Re: Zerotohundred TimeToAttack Round 2
pdreams;935164 said:
Participation is in good spirit and interest, even if you came in at 3:00mins with GTR I also will not say wasted.
But mate you've used that exact phrase before re: one of my friends, despite his already class leading laptimes, remember? :chinese: I don't take it to heart.. just use it and be cheeky....needle back with it lol..
Its a different act altogether to set good times in TAs with limited time and traffic. Quite similar to a qualifying session I suppose.
Yes, especially if the $ at risk is high (relative to your ability to pay for everything in cash if it all somehow goes bad), if it's not your car, and if you're not completely familiar with it. The overall cost and the $/performance ratio of SG roadcars is so much worse than some pretty awesome racecars.
Also the bad reputation that's built if anything happens. The haters will laugh and make up stories even if it wasn't your fault, etc. More eyes and mouths at these events vs a typical trackday.
Despite all the above, you don't want to drive too reservedly because that defeats the purpose of entering competition. Everyone wants to improve, to be quicker, all the time.
Indeed karting is a most physical and rewarding driving experience within reasonable means. Still, I wouldn't say that you are in an easier league with limited field and field quality. Cut yourself some slack lah.
It is in fact easier physically and mentally. No disrespect to anyone, and the event. I say easier, not easy. If you take every form of driving and compare the different aspects, they're more difficult or easier in different areas. Karting scores high on physical and mental challenge, low on psychological pressure of $ risk, high on physical injury psychological pressure (this last one especially IMO). Can't be a lazy out of practice karter (even a couple of months break hurts) and expect to win especially on a tough track, whereas in many racecars even with low loads, low frequencies, it is only a matter of knowing/remembering what to do. It's just much less hard work. With truly high performance vehicles, knowing is one thing, having the strength, precision, endurance to be able to apply it and be near the top, is another.
The lower the cost of a class of racing, the lower the entry barrier, the bigger the potential field, and the wider the net cast to find true drivers. We have to acknowledge that many forms of racing allow you to buy an advantage, or buy a seat. Time attack is such a form because of very open rules. You spend an extra 200K, you get a huge reduction in laptime from something like perhaps +700hp (+140%) on top of a base 500hp, +10% lateral accel, -10% weight, really advanced bespoke electronics to help the driver, all fitting within the rules. And any decent enthusiast driver would be able to use those big changes and win. In karting you could spend 20K more and get perhaps +2hp (+5%), no change in lat accel, and no change in weight (if over min weight). So essentially you've just wasted 20K unless you are
top 30 in the world or so. Anything less than that and a better driver will just blow past you in his 5 year old kart vs your top of the line everything with an army supporting you.
Buying an advantage applies to many other forms of sprint or endurance racing where there's a huge difference in team budgets and quality of team (experience, preparedness, etc.) with rules that are still open enough for significant differences to where various weight breaks and restrictions have to be applied and no one ever agrees on what's fair. If I buy a seat for 300K and I beat 10 teams spending 1/4 what mine is, because my team has tested every option to find the platform with the greatest advantage, run tons of development, has the most spares, the most and the best crew, hired good pro drivers to carry the team and the sole non-pro, etc. it says very little about me as a driver except that I recognize a quality race team and can pay to join.
None of this is a complaint...it's the nature of racing. It's just that drivers should be aware of the purposes that different classes truly serve, and pick what's really important to them.
For highly competitive fields in physically demanding vehicles with very good parity, in Asia I'd say Rotax Max Championship, AKOC, Formula Nippon/3000, F3. And of all these, RMC will have the largest fields, lowest barrier to entry, and it leads to world finals where you face truly some of the best internationally.
.... to see other cars and what others are achieving in similar machinery in class.....
Yup, just is difficult if everyone is under declaring what they run. This is why even simple data is so helpful. For example my own claim of only 680hp earlier on may be considered false by some, but if I have logs matching the transponder times for entire stint, and all laps show significantly weak acceleration vs other known references, including competitors in class, same day same session, then it's irrefutable. It's also why I am open to trading data class for class as long as it is +/- 1 sec.
So, rental of any beat-up kart available? I feel bad running in your nice KF2 karts.
Don't need to feel bad
Just pay more to remove the guilt lol. We should have some Rotax powered karts for rent or sale soon as owners upgrade to KF2 for 2013 race season. You should buy..and kart more regularly to also get beat by young girls and old men :chinese: