GPL DRIVING COURSE  

 ENHANCE YOUR KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS AND ENJOYMENT or  
‘THE MORE YOU KNOW, THE FASTER YOU GO’

By Jim Pearson  28 August 2002                                                                             

1 INTRODUCTION

Hello and welcome to this new learning experience.

As I see it, my role as leader of this group from GPL-W Driving School is to run a series of group sessions and provide individual contact/feedback that will help you to identify how some aspects of your GPL driving can be improved. The ultimate objective is for you to gain greater satisfaction from driving this great simulation, racing with the AI and within the On Line community. 

If  I can convey some of my hard earned experience/knowledge to you in a way that is helpful and if, as a group we can all learn something from our mistakes and successes in the sessions we have together, then this course should represent time well spent. 

As it will be very difficult to convey entirely new or complex concepts to you via chat rooms, I thought I would set out what I have learned about driving GPL in this document, which can then be used as a reference in our chat sessions or for your personal use at home.

We all race GPL for enjoyment, so lets make sure that we have some fun along the way. There will be no pressure to perform or be better than the next person. Please remember that it’s only by trial and error that we find a better way of doing most things, driving GPL included.

Forgive me if I deal with matters you already know well or skills you are already accomplished at.

2	FIRST SOME BACKGROUND 

I am 50 yoa and have a background in the Finance Industry. I play golf to an 8 handicap and have done a lot of long distance walking/trekking in the UK, Nepal, New Zealand and Tasmania. 

I did dabble with some motor sport when I was younger, mainly lap dashes around Sydney’s Oran Park and Amaroo Park in street cars. I once completed an advanced driving course at Sydney’s Warwick Farm circuit with Peter Wherrett and John Leffler. Sadly that circuit has not been used for many years.

 I like watching motor sport. F1 certainly, but also the Moto GP and Superbikes, because I believe those bikes ridden at the limit by Rossi, Baylis and Co are far closer to the old “seat of the pants, edge of adhesion, sliding 60’style” of Formula 1 cars, than today’s high down force stick like glue examples.

I bought GPL midway through 1999 and remember distinctly embarking on my first lap at Kylami in the Brabham with the default set-up, cold tyres and 80 odd laps of fuel.  I spun at nearly every corner, couldn’t keep full throttle on for more than a few seconds and found it hard to find the proper braking points. No way could I keep up with the AI.

I finished that session both excited and frustrated. Excited about the endless challenges ahead learning to drive straight and faster, then learning how to drive the other cars, another 10 tracks and the minefield that the set-up screens presented. Frustrated and impatient that I couldn’t master this thing and daunted by the prospect of driving the Ring, something I didn’t try in earnest for at least 6 months. Perhaps you recognise yourself in some of these comments. 

At that same point I think some people who bought the sim simply gave up. However I wasn’t going to miss the challenge presented by GPL and I am still challenged and rewarded by it. It says a lot to me about your own level of determination that you are persevering and prepared to dedicate some structured time to improving.

I get a great kick out of the GPL community, the add ons that keep the sim fresh and new initiatives like this       school. I have even got into track building for fun and to give something back to the community. If you have driven either of my two Adelaide circuits, then you have experienced both where I live and the results of some very hard work through a different sort of steep learning curve!

My web site is http://www.jrpearson.homestead.com/index.html if you want to take a look at what I’m doing these days.

Improvement as a GPL driver did NOT come easily to me, that’s why I think I can help drivers with positive ranks to improve, because I’ve been there. My first GPL Rank was something like + 50. 

My current GPL Rank is -31.6 and my best laps screen looks like this.

Grand Prix Legends 
Best Laps 
Jim Pearson
22/08/02 

All Cars 	
	All-Time 	Practice 	Race 	
Kyalami 	1:19.67
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:19.74
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:20.05
Lotus-Ford 49 	
Mexico City 	1:48.11
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:48.72
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:48.85
Lotus-Ford 49 	
Monaco 	1:27.98
Ferrari 312 	1:29.48
Ferrari 312 	1:29.39
Ferrari 312 	
Monza 	1:28.09
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:28.09
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:28.53
Lotus-Ford 49 	
Mosport 	1:21.64
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:21.64
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:22.16
Lotus-Ford 49 	
Nurburgring 	8:11.93
Ferrari 312 	8:14.46
Ferrari 312 	8:17.77
Ferrari 312 	
Rouen 	1:57.44
Ferrari 312 	1:57.77
Ferrari 312 	1:57.44
Ferrari 312 	
Silverstone 	1:27.33
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:27.56
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:28.27
Ferrari 312 	
Spa-Francorchamps 	3:16.21
Eagle-Weslake T1G 	3:16.21
Eagle-Weslake T1G 	3:16.59
Ferrari 312 	
Watkins Glen 	1:05.33
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:05.33
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:06.11
Ferrari 312 	
Zandvoort 	1:24.90
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:25.19
Lotus-Ford 49 	1:25.73
Lotus-Ford 49 	

You can see that I’m not just a Lotus man going for the fastest possible laps all the time. I have spent perhaps 80% of my time in the Ferrari, because it’s still fast at most circuits, even Spa, is a nice car to drive and handles without too many vices.

It took me a long time to get to this level. Faster than many but still light years away from the Huttu’s, McLean’s and Stewart’s of this world on –90. I still make many driving errors, from occasionally overreving and blowing an engine to overdriving and crashing into something hard. I still have to “relearn” to some degree all the tracks, including the originals, when I haven’t driven them for a while and there are times when I am just relatively slow, my timing and reactions and concentration is off. 

The things I found hardest to learn to do reasonably well trying to drive GPL, yet contributed most to the steady reduction of my GPL Rank and my driving enjoyment, were proper braking technique, the effective use of partial throttle, short shifting where called for, winding off steering lock, learning to be patient while the car went through the slower transitions in a corner and avoiding speed shifting, which ultimately blows engines. 

THESE SKILLS ARE EVIDENT IN THE DRIVING OF ALL THE FASTER GPL DRIVERS. 

THE END RESULTS OF THESE TECHNIQUES CAN BE SUMMARISED IN A THREE WORD PROGRESSION    

SMOOTHNESS + BALANCE = SPEED

All these skills we should at least discuss if not practice during the course.

I have found that my own improvements in driving technique and fastest times at tracks tend to come spasmodically and sometimes when I am just ‘dialled in’ and relaxed. At those times you find yourself more at one with the car, not fighting it so much, just guiding it and letting it do more of the work. More than once I have had a faster race lap than my best ever practice lap. There is a lesson in that somewhere.

I still occasionally race against the AI especially when refining them for my own track building projects and am involved in two on line leagues. The 5th Australian Championships over the original tracks in F1 Pro Long mode and a less intense F2 series. When qualifying for these races my best qualifying lap is WITHOUT EXCEPTION either in the first 10 minutes of qualifying when I am just trying to warm up or at the very end of the session, when I force myself to concentrate on driving smoothly to avoid the mistakes that have been coming from impatience and overdriving.

There are lessons [at least for me] in that as well.

What I am most pleased about with my driving of late is my improved race craft. Its one thing to do a fast lap or two in qualifying or hot lapping, quite another to develop the skill, concentration and experience to just sit on someone’s tail at the correct distance and wait for an opportunity to pass safely, or to drive a tidy line without blocking and make a faster driver really work hard to overtake.

