iRacing

[Trupwr]

I have been in Beta since May, it is the best sim-racing out there. I joined up for a year $153 plus they give you $65 i-Racing dollars to buy tracks and cars with. The thing is you don't need to buy cars or tracks until you get to that Class and that week's Series is at that track. You can buy it but, you can't race in events just testing by yourself if you don't have that Class license.

Everything is laser scanned and the graphics are the best eye candy I've seen.

I'm a C-Class license now, but you start out in Rookie and progress by achieving a good Safety Rating and completing min req. of races.

All the competion is broken down into 10 divisions that run 12-week Series and then Championships are awarded at the end after Championship Week. Also you get your next license if you met the requirments

Season 1 has just ended: http://www.iracing.com/newsEvents/ar...php?id=67&lc=3

Also here is a real-time look at what's going on in the next 6-hours
http://www.sportscores.de/iracing/?offset=300

iRacing.com motorsports simulation and internet racing service will reach a critical milestone at noon EST (18:00 GMT) on August 26, when the service will open to the general public. So whoever wants to sign-up can.


I'm addicted to it for my racing fix.

Eric

[kneebon5]

Yeah i would tell everyone to give it a try and see if it fits your style of racing. I have always been a oval racer, but for the last few weeks i have been running roadys. Today i spent 2 hours testing at summit point in the skip barber, im really starting to love road racing, it is something you can do by your self and it takes a ton of skill to be fast and not mess up a corner. But give it a try if you have 20 bucks to do so.

[kneebon5]

Small Track, Big Action: Bristol Now Available

BEDFORD, MA (August 20, 2008) - The eyes of the stock car racing community turn this week to the hills of eastern Tennessee and the high-banked, half-mile Bristol Motor Speedway. You probably can't buy a ticket to Saturday evening's "Sharpie 500"; all 160,000 seats tend to sell out well before race day. But starting today, iRacing.com subscribers will have access to the best seat in the house anytime - the one behind the wheel of a Late Model stock car or other oval-track machine.

"It's somewhat coincidental that Bristol Motor Speedway is coming on line at iRacing just a few days before the track's biggest race of the year," said Scott McKee, vice president of marketing at iRacing.com. "But it's a fortuitous coincidence. While the fans in the stands and even the crew members working in the pits can only imagine what it's like to drive a stock car around this track - it's been described as being like 'flying a jet fighter in a gymnasium' - members of the iRacing community can get an accurate feel for what it's really like to drive a stock car around there."

This virtual version of Bristol Motor Speedway has been licensed to iRacing by the track's owner, Speedway Motorsports, Inc. In addition to other benefits, this agreement permitted iRacing to have access to the facility itself, rather than just secondary sources of data about the track.

According to Greg Hill, iRacing's vice president of art and production, the on-site use of iRacing's laser-scanning technology produces a mathematical 'bump map' of the track, including its high-banked turns, variations in camber, cracks and undulations - recording every millimeter of the surface.

"Anyone who has seen an aerial view of Bristol knows that the north end of the track - Turns 1 and 2 - is tighter than 3 and 4," Hill said. "But that's really just the beginning. We captured all of the details of what really makes it Bristol as opposed to a track that's kind of like the real Bristol. We have everything, right down to the concrete construction of the racing surface, which is an uncommon paving technique for a race track."

Hill said that because concrete paving is done in discrete sections rather than continuously like asphalt, there are minute variations in height from one slab to the next, each of which is captured in the simulation.

"I don't know if most drivers will notice the bumps - they're pretty small - but the car knows they are there," said Hill. "What our testers have commented on is the difference in racing on Bristol's concrete surface; they say that in the simulation they can 'feel' the texture of the paving. Which I think is pretty remarkable."

And then there's the matter of how steep Bristol's banking really is, an issue that stock car racing fans sometimes debate. "Yeah, we know exactly how steep the banking is, at every point on the front straightaway, the back straight and in each section of the banking at each end of the track," Hill admitted. "But we're not going to take the fun out of fans' discussions on that subject. What's important is that in the simulation, the banking is exactly what it is in the natural world."

[avrbas]

Dont feel like making a seperate thread for this

The DMP guys are going back to NR2003 with CTS mod and not using Arca anymore. I guess they got tired with the lack of tracks they got along with league/server issues

iRacing doesnt have leagues yet right?

[kneebon5]

Quote: Originally Posted by avrbas

Dont feel like making a seperate thread for this The DMP guys are going back to NR2003 with CTS mod and not using Arca anymore. I guess they got tired with the lack of tracks they got along with league/server issues iRacing doesnt have leagues yet right?

nope it is just one big league, but it will be really fun when they do.

[kneebon5]

Well it has been about 3 months now for my iRacing career.

On Ovals i have 52 starts with 7 wins, Road Racing i am at 39 starts with 0 wins.

Now that i have had 3 months of racing under my belt i can give a little better review of it.

Racing Times:

You can still pretty much race at anytime you want, it just may not be in what series you want to, but it is still racing and always good to go back to the lower series to run. I just moved up to the Star Mazda series and found 2 races to run in on one day, but there is still a lack of people in the series. Skip Barber you can pretty much find a race at all the times they run. And rookie solstice is the same way. On the oval side of things the Silver Crowns are about the same as the Mazdas, a lack of people running them causes there to be alot less races. But this may also be due to the fact that not very many people like them, as they are really twitchy and seem to always kill peoples safety ratings (one bad driver on the start can kill everyone it is a very demanding car) latemodels run most of their races until the late night hours when the international people are up (they normally just run road racing) Rookie legends usually fill up races pretty easy. I think the reason the Class D series are always running is because everyone can run them (rookies that have reached a 4.00 SR) This makes the races "more" clean than the legends and solstice.

Tracks:

So far the tracks are amazing, everything about them is great. I thought Concord would be a really stupid track because of the layout but it is so much fun to drive. Each small oval has it's own feel.

The roadies are amazing too, it is so much more fun to drive road races now with the tracks having little things like the bumps and correct bankings for the corners. The Rovals are even more impressive, outside of iracing all rovals have been flat boring tracks, with the laser scanning there is actually elevation changes that you wouldnt have known were there unless you knew the tracks well.

Points / Safety Rating / Irating

The points system is strange, but it seems really fair. If you are in a race with alot of good people you will get more points for where you finish. If it is with lesser people you dont get as much so you must finish higher to get more points. But since it is people that arnt as good it should be easy to finish higher.

The safety rating is too easy if you ask me. But it is done well and YES you will get points knocked off if some idiot spins and you hit them, or someone dive bombs you and takes oyu out. But if you are a smart driver you wont struggle to get those points back.

Irating seems to have some flaws based on how much you race. But i guess if you race alot and have a high irating you must have finished in the top half of the field almost all the races.

So far i love this sim, and it will onyl get better, i guess it just fits me on how and when i want to race. Yes it has cost me alot, but it isnt as bad as i thought. really havnt noticed a dent in my pocket yet, and i own almost everything.

Right now in it's current state i give it a 8 out of 10

With all that is coming it will go up to a 10 out of 10

[kneebon5]

just got put out there that Trucks and COT will be added the Trucks will be the class C series COT will be the A series with a 3rd stock car filling in the B series

[pk500]

My three-part early impressions of iRacing:

Nov. 28

Very early, superficial impressions are that I would have been a hell of a lot more impressed by this game if I'd never played Live For Speed. This game clearly has a far superior physics model to that of rFactor and GTR 2. But LFS stacks up VERY favorably to iRacing, especially the tire model and feeling of weight in the car.

The laser-scanned tracks are damn nice in iRacing. You really feel the bumps and imperfections. But the driving and physics model are nowhere near the quantum leap I expected, especially after driving LFS. I think those who claim this physics model is the holy grail have jumped straight from GTR 2 or rFactor, never driving LFS.

It's way too early for me to formulate any detailed impressions without more seat time. But feel free to shoot me any questions.

