easytrucks sim-racing update 2

I taught myself how to use some image editing software and put together some graphics for the #easytrucks #iracing #dirtmidget speedway racing car.

Tricky time consuming stuff, but I think it looks great!

I can't wait to show off some of the wheel to wheel racing video footage, it's intense to be a part of.

Once I figure out how to convert the replay footage I'll post it on easytrucks updates.

I've only been doing this iRacing thing for just over a month and man it's difficult. Some people take their sim-racing super seriously and some others treat it like a game of dodgems, so it can be a bit of a battle trying to learn and improve.

I'm learning and understanding more as I go. It just takes laps and laps and laps, and then even more laps to gradually get better. iRacing is super popular across the globe right now, so there's plenty of racing readily available.

Thankfully I discovered Tommy Brandon's School of Sim Racing. Tommy's based in California USA and he's trying to help the dirt sim-racing community improve their skills.

Tommy posts car setup tutorials and driving tips videos and has just started a series of iRacing leagues under the National Auto Racing Club banner, where members can meet and learn to race cleanly and competitively.

Day 1 of the National Auto Racing Club dirt midget SSR test and tune session, I was using unmodified car setups provided by Tommy at SSR, which proved really helpful.

I qualified in the top 4 from nearly 40 entrants, which was an amazing result for me. Many of them are highly experienced sim-racing drivers from the USA, including Tommy Brandon himself, from SSR.

I went from Grid 1 in Heat 4, which I then went on to win. Woohoo! exciting stuff

There was 4 Heat races of 8 laps, each with about 9 or so cars. The top 4 from each Heat race transferred to the 30 lap A-main feature race.

To get the full field of 24 cars for the A-main feature, there was an 8 lap C-main race with the top 4 from that transferring to a 10 lap B-main race. Then the top 8 from the B-main transferred to the remaining 12 grids in the A-main.

1st place in my Heat race put me on Grid 3 out of 24 cars for the 30 lap A-main feature race.

I got a great start and was up to P2 by lap 3. I stayed in P2 for several laps trying to chase the leader down. By this time the track surface was becoming more and more slick (slippery) with two distinct lines, one up high by the wall and one down low by the pole line.

On lap 8 or 9 there was an incident back down the pack somewhere and the race went under caution. The leader and I were running flat out up by they wall and the car in P3 was running down the bottom, around the pole line.

On the restart I struggled to get back into a rhythm of running flat out up against the wall (knife edge do or die stuff).

On lap 10, I went too hard into turn 3 and tagged the wall with my right rear wheel. That sent my into a wild flip which put me out of the race and back into the pits.

Luckily in sim-racing the only pain is to your pride.

There was another caution period whilst I was in the pits so I was lucky enough to get back on track and pickup the rear of the field for the next restart on lap 13.

I was now a couple of laps down in P22.

The rest of the race was really tough. The tracked slicked off (got super slippery) and cars were losing control and crashing all around. I think I ended up finishing somewhere around P15 about 2 laps down from the leaders.

It's all good experience though and I'm really looking forward to the next race.

Thanks once again to @TommyBrandon from SSR for putting the National Auto Racing Club league together and for helping rookies like me improve their experience of sim-racing on dirt. #cheers

Craig Silby