My most satisfying race laps would have to be earlier this year at an on line championship practice race at Zandvoort when I found myself in front of Greg Stewart after he had spun. My best times there are 2 seconds off his, yet by driving as fast as I could, but precisely and with great concentration, I held him off legitimately for 3 or 4 laps. Big grin factor in that!

3 NOW A LITTLE BIT ABOUT YOU                                                                                                                               

Please fill out the school survey, but to enable me to help you as much as I can, it would be useful if you could provide me with at least the following information about yourselves as soon as possible. 

a) Time you have been driving GPL
b) GPL Rank
c) Whether you use any driving aids like auto shifting and braking help
d) If you do, how you would feel if I asked you to try driving with them turned off?
e) If you use the in car or F10 [outside] driving view
f) If you use F10, how you would feel if I asked you to drive “in car”?
g)Do you brake with the right or left foot?
h) Copy of your “Best Laps” Screen from your game saved as a word document or as it comes [HTML]
i) The car you mostly drive
j) Copy of the current set-up you mostly use or a description of it as I have done later in these notes
k) Whether the set-ups you use for different circuits are similar or very different to each other [disregard camber and gearbox ratios]
l) The circuits you mostly drive and your reasons why
m) The circuits or type of circuit you like the most and why if different to the above [eg you could be trying to improve at one you dislike]
n) The circuits or type of circuits you like the least and why   
o) What you find most difficult/frustrating about driving GPL and what strategies you have tried to overcome that?
p) What aspect of your driving you would you like to improve the most?
q) What aspect of your GPL driving do you think is your weakest? [Could be different]
r) Any other information you feel may be helpful
s) Let me know if you don’t have and don’t know how to use Replay Analyser,[available from
http://home.bip.net/martin/gplra/ and GPL Spy Girl http://www.theuspits.com/owheel/gpl/index.html [Great utility for merging replays to show where one driver of similar speed gains time on another]  
t) Tell me if you don’t know how to do any of the following. Save a replay, cut out and save a small section of a replay, save an export and how to zip these and text files, watch other drivers in VROC races from their in car view.                                                                                                                       

3	PERSONAL OBJECTIVES…  JUST HOW GOOD A GPL DRIVER CAN YOU OR I BE?

Ever wondered that? I have. Ever wondered why some people seem to progress easily and others don’t seem to improve? What makes the fast guys so fast and their driving so effortless? Why do they seem to be going so slowly through the apex of some corners yet still have great speed on the next straight?

So I tried to distil the factors that I think make someone consistently fast, yet stay in control, for it seemed to me to be fundamental to imparting to anyone, thoughts about how they might improve their driving in GPL. 

I think most of the key elements are these and that they should be considered in this specific order.

a) Personal
(i) Speed of reactions and hand/foot eye co-ordination
(ii) Controlling concentration.

b) Cars and Set-ups
(i) Choosing a car
(ii) Using set-ups that are consistent, well balanced and give you confidence
(iii) Set-up Adjustment and ‘Dialling Out Understeer’
(iv) Qualifying and Race set ups

c) Cornering
(i) Cornering Theory

d) Car Control and Maintaining Balance From Good Driving Skills
(i) Changing gears
(ii) Braking 
(iii) Throttle use
(iv) Steering

e) Driving Laps
(i) Track knowledge
(ii) Fastest Driving line, Braking points, Turn in points and Corner apexes 
(iii) Thinking ahead 

f) Racing Technique and VROC Courtesy
(i) Starting
(ii) Racing on Cold tyres and the first corner.
(iii) Racing on Hot tyres
(iv) Slipstreaming
(v) Overtaking
(vi) Being overtaken, protecting your line and flag signals
(vii) Shift R
(viii) Crashes, Fault and Courtesy
(ix) Chat Messages
(x) Race to survive [Racing is not Qualifying or Hot lapping]
.
SO, LETS GET ON WITH IT!

a) PERSONAL

(i) SPEED OF REACTIONS/COORDINATION.                                                                                                                                                  

Some people are blessed with great abilities in this area, natural ability if you will and some of us are less gifted. 

I pick up a tennis racquet as a kid and do ok, but John MacEnroe does and immediately he’s a world-beater for his age. 

Some people have good real life driving skills and good reactions/coordination yet still struggle with GPL. Why is that? Probably because GPL requires you to replace the seat of the pants /centripetal [sideways] force feelings of real driving with an exclusively visual experience. Some people simply cant get their brains to do that very well. 

How can you try to compensate for any deficiencies you may have in this area? 

By driving smoothly, keeping in mind the features of the track that you are about to deal with and trying to anticipate the possible actions of the drivers around you. 

All these skills will reduce the instances where you will be surprised by something and your consequent need to react quickly. 

Sum this up in one word? ANTICIPATE!

(ii) CONTROLLING CONCENTRATION                                                                                                                                                    

To drive well consistently I believe you must discipline yourself to concentrate hard when it really matters, yet be able to relax that concentration to a degree when conditions are easier. 

For example, at the start of a race or the first turn, a tricky track section or when following someone closely, there are a number of fast changing events around you that require high levels of concentration, yet even on the first lap of a race on, say, a long straight without immediate threats to your position or opportunities, you can learn with practice to admire the scenery. True. 

The trick is to know WHEN TO REFOCUS. 

If you try to concentrate hard i.e. 100% all through a race, then if you are like me, you will not be able to maintain it and not be able to reserve your hard concentration for the times that really matter. 

This view is offered for whatever its worth to you.

b) CARS AND SETUPS

(i) CHOOSING A CAR

In group sessions where I am demonstrating or driving/racing with you I will most probably drive the Ferrari.

The reason I have chosen this car is that I think it’s an ideal vehicle in which YOU can improve your driving competence and speed now that you are generally familiar with GPL, its physics and tracks.

Your favourite might be another car and that’s fine, but here are my views on each car’s suitability for average drivers wanting to improve their driving, lap times and Rank.

LOTUS.  Fastest acceleration and good top speed. Manoeuvrable but difficult handling, unless you have an absolutely perfect set-up for each track. Even then, the handling can be tricky. The Lotus also has the most fragile engine.

EAGLE.  Not quite as fast to accelerate as the Lotus but with a slightly higher potential top speed because of better aerodynamics, which is useful only on circuits with very long straights like Lemans Sarth, Spa and Monza. Detracting features are that it is not very easy to change direction on twisty circuits because of its long wheelbase and it’s hard to prevent inherent oversteer on the limit, which is not so good for building confidence.

FERRARI.  As quick as the Eagle in acceleration without quite the same top end power. Still very fast at most circuits because of its good mid range power and its light, safe handling, good manoeuvrability and inherent mild understeer.
Narrower track than some cars means it’s slightly easier to drive on some narrow twisty circuits. A safe car that you can learn to go very fast in.

COOPER. The car I would recommend for absolute beginners and still not a bad choice for the more advanced. Perhaps the sweetest handling car. Pity it just doesn’t go. Ultimately it may hold you back because of a distinct lack of top end power and relatively heavy weight

BRABHAM Good, reliable, bullet-proof, nimble. Looses out on power and can be a handful to keep on the track at higher speeds due to its narrow front track and tiny wheelbase.

