you have been warned.

 

[Allan Ramsbottom]

@Kek700
I,ll be your 1st test case..I need to find a bit more pace..