Oh, and I HATE the racing league structure, in which you can only race certain cars at times decided by iRacing. No DSP Poker Nights, either, as you must join sessions set by iRacing. I knew that, but it's still just as LAME now as it was when this information first leaked.

It's VERY early, but there's no way right now -- especially with the paltry amount of cars and tracks available -- that this game is worth $159 per year, plus an extra $15-25 for each new car or track. The only car in which I really had any pure fun was the Formula Mazda. If anything, the oval physics and sense of weight feel like a regression from NR 2003, other than the quick-snap spins that plagued NR 2003 are gone.

More impressions to come.

Nov. 29

Did a bit more testing this afternoon with iRacing, and my impressions remain lukewarm.

The laser-scanned tracks are a sheer delight. It's really nice to feel every bump, dip and imperfection and the effect they have on your driving.

But most of the cars, even the light, nimble cars like Legends and the Silver Crown, just feel sort of ... dead. There's just very little feel of weight transfer to the cars, a sensation that's so nice in LFS.

The physics of iRacing are very consistent and predictable unlike rFactor, but I think the tire model in LFS beats iRacing, hands down. And I think iRacing's very good physics model is dragged down by the mediocre tire model.

The wheel gets light just before understeer, but that's the only clue you receive. You don't feel the tire flex before the transition to understeer that is so damn delightful in LFS.

I'll keep testing iRacing, but every time I'm running with anything but the Star Mazda or Legends car, I want to return to LFS almost immediately and try to shave time from my FBMW laps at Blackwood.

More impressions to come.

Nov. 30

I drove a bit more iRacing last night. I'm really trying to muster enthusiasm for the greatest thing in sim racing since the first Sidewinder steering wheel, I really am.

But it's damn hard when a GAME is this overrated. And the word game is emphasized because that's all this is -- it's not the revolutionary simulator that Kaemmer and Co. promised.

iRacing is different and unique because of its laser-scanned tracks and its ladder structure that forces you to race only at certain times against certain people and earn licenses to gain more powerful cars. Oh, and it's unique because of its obscenely high cost, too.

Not much has changed from my first impressions of the game. The laser-scanned tracks are a sheer delight. It's so cool to feel every bump and ripple in tracks. And the physics model is solid and predictable. But previous games match or exceed iRacing in a two key departments:

Tire model: Live For Speed is superior, with its flexing sidewalls and cues of impending understeer. The cars also slide seemingly more realistically than iRacing.

Suspension: Properly tuned RealFeel, with an rFactor mod suspension built with carFactory, still feels superior to anything else I've driven.

But the biggest flaw to iRacing, besides the excessive cost, is the restrictive racing setup. There is no offline racing, no AI, and you must race only at times iRacing designates. That's absolutely ridiculous. If you miss the start of a race, you need to wait another 30 minutes to race again?

Plus there are no private rooms, no Friends lists (which LFS has), etc.

I admire Kaemmer and Co. for trying to take the real-world environment of the racing ladder and bringing it to the virtual world. But it simply doesn't work, for a two reasons.

One, the existing model of "race when you want with whomever you want" is so entrenched in online sim racing that I can't see the iRacing model ever becoming any kind of standard. The freewheeling nature of Xbox Live console play, which has become the gaming standard, will further limit gamers' tolerance for restrictive online models like iRacing.

Two, the physics and tire models just aren't anywhere as good as advertised and pimped by iRacing zealots. There's just not enough weight in the wheel or friction in the tires for me to consider this anywhere near realistic.

I've only driven a stock car on an oval; I've never done asphalt road racing. But I've done my share of sliding on wet or snowy roads, especially snow, in lightweight passenger cars, and iRacing doesn't feel like that. Live For Speed does.

The tracks, for better, and racing ladder system, for worse, are revolutionary in iRacing. But nothing else is. The driving, physics and tire models are not the quantum leaps hyped by developers and disciples.

My iRacing subscription is valid for a while, so I'll give it another crack of the whip sometime soon. But I'm underwhelmed. Every time I was driving in iRacing, I was thinking of racing either Live For Speed or the Historic GT & Touring mod in rFactor.

Take care,
PK