HONDA.  Sweet powerful motor married to such a heavy chassis means you will be a lot slower than in a Ferrari for any given skill level. Weight causes the back end to want to reverse direction on the limit, which doesn’t inspire absolute confidence.

BRM Quite a nice car to drive but the combination of no low to mid range power [its all at the top of the rev range] and humungus weight mean that compared to the other cars, its just SLOW. You are giving away too much speed. 

(ii) SETUPS THAT ARE CONSISTENT, WELL BALANCED AND GIVE YOU CONFIDENCE 

Sometimes I think there are more theories about what constitutes the ideal set-up for GPL cars than I’ve had hot dinners. 

These are the aspects of set-ups that I feel are important for YOU to consider during this course. 

First a short story. The aforementioned Greg Stewart, still within the fastest 2 or 3 GPL drivers in the world once stated publicly that he tried the default set-ups at several tracks, only changing the fuel load. He said he quickly got to within 1 second of his best ever times at those tracks. So set-ups are not the magic potion that will make anyone fast overnight. Even for the most skilled amongst us.

What this proves absolutely I’m not really sure, but perhaps in the hands of the most skilled, a GPL car is a GPL car period. 

What I have found is that once you have a good balanced set-up for a car you really should make only very few and only slight adjustments to it as you gain confidence and vary your “base” set-up only slightly for different tracks. 

IF THERE IS ONE TRICK TO DRIVING GPL WELL ITS KEEPING THE CAR BALANCED AND IN YOUR CONTROL 

Changing set-ups completely on a regular basis eg every time you drive another track, will only hold back your development. Different set-ups can feel radically different to the less skilled [including me] and can therefore affect our speed if only through lower confidence. Its hard enough concentrating on the track let alone dealing with a car that handles differently every time you go out.

Also be aware that many of the newer add on tracks do not seem to have Default Set-ups that are well developed and I suspect some just have copies of another track’s default set-up, which could hold you back and make the track very hard to drive.  

In my own view the ideal set-up for people with a positive GPL Rank, is one that works well on a variety of circuits with only changes to gear ratios, cambers and possibly minor changes to spring rates and sway bars required when you change circuits. I also think that’s closer to what the real 1967 teams did with their cars.

Consistent feel is what you should be after, to aid your driving development and progress. 

While I think you should avoid radical Hot Lapper set-ups which are unstable for all but the very highly skilled, set-ups that have poor braking potential and poor turn in [read too much understeer], typically set-ups using 55-60% brake bias front, with diffs of 85/30  4/6/clutches and/or lots of front toe in, should also be avoided.

This is because with those types of set-ups it’s hard to drive a fast consistent line without constantly slowing to correct for understeer and the front tyres heat up too much and lock more readily under hard braking. Safe braking distances with these are also just too long to allow you to improve your lap times as well as you can. 

Understeer and Oversteer

I hope you all know what the terms UNDERSTEER and OVERSTEER mean. I like to define them as;

UNDERSTEER = The car turns less than the steering inputs suggest because the front tyres slip away from a turn well before the rear tyres loose grip. The car wants to go straight ahead in turns especially before the apex when power is applied and on the limit, meaning it’s difficult to meet apexes and maintain a good line without slowing down too much. [Some Americans call UNDERSTEER “PUSH”]

OVERSTEER = The car starts to turn more than the steering inputs suggest because the back tyres slip away from a turn before the front tyres loose grip. The car points inside the desired line through a corner and at the limit will swap ends [spin] [Some Americans call OVERSTEER  “LOOSE”]

Accordingly I will be asking you to send me the set-ups you are using the most and we can discuss how you drive with them and some possible alternatives. 

Frankly, it would be ideal if at least during this course, we ALL used the same car and the same/similar set-up but I understand you may have your favourites that you would be reluctant to part with.

So I am happy to work with you in any car and to discuss your set-ups individually.

A Balanced Ferrari Set-up

But to repeat, I will be driving a Ferrari with the sort of BALANCED STABLE SETUP that I think would most probably help get YOU down towards a low positive or even negative rank. These BASE settings need be modified only slightly for different tracks and closely resemble most of my regular Ferrari set-ups. 

I have used more radical set-ups in the past but have always come back to something close to this, especially when I am not driving lots of laps a week. 

Front /Rear Wheel [spring] Rates                85/115
Front/Rear Bar                                          160/130
Front/Rear Shocks Bump/Rebound           3/3 Front  4/4 Rear
Front toe                                                       -200   [toe out]                      
Rear Toe                                                       +175  [toe in]      
Camber Front/Rear                                      -75/-25    
Brake Bias                                                    53 % front
Ride Height Front/Rear                                2.75/2.75
Bump Stops Front/Rear                                1.5/1.5
Steering Ratio                                               15/1
Ramp [diff] Angles                                       85/45
Clutches                                                          4

A brief explanation of these choices.

Wheel [Spring] Rates…Higher in the rear to account for the greater percentage of weight over the rear wheels. Springs are there to keep the car off the bump stops for most of a lap. Relatively firm because of the one weakness in the GPL physics model; i.e. the cars bottom out much earlier than they did in real life. When a car runs out of spring travel it looses grip and skates/skids, sometimes quite suddenly.

Front/Rear Bar…. Both relatively firm for stable handling and braking. Any higher in the front results in loss of front-end grip. Any higher in the rear and the car becomes twitchy under hard cornering and tends to wander under braking

Shocks…Firm Bump for the same reason as firm springs.  Shocks only provide initial resistance to a sudden corner/bump load. Relatively high Rebound because this resists fore and aft pitching, which makes the car feel more stable to me.

Front Toe…Toe out to assist turn in and cornering at the expense of a little braking stability

Rear Toe…Toe in to make loss of control of the rear end [oversteer] more predictable and controllable. Also increases braking stability, counteracting front toe settings to a degree in that regard.

Camber Front…Front suspensions in most cars flex more than the rear and require more camber to maximise grip in corners, which after all is where you need it. Tire will run hotter on the inside on straights but it’s the corners that count.

Camber Rear…Minimum camber you can get away with to maximise grip under acceleration and stability / grip under braking. [More rubber on the road].

Brake Bias…53 % front may seem radical, but I have compromised my usual habit of running 49-50%
 The fast guys run 47-48% Objective is to brake hard without locking the fronts [with consequent loss of steering /need to back off] and minimise braking distances. The more brake Bias you have on the front the easier it is to lock the front wheels, which is a big destroyer of confidence. 

While it is true that weight transfers to the front wheels under braking and it should take a lot of effort to lock them, it’s also true that rear tyres are far bigger than the fronts and have a much bigger contact patch on the road! With the right braking technique I suspect this is probably the area where you can gain most time compared to how you are driving now. With 53% the fronts should still lock before the rears.

Ride Height…Bit higher than the minimum gives a little more suspension play and less time hitting the bump stops. 

Bump Stops…A bit higher than minimum means they are a bit more forgiving when you go down to them and less likely to unsettle the car.

Steering ratio…Set to get quickest reaction without the car being too twitchy    Personal preference and related to how small and how much turn you have in your wheel. Mine is 12” and turns 270 degrees.

Ramp Angles/Clutches…85 with 4 clutches on the power side gives a limited slip diff with predictable behaviour and good power application out of most corners. 

45 with 4 clutches on the coast side provides a good conservative compromise between the conflicting needs for good turn in ability on the one hand and controlled braking on the other when the throttle is lifted.

(iii) SETUP ADJUSTMENT

If you are taking a BASE set-up to a new track you will need to adjust the following. Don’t skip this step. It doesn’t take long and will repay you well with maximum drive, grip, control and driving enjoyment!

Gear Ratios and sometimes, final Drive Ratios 

The best method is to first copy the default ratios to your BASE set-up, but not the diff ratios/clutches. Then fine-tune them. 

I tend to do the following
 
*Use a fairly high first gear [one with a faster maximum speed] because it is then more useful in the slowest corners by preventing excessive wheel spin. A bit harder to start a race but you only do that once.

*Then I might bring second up a notch to preserve a reasonable spacing from first.

*Then I make sure that I can rev top gear out to near maximum revs on the fastest part of the circuit, using a slightly higher ratio only if there is a lot of potential to slip stream someone to a speed over your normal maximum. Eg. Spa on those long downhill straights before/after Masta and at Le Mans Sarth.  

The last thing you want when you get a good slipstream going is to have to back off  because you have no more gears and no more revs left. However, take care not to have too “tall” a top gear, because your acceleration in top gear will suffer.

Cambers 

Again you can copy the Defaults to start with, but you will need to fine-tune them because different suspension stiffness will affect how much camber you need. 

You can’t afford to ignore this; CAMBER has a big effect on cornering grip and hence car control and balance.

This is the correct method.

*Adjust cambers by looking at your tyre temperatures.

*Make sure your tyres are properly warmed up. Drive 2 laps of short circuits or 4 minutes of quick driving at other circuits after starting, or after any Shift/R [when you start again with cold tyres].

*Never look at tyre temps for camber adjustment unless you have driven smoothly and haven’t spun or made a big driving error in the previous minute. The reason is that mistakes/skids cause tyres to heat up abnormally and they don’t resume normal temps for a while. This is why you can often spin after recovering from a bad mistake because one or two of your tyres have overheated on the inside or outside of the tread and temporarily lost grip.

[Try exiting and looking at tyre temps after a bad spin and you will see what I mean.]

*Find the most critical corners for maintaining fast lap times at the circuit. 
     
 Eg. Curva Grande and Parabolica at Monza. RH
       Burnenville and Stavelot at Spa, RH
       Massenet and Mirabeau at Monaco LH & RH
       The Esses at Mexico RH & LH
       Sunset at Kylami RH
       Stowe and Abbey at Silverstone RH & LH

FIRST Drive completely through them at speed then brake steadily to a stop and exit the track Esc/Enter. Go to your set-up screen and you will then see what temps your tyres got to in those corners and probably understand why you were fighting, say, understeer.

What you first look for is whether the outside temp is higher or lower than the inside temp on the two wheels facing the outside of the corner. The outside tyres are the most important because that’s where most of the cornering load is taken. Eg. Left front and left rear in Curva Grande. If the outside is hotter by up to 5 degrees in temperature, increase negative camber by 0.25 degrees of angle [eg from –0.50 to –0.75] More than 5 degrees in temp, increase neg. camber by 0.5 degrees in angle.  The reverse applies if the inside is hotter.

Then go back to the track and do the same exercise and you should see an improvement in grip and handling. Then exit in the same way as before and check that the inside and outside temps are now close or the same. If one is slightly higher than the other its better that it’s the inside temp, especially if you think you can go a bit faster in that corner with practice, which may increase suspension loads and deflection.

The NEXT thing to do is to balance your middle tyre temp by increasing or reducing tyre pressure until the tyre is the same temp across the tread IN YOUR CHOSEN CRITICAL CORNERS.

The LAST thing you need to do is adjust the cambers on the other side of the car. I recommend keeping the cambers on both sides the same or within 0.25 of a degree front and rear to aid stability at MOST circuits. This will mean that at circuits that have mostly right hand corners, the inside of your right side tyres will run hotter than the outside for much of a lap. However you still need negative camber in these “inside” wheels when you do come to a corner that goes the other way eg Abbey at Silverstone. 

If the “inside” F/R tyres [ eg the right side tyres at Silverstone] do run hotter on their inside treads, balance their pressures by ensuring the tyre temps are progressive across the tread; eg If the inside of the tyre is 175 degrees and the outside is 168 degrees , adjust the tyre pressure so that the middle temp is about 171/172 degrees.

Asymmetric Cambers

Generally I recommend you avoid playing around too much with asymmetric set-ups, but at some tracks the benefits are two big to ignore. Ovals definitely. But Monza is also a classic example where the only really serious left-hander is Ascari, which has a very big radius and virtually no camber in the track surface. It therefore accepts set-ups with no right side wheel camber or even positive camber very well. I.e., you still get reasonable grip.

Flat or even positive camber on the right side wheels at Monza produces slightly greater potential mid corner speed and even better exit speed by allowing you to get more power down through the inside back wheel out of those long right hand bends.
 
By all means experiment a little but don’t overdo this. Try not to have the front cambers more than 0.75 degrees different and the rears 0.50 degrees different, even at Monza, otherwise your braking will become too unstable.

At tracks with lots of right and left bends or tracks that require higher ride heights like Solitude and Nurburgring, you need symmetrical set-ups.
‘Dialling Out’ Understeer

Perform the above adjustments FIRST 

Only if you then have too much understeer entering critical corners in the track you are at, perform the following adjustments ONE AT A TIME until the car handles as neutrally as you want. Please remember though, that the further you go with these adjustments, the more skittish the car will be in braking situations and the quicker the car will snap into oversteer.

Step1 - Raise rear Bar to 140 then 150 if necessary. i.e. to 160/140 or 160/150 F/R Split
Step2 - If you still have too much understeer drop the front Bar to 150 i.e. 150/150 F/R Split
Step3 - If you still have too much understeer raise the rear Bar to 160 i.e. a 150/160 F/R Split

(iv) QUALIFYING AND RACE SET UPS

I have a personal Qualifying and Race set-up for each track. I have lots of other imported ones to try but the ones I use on race days are always my JPQ and eg. JP13L set-ups.

In this case JPQ stands for my initials/Qualifying and usually has about 3-8  laps of fuel depending on the length of the track to keep the weight low.

JP13L simply means my initials and a 13 lap fuel load for, say an 11 lap race. Always put more fuel in than the number of laps in a race , especially as you get faster and especially at add on tracks, because some tracks make you use slightly more fuel than the GPL programme allows for. As a track builder, take it from me that you can’t adjust this; you can only adjust fuel loads per lap [fuel consumption] for the AI, not players.

If I am doing a longer race I will add more fuel and save the set-up as, say JP33L for a 28 lap race. Having a system like this saves any confusion and preserves your Qualifying settings.

Race set-ups for me are often much the same as Qualifying Set-ups but if they differ its usually in at most three areas apart from fuel load.

I make sure I do some longer practice sessions and see if there is some heat build up in any of the tyres. If so I may need to drop tyre pressures for the race set-up on one or two tyres by one psi to make sure the middle of the tyre doesn’t run hotter in a race. If it does this it means the tyre is not running flat but convex with the edges doing less work than they should. The result is a big loss of grip.

For very long races and on long fast tracks I will also consider making the top gear ratio higher to ensure the engine doesn’t sit on its rev limit for long periods; and finally if the car is slightly unstable in some sections, for long races I may take the rear sway bar down 10 lbs and trade off the added understeer this gives for extra stability.

c) CORNERING

(i) Cornering theory

The key to improving lap times is to increase your cornering abilities and in particular, increase corner exit speeds. 

Anyone can drive fast on a straight!

A good way to check your progress is to run your laps through Replay Analyser, which has a handy measure of overall friction efficiency.

Now please consider this question/example and keep it in mind as you read the rest of this section.. 

Is it better to give up a tenth of a second braking a bit earlier for a tricky corner like Malmedy at Spa, to ensure you meet that difficult downhill RH apex, maximise your acceleration out of it and optimise your angle of exit, or try to speed through and have to back off a bit after the apex to avoid running out of road? 

The answer is simple; the first option will probably give you 5mph greater speed down most of the following long straight which will save you 1 – 2 seconds. 

Me, I’d rather have the 2 seconds than save the tenth!! It’s also much less risky.

Correct cornering practice goes like this.

•	You arrive at your PRE DETERMINED BRAKING POINT and brake in the direction of your PREDETERMINED TURN IN POINT which is almost always at the EXTREME EDGE of the track.
•	When you arrive at your PREDETERMINED TURN IN POINT you should have completed or almost completed braking but reached a safe turn in speed, which will still be faster than the speed you will be doing at the APEX
•	Gradually feed in steering lock and reduce your speed further with trail braking or just through the friction of the tyres from the steering inputs. You should be off the throttle. Make your turn tighter as you approach the APEX and keep reducing any braking input. You should feel the front tyres grip and respond to the steering inputs.
•	The more you are turning the car the less it will accept throttle or brake application, so be patient.
•	Steer the car to the APEX and don’t be satisfied until you can hit the correct point on the inside of the curve, the one you know is the correct APEX.  Also, missing it by more than 2 feet/ half a metre is missing it and giving up exit speed, so be focussed and precise!
•	Some corners are inherently slippery, or cars approach them at a speed that makes the car drift away from the APEX. Lesmo’s 1 and 2 at Monza and Masta at Spa are such corners. For these corners it’s critical that you aim the car INSIDE the corner APEX so that you can compensate for the drift away. Fail to do this and you will always miss the APEX
•	When you have reached the Apex at the correct speed, you can gradually start accelerating only if the line opens out straight away. If there is some constant radius in the middle of the corner, then you will have to be patient and only apply enough power so that your front or rear tyres don’t loose grip and move you outside the CORRECT DRIVING LINE
•	When the corner and the CORRECT DRIVING LINE open out, start feeding off steering lock and increasing acceleration without losing the rear wheel grip to maximise drive. At this point you will be headed on a line that is inside the point where the CORRECT DRIVING LINE straightens out.
•	You should now be heading progressively further to the outside of the track as your speed increases and as you feed out the remaining steering lock.
•	Your point of exit from the corner should normally be the extreme opposite edge of the track at which point you are accelerating hard and steering is centred.
•	The only exception to this latter point is when you need to modify your exit because of another closely following corner sequence.

d) CAR CONTROL AND MAINTAINING BALANCE – FROM GOOD DRIVING SKILL

(i) CHANGING GEARS

Shifting Up

When you change gear GPL engages an automatic clutch, which is nice and convenient, but also immediately takes the entire driving load off the engine. If you don’t back off the throttle as you up shift, when you often are under maximum acceleration, the engine will IMMEDIATELY EXCEED RECOMMENDED MAXIMUM REVS. 

This practice is called “Speed Shifting”, changing gears manually without lifting off the throttle [or not lifting enough] on up shifts. 

Speed shifting can also occur if you get back on the accelerator too quickly after lifting off for a gear change, because of the time GPL takes to re-engage the clutch. 

If you only ever do Novice races against the AI offline you will almost always get away with it. The trouble is, GPL “remembers”. The longer the race and the higher the damage level, the sooner GPL will add up the over revs and “decide” that you have now blown a motor or gearbox.

So back off to half to 2/3 throttle as you up shift and ease the throttle back on a little after you hear the gearshift sound, because the clutch re engages a split second after that sound.

Some cars can take more punishment than others. The Ferrari and Brabham are quite robust but they will still break if you don’t take care of the engine. Avoiding engine damage during races through proper up and down shifting technique is something we should practice during the course.

Down Shifting

You will probably only over rev the engine on down changes if you shift down too early when braking. Even though down changing while braking helps the braking effort in theory, in practice brake fade is not modelled in GPL so you are not “saving” your brakes, just putting more braking on the rear tyres in sudden jerks as the clutch engages/disengages [only on the rear tyres because the cars are rear wheel drive] which can upset your delicate brake balance and lock the rears. 

Better to rely on properly modulated brake pedal pressure. 

My technique is to down shift progressively, but only when I know that the gear I’m shifting down to will engage well below its maximum rev range. I am especially careful to shift down as late as possible to the lowest two gears. Shifting back to first from second while still braking heavily is a recipe for disaster, for the back end will not want to cope and will probably loose all traction just as you are trying to enter a tight corner. Can you recall that happening to you?

Short shifting

This is the practice of changing up before reaching the maximum revs in a gear. Used in the lower gears especially when wheel spin is evident, or when extra drive control is required, or if you don’t want to unsettle a car if the up shift would otherwise occur in a tricky corner. SEE ALSO UNDER THROTTLE USE BELOW

‘Entry’ Shifting

My term for what happens when you down shift at or just after turn in to a corner. The sudden increase in revs applied through the drive train when the clutch reengages can cause the rear end to loose some or even all grip.

This should usually be avoided by changing gears before corner entry or by carrying a higher gear through the corner, to avoid loss of control. 

However if you have a car that is understeering more than you would like entering a relatively fast corner eg third/ fourth gear. Then changing down to third just after turn in will help to skip the rear end around a bit to help you make the apex. Eg. I often change down to fourth gear after the turn in to Curva Grande at Monza for this very reason. 

(ii) BRAKING

Much has been written already in GPL circles about braking technique, brake bias, trail braking, braking with accelerator still activated and the effect of various diff, clutch and toe settings on braking comfort and efficiency. 

It’s not that hard to get right. 

Braking efficiency and consistency come from 5 areas, in my view. 

Firstly you need a car set-up that is sympathetic to your skill level and aspirations. 
Secondly you need to understand what happens to your car during the various phases of braking. 
Thirdly you need to work out your braking and turn in points for corners then hit those marks consistently. 
Fourthly you need to develop a consistent braking technique that works for YOU 
Lastly…. PRACTICE!

Two basic techniques that I know of are what I would call ‘the stab and release’ and the ‘progressive’ methods.

Both methods work reasonably well. Both methods work equally well if trailbraking at the end of your braking phase. Both methods can work with partial accelerator applied. [See later]

Stab and Release Method

The ‘Stab and Release’ is a method I don’t like personally but it suits some. It commences at the shortest possible braking distance but doesn’t necessarily save any time and has risks. 

You simply set the car up in a straight line and apply heavy braking pressure straight away at the latest possible braking point until the front  [or rear] tyres are on the point of locking, then release some pressure to get them rolling again. Brake pressure can then be modulated up and down to theoretically keep the wheels just on the verge of locking and thus minimise braking distance. Just like ABS, but manually controlled. 

If done correctly it does all those things, but if you cant be consistent with it, you can be fighting an unstable car as initially, its weight violently transfers to the front, lock up your front tyres and overheat them and as a consequence, lengthen braking distances just when you haven’t got any road left. You can also loose steering and sometimes directional control, because the back tyres are more likely to also loose grip with a very sudden weight transfer to the front.

Progressive Method

I much prefer the ‘progressive’ method, where you apply the brakes slightly earlier [eg 10-20 metres braking from  high speed] but in a far more gradual and progressive manner. This has the effect of keeping the car very stable and under control, allowing weight to transfer gradually to the front wheels, WHILE INITIALLY LOOSING VERY LITTLE SPEED. 

After you feel the weight transfer fully to the front wheels and the car is slowing “in balance” you progressively apply more pressure and keep this pressure up to the corner. You will often catch up to the guy who braked later than you and used the more extreme stab and release method, simply because you were smooth, progressive and efficient and he made some slight misjudgement at the edge of adhesion in his attempt to brake as late as possible. You are also much more likely to make your turn in points under control, be able to trail brake more effectively and use all the available road with this method, because you will still have good steering control in the initial phase and he will not.

Remember GPL cars don’t like harsh/sudden use of controls; they react well to smooth, progressive application of steering, gearbox and brakes.

‘Two Stage’ Braking

This is the practice of dealing with braking situations in approach corners. Best if I just give two examples

The approach to Schatten at Solitude – This is a very tight RH corner approached downhill after a very long straight with a kink at the start of the braking area. If you wait to brake until after you have turned through the kink and then also wait for the car to become straight and stable before braking you will likely run out of room and fail to negotiate Schatten [read crash] My method is to touch the brakes lightly before the kink ,ease off them through the kink then reapply them when the car straightens out.

The approach to the hairpin at Rouen – Similar circumstances. Here you have to brake downhill and go from  fourth gear back to first through a section that also turns left midway through your braking efforts. I brake as heavily as I can in a straight line before the kink and drop down to third, then ease back on the brake pedal as I turn through the left hander, then feed on more brake and change to second as the car straightens up, changing to first only at turn in to the hairpin.

Using throttle with Brakes

Mostly used by drivers with very loose diff/clutch settings like 60 or 85 on the trail side and only 1 or 2 clutches eg 45/60/1 because the action of keeping the throttle partially depressed tends to keep more “lock” on the rear axles adding to their braking stability. With more conservative trail side settings like you have with a 85/45/4 set-up recommended above, the benefits are slight because there is already enough “lock” in these settings to ensure stable rear wheel braking. 

Trail braking

Simply the practice of leaving some of your last braking effort with light and decreasing pressure for the initial turn in phase of a corner, thereby shortening braking distances. SEE NOTES ON CORNERING ABOVE.

(iii) THROTTLE USE

As you well know, GPL is not an arcade game!   It’s a simulation!

1967 GP cars had hard tyres, no down force and were overpowered for their chassis [The Brabham had an American alloy V8 stuffed into an F2 chassis with wide wheels, that’s why it looks so small] 

SO YOU CANT USE ALL THE POWER ALL OF THE TIME – OR YOU LOOSE GRIP THROUGH WHEELSPIN OR OVERSTEER/UNDERSTEER

NEITHER SHOULD YOU USE THE ACCELERATOR AS AN ON/OFF SWITCH, BECAUSE IF YOU DO, THE SUDDENESS OF THE FORCES APPLIED TO THE DRIVE TRAIN AND CHASSIS WILL CAUSE THE CAR TO BECOME UNSTABLE

Keeping a GPL car pointed on “THE CORRECT DRIVING LINE,” in control and balanced has a lot to do with how you feed in the power, knowing how , when and how much to back off, and how to maintain best possible speed using partial throttle.

Grand Prix/Moto GP/Superbike racers are the ones to study to get the right idea. They also have machines that are hugely overpowered for their tyres and no down force aids. They have a term for what I admire in their correct throttle technique. They call it “rolling off” the throttle.

In corners or slippery track sections where full throttle is impossible without risking snapping the rear tyre loose and being thrown off the bike [a high side] they just gently and progressively ROLL BACK the hand throttle to a point where the rear tyre wont “let go” but they can still use as much power as possible.  You never see or hear them make big or sudden changes to the throttle anywhere from turn in to exit of corners, even when intentionally sliding the rear tyre or “backing it into” a corner.

I would like you to think of your GPL car like that, feeding power on gradually and off gradually; no sudden stamping of the right foot down to the floor in the lower gears and no abrupt complete lift of the throttle, because both will cause the car to become unstable. THINK SMOOTH AND PROGRESSIVE WITH THE THROTTLE , MASSAGE IT A BIT and you will STAY IN CONTROL AND THE CAR WILL STAY BALANCED. 

Notice a repeating theme developing in these notes?

Partial Throttle, Steering with Throttle and Short Shifting

There will be many places on all circuits where PARTIAL THROTTLE application is the fastest way. Slower GPL drivers often get these sections wrong, going in too hard initially then trying to correct UNDERSTEER and sometimes OVERSTEER by backing off completely. Then they get back on the throttle and the same series of mistakes occur, sometimes in the same corner. Meanwhile the more skilled or just patient GPL driver has set his car up for that section, ROLLED OFF the throttle so the car remains stable, then modulates the throttle to keep balance and speed until its safe to apply full throttle again.

So, SLOW = FAST [mind boggling isn’t it?]

In corners and with the sort of mildly UNDERSTEERING set-up that I have recommended above, if you use too much throttle before the apex the car will just UNDERSTEER more and you will not meet the apex. The result is your exit speed will suffer because you have lost the exit angle you would have had to maximise your acceleration out of the corner and you would have had to slow down to make the front tyres grip again. 

Use of too much throttle from the apex will usually result in OVERSTEER but this is easier to correct as you should be able to feel the back start to come around. When this happens don’t panic, use this by gently “ROLLING BACK” your throttle and you will stay fast and in control. Anticipate that it can happen and you will be quick enough to deal with it. 

You can intentionally use the throttle to steer out of some corners with your steering wheel pointed almost straight ahead, if you learn to balance your throttle inputs to replace steering wheel inputs.i.e, more throttle tightens turn, backing off widens turn.

However lets not just consider throttle use in corners. There are some relatively straight track sections where PARTIAL THROTTLE and also SHORT SHIFTING are required to maintain maximum control and speed. Two typical examples are;

After Portier at Monaco – The track is very slippery there but Portier is a very slow corner. If you try to exit in second gear most cars just bog down because the revs are too low. I exit in first using PARTIAL THROTTLE to modulate wheel spin then accelerate as much as possible until the revs are just too powerful for the rear wheels to accept the power, maybe 9000 revs in the Ferrari. 

At that point if I tried to stay in first until the redline at 10500 revs, I would take too long to get there avoiding wheel spin, so I SHORT SHIFT at 9000 revs into second and by that time, the speed I have attained in first is now enough to get acceptable acceleration in second.

From Hedersbachkurve at Solitude – This is the first tight uphill right-hander about 400 metres after the start.
Again it is really too slow a corner to be taken in second but you need PARTIAL THROTTLE through the corner and on the first very steep section that follows, especially on a first race lap on cold tyres. I SHORT SHIFT into second halfway up that short rise for the same reason I gave for Portier above, then shift to third normally over the next crest. 

However before I run out of revs in third there is a crest and a jump so I again SHORT SHIFT to fourth gear just before reaching the crest then ROLL OFF the throttle to avoid over revving as the car gets light or airborne. As I land I know I don’t have to waste time changing gear as I am already in a gear that will take me through the next corner. 

So some thought about how you tackle such sections and some disciplined use of the above techniques makes these “tricky bits” quite manageable and smooth to drive.

Last is the practice of using throttle with brakes, which I have already covered in the Braking section ABOVE.

(iv) STEERING 

One of the truly remarkable talents the fastest GPL drivers have [and 67 GP drivers had] is the use of set-ups and a driving style that allows them to turn their cars and drift their cars through corners without moving the steering wheel far from centre. 

This demonstrates that they drive without the need for big steering inputs to counteract either UNDERSTEER or OVERSTEER and that when their cars slide through corners, they do so with the front wheels straight ahead and the front and back wheels slipping sideways at the same rate ….a true four wheel drift. This has much to do with the very twitchy set-ups they use and their consummate skill in controlling them. But the outcomes are ideal and those should be aspired to as much as possible. 

I mean ideal because the less steering input needed, the less forward momentum is lost. Where big steering inputs are required, the front tyres [and the rear tyres where the car is oversteering] are acting too much as a brake on forward progress. We can discuss this and try at least to develop some of the smoothness that comes from this disciplined technique. 

Correcting Understeer and Oversteer

If you find jour car starting to UNDERSTEER you should initially steer towards the inside of the curve more i.e., towards the direction you want to head, to try and bring it around and at the same time ROLL OFF the throttle.   This is to get more weight over the front tyres and slow the car down so front-end grip is restored. Power on tends to place more weight over the rear wheels, while getting off the throttle tends to move weight forward.

If you find your car starting to OVERSTEER you should use opposite lock, initially steer away from the inside of the corner i.e., towards where you want to head and also ROLL OFF the throttle to slow down and restore rear wheel grip that might have been lost through power induced wheel spin added to cornering forces.

Emergency Steering Corrections

However there is one quirk to the handling of GPL cars that comes in handy for correcting SEVERE UNDERSTEER and OVERSTEER slides. This takes practice and a cool head but believe me it works in severe cases of understeer and oversteer if you react quickly.

IF, AND ONLY IF, YOU HAVE TRIED TO CORRECT A SEVERE UNDERSTEER OR OVERSTEER SLIDE USING THE ABOVE TRADITIONAL METHODS AND IT HAS NOT WORKED AND YOU ARE STILL HEADED STRAIGHT OFF THE TRACK [UNDERSTEER] OR STARTING TO SPIN [OVERSTEER] QUICKLY CENTRE YOUR STEERING 

Why this works on the limit has something to do with the complexities of slip angles and the way GPL is modelled, but what happens in EXTREME situations is that you get LESS grip from the front tyres the more they are angled to the direction of travel. 

So if you are UNDERSTEERING severely you will get more control and more steering/ braking effect with the wheels more centred. 

Conversely when OVERSTEERING so severely that you are really starting to spin, turning your wheel back to centre suddenly from the opposite – lock position will cause the front tyres to loose traction. You will save the spin by causing the front wheels to slide with the back wheels, i.e., by sliding all four wheels sideways. 

This is about the only time I will recommend you do something suddenly, but you have to be quick to reverse the initial steering inputs designed to correct minor imbalances in front / rear grip.

If you think this is cheating and abusing the GPL physics model, just consider this. 

Colin Chapman, the designer of the early Lotuses also raced successfully. He is quoted somewhere as saying that he knew it was time to give up his aspirations to stay driving open wheel racing cars, when Jim Clark confided to him that when he [Clark] was starting to spin a car [read severe oversteer] he got the best recovery by steering into the corner and away from the spin, not towards it with opposite lock, the traditional method described above.

If you think this is a technique that is just too difficult, to be used only by the most highly skilled, let me ask you this. Just who are the drivers who have the most trouble with severe UNDERSTEER or OVERTEER/SPINS and could benefit from the technique the most? People like you and me who are driving at the edge of their skill level trying to go faster, that’s who!

Winding Off Lock

The last thing I need to say about steering is that the fastest line through most corners involves gradually winding on some steering lock until you approach the apex, then, unless you are driving on the throttle in a four wheel drift like the very best drivers with your steering centred, you should be exiting from the apex by aiming initially at the centre, not the outside edge of the track, then gradually unwinding steering lock and aiming progressively more towards the edge of the track as you accelerate. This  usually represents and keeps you on the CORRECT DRIVING LINE

e) DRIVING LAPS

(i) TRACK KNOWLEDGE  

You may think you know a track well but do you really know what the corner radiuses look like?

 Are they consistent all the way through or do some tighten up requiring a later apex like Bournenville and Stavelot at Spa; and others open out like Bosch at the Osterrichring, allowing earlier opportunity for acceleration? 

Do you know about the subtle spine in the track surface that makes the car miss an apex or sometimes causes you to spin, like the two separate ones at Watkins Glen’s Loop and Big Bend or at Silverstone’s Club? 

Are all the cambers the same? They certainly aren’t at Zandvoort! 

Are all the cambers constant across the corners? They certainly aren’t at the Nurburgring’s Karrusel or Adelaide’s Stag.

Do you understand why you can enter some tight corners faster than others or how an uphill or downhill entry or exit can affect your braking distances, driving line and cornering style? 

I will try to help you with these issues.

(ii) FASTEST DRIVING LINE – BRAKING POINTS, TURN IN POINTS AND CORNER APEXES

In order to work out the BEST DRIVING LINE, which includes BRAKING POINTS, TURN IN POINTS and the CORRECT CORNER APEXES, you need to know as much about the track as possible through a study of tracks as mentioned in the last paragraph and reference to a track map [bigger the better - Printable track maps on the Tracks Database website by John Bradley [BAPOM] I believe, are great http://magnust.d2g.com/ but the programme maps will do at a pinch.] 

Believe me, knowing a circuit well and being prepared to understanding its subtleties is time well spent. You’d better believe the great GPL drivers know them.

The aim in determining the BEST DRIVING LINE can be reduced to three things

First, to “straighten out” the curves as much as possible; 
Second, to maximise exit speeds from corners onto straights; and
Thirdly, to use ALL of the available road.

How do you identify these points? Use a map first. Then drive laps relatively slowly and try to pick up reference points for these critical markers.

BRAKING POINTS  are relatively easy because you can use the groove where it starts to become darker as a rough reference point. However these grooves are laid down in the track file by using a track builder’s own fast lap, so beware that the groove should not be an absolute guide to where you should start braking or the correct place laterally, to brake. Depends on how good a driver the track builder was!

However you will soon be able to remember that, say, when braking for Lesmo 1 at Monza, that you should brake just to the left and 20 yards past the first black “patch” of groove etc

TURN IN POINTS and APEXES are sometimes more difficult but not impossible to find a marker for. For example on that long tightening super fast right hander Burnenville at Spa, my turn in point is when I run out of road heading towards the big brown building on the left [yes you need that late an apex for exit speed] and my APEX marker is a single spectator next to the fence on the right. 

When you have worked these points out through observation of your own and/or others’ replays and have identified points on the track that you want to “hit” every lap, you are halfway towards driving some decent and consistent laps. 

If you think you have driven a decent lap then save it and get Replay Analyser to show you the drawn line you took through the corners and you will soon see the apexes you missed or were too early or late at, the width of track you didn’t use and the speed you lost where your line wasn’t ideal or where you had to slow down to correct a handling problem or mistake. 

An overhead camera view is also good for doing this, available here; http://www.gpljunk.nildram.co.uk/~kclark/index.htm 
We will be spending some time on this most important aspect.

There is absolutely no reason why you shouldn’t be as familiar [and as comfortable] as the fastest drivers with any circuit and the correct driving line/technique required to get you around that circuit at YOUR potential maximum speed. Well-directed thought and some diligent practice is what it takes. Once you gain the confidence and competence that comes from proper assessment of a track, you will appreciate even the supposedly most difficult circuits. 

Perhaps you say that you have driven these circuits a lot and still have trouble. All I can suggest is give it another go and try to find a fresh way to approach the task.

I’ve heard it said many times that people find Zandvoort just too exacting, narrow and twisty. I also found it so to start with, but after working out where the correct line was and where to make the car transition from one bend to the next, the track started to have a delicious seamless flow to it that paid back the time I put into working out how to get around it. 

The same thing happened with me at Mexico in relation to that fast first turn and the Esses with the tyres. Get a car flowing well there and catch up ground on another driver, then try to keep the smile off your face.

 (iii) Thinking ahead 

The key to driving a good line and one that will help you to moderate your inclination to push too hard is, in my view the simple practise of thinking and looking ahead. 

In other words driving a good line will come easier if you look further ahead than just in front of the car and you will be smoother in tight sections if you are mindful of the entry to the next corner as well as how you are doing in the one you are just negotiating!

f) RACING TECHNIQUE AND VROC COURTESY

(i) Starting

Whatever method you use, timing is critical. When the starter is ready to drop his flag you should not be looking at him! You should not even be looking generally at his flag! You should be concentrating ALL your attention on the top of his flagpole, because that is what you will see move first. Practice trying to get under way after that moves and before the flag is lowered completely. You wont have the reactions to do that but the distance you gain at the start may surprise you!

The safest method of starting is to just put it in gear and hit the throttle as the Starter drops his flag. However if you run a “tall” first gear or are driving one of the heavier cars this will be slow because you wont have enough revs in the engine to power up the drive train.

The method I use is to engage first gear with the clutch held out then rev the motor to about ¾ of maximum revs. As the Starter drops his flag I simultaneously press the throttle more and let the clutch engage. The engine will die a bit but as you add more throttle the rear wheels will start to spin. 

This is what you want. Controlled wheel spin in first gear to get the car moving forward with revs kept around ¾ maximum where there is lots of power and torque. It feels like you are slipping a clutch but you are really slipping the rear wheels.

Too much throttle and the rear end will spin too rapidly/fishtail and you will slow down, too little and the revs will die. A perfect start will be one where you can maintain ½ to ¾ revs up until the moment the speed of the car catches up with the speed of the rear wheels and full grip/drive is achieved!

(ii) Racing on Cold tyres and the first corner.

Beware cold tyres when you start and the weight of extra fuel in a race. Give yourself an extra 10% in braking distance and enter corners slightly slower in the first half dozen corners until the tire temps become more even across the tread and tyres start to grip properly.

Keep your eye out for drivers [AI and real] who forget these things and try to dive up the inside of you. Protect the inside line to corners well in advance so they will back off [if they see you]

(iii) Racing on Hot tyres

If you have an “off” or a spin drive carefully for the next few corners because your tyres will have heated up unevenly and you will have unpredictable grip.

(iv) Slipstreaming

Yes slipstreaming is modelled in GPL and you can attain higher speeds by following someone closely on long straights.  My best advice is not to get too close too early, roll off your throttle a bit then accelerate up to and then past the other driver as his acceleration slows from aerodynamic drag. If you pass too early the he can tuck in behind you and repass you before the next corner using the same technique.

(v) Overtaking

If you are lapping another driver you should be able to pass with care because they should allow you to pass when it is safe. They will see blue flags waving. Don’t rush your move and try to dive up the inside when the other driver may not see you. Remember his/her field of view to the rear is very narrow.

If you are trying to overtake a driver on the same lap who is as fast as you are be patient. Try to drive extra smoothly but no closer than a car length away, more if the VROC connection is not optimal [you see him/her jumping around a bit.] 

You should only proceed with an overtaking move if you have established a good overlap [your front wheels past the other drivers head] by corner entry. If you have this level of overlap you can be sure that the other driver knows you are there by either seeing or hearing you.

Keep pressure on by driving a very good line then to wait for the other driver to make a driving error before you attempt to pass, unless you are slipstreaming. If you can do this the other driver will usually miss an Apex or make another mistake so you can safely pass. If he/she does not, at least you will have had a great and very satisfying race. 

At all times drive within your capabilities, otherwise you will be the one to go off. Above all stay calm; if you get too excited, impatient or annoyed you will loose it.

(vi) Being overtaken, protecting your line and flag signals

We all have to accept that there are faster drivers out there, whether it is Jim Clark in the AI lotus or someone in VROC. They might be passing you because you are being lapped, in which case you should plan a safe place for them to get by so that you are not forced off the track.

If they are on the same lap it may be that they are recovering from a first lap pileup. You can legitimately try to keep them behind you by, say, protecting the inside line to corners, but if you do, remember you need to slow down more for corner entry if you are not using your normal turn in point.

Deliberately blocking a faster driver by changing your line more than once is not acceptable racing practice.

(vii) Shift R

If you have to shift R in an on line race be aware that you are now running on cold tyres again and that you  have a responsibility  to stay out of the way of overtaking drivers until you are up to racing speed.

(viii) Crashes, Fault and Driving Courtesy

If you crash into another driver and it is clearly your fault eg you run into the back of him/her, then you should wait for that car to resume racing in front of you before following.

(ix) Chat Messages

If you can use macros and chat dialogue acknowledge fault or accept an apology with brief comments. It is impolite to continue to chat during a serious race because it can distract other drivers.
(x) Race to Survive [Racing is not Qualifying or Hot lapping]

Drive within yourself, especially during the first few laps of a race, to bring your tyres up to temperature and “Dial yourself in”. Sure some other drivers may take advantage of you but they are often the ones who will go off halfway around the first lap and you will likely recover your starting position within the first few laps.

Above all try to discipline yourself to be smooth and hit your “marks” [ braking, turn in and apexes] and use all the road when traffic allows. You will surprise yourself how consistent and fast your race lap times can be if you adopt this philosophy. Get excited and you will make big mistakes. To do well in a race you have to finish after making as few errors as possible.

FAREWELL

That’s all for now, good luck and good driving!

Jim Pearson.