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Post by Mudcat on Sept 16, 2020 0:07:47 GMT -5
I set a new record! After a rather bumpy first stage or 2 I felt like I was getting a little rhythm down. Had the Seat red lining for long stretches even (i really should tune my car) and as Stage 4 rolled around I thought, easy peasy, i'll make it past stage 5 no problems. Then I had a problem. I was drifting to my right and saw a long stretch of fence coming up. Plenty of time and really straight road, but I was going fast enough that I didn't want to over correct in the slightest (I landed on my roof due to that earlier). I didn't want to hit the brakes and get squirrely being halfway on the grass. I was trying to drift back to the left and then KABLAM. Corner of the chain link fence jumped out infront of me at 120 mph. Yes, that was the terminal speed 120 mph lol. Just when I thought I was going to be ok too.
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Roo
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Post by Roo on Sept 16, 2020 14:36:03 GMT -5
You had one job. Just make it to Stage 6 and you'd be home free. Poland was surprisingly challenging. Congrats to An70ny for being the only one to make it past Stage 5. Amazingly I think we had more finishers when we ran the Group Bs here. Maybe the "slower" F2s gave us a false sense of security? I'd also run my practice stages with the default setup but then decided to lengthen the gears a bit. Shaved a good 7 seconds off my time in my one practice run with the new setup, but probably changed my reference points for the other stages which I didn't practice with the longer gears, so that's probably what did me in. I'm actually a little nervous about the Group Bs in New Zealand. Considering my latest practice runs in the 205 T16 in Scotland constantly ended in a smashed up car, I think I've lost my edge with the beast. A bit of taming practice is in order methinks.
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Post by Mudcat on Sept 16, 2020 14:49:59 GMT -5
Maybe the "slower" F2s gave us a false sense of security? You keep saying this, but the top speed of the RS200 is 118 mph, I wasn't even at top speed in the Seat and hit a fence at 120 mph. Just pointing that out.
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Roo
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Post by Roo on Sept 16, 2020 20:25:49 GMT -5
Maybe the "slower" F2s gave us a false sense of security? You keep saying this, but the top speed of the RS200 is 118 mph, I wasn't even at top speed in the Seat and hit a fence at 120 mph. Just pointing that out. Pfft, that's one of the easy Group B's (is there such a thing?). The 205 T16 will happily shoot you into a tree at 150 mph. Ask me how I know. The F2's also don't seem like they were specifically designed to kill you. They don't give you an initial false sense of "oh, maybe this isn't too bad," then the turbo kicks in and it tries to maul your face off. Be honest, if you had to meet either a Group B or an F2 in a dark alley and they were after your lunch money, which one would you pick?
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Post by Mudcat on Sept 16, 2020 22:30:53 GMT -5
not sure how to answer that lol. I only used the RS200 because I happened to know it's top speed off-hand, don't ask why . Un-tuned I find the F2 cars at least as "scary" as the Group B cars tbh. They might tune up nicer though and they certainly don't have the same cool appeal. Maybe my opinion is more based on the fact that the last two times we raced them they tried to kill me more often haha
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Roo
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Post by Roo on Sept 16, 2020 23:10:31 GMT -5
Oh sure, they're still not mellow, easy to tame kittens. They're the most viscous FWD cars.
The FWD layout gives a little bit more tame handling. The real difference for me, though, is the 205 T16's acceleration. You put your foot down and you're just shot out of a cannon. When we ran the Group B's in Poland I was backing off to at most half throttle after a few seconds, while with the F2's I could keep my foot in for most of the straights (at least with the default gear ratios).
They still bite very hard if you let them, they'll just do it slightly less quickly than the Group B's.
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Post by an70ny on Sept 19, 2020 19:01:37 GMT -5
Drove the first half - the awesome Delta S4 drives smoothly on the round corners of NZ. Scary though, I have to lift my foot from the gas all the time, and brake way early. On the narrow roads and high speed, a lapse of concentration can be fatal. I get tired 2x as quickly as with a regular wrc car, I have to take a break to recharge. Drove 2nd half now, happily uneventful
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Post by Mudcat on Sept 23, 2020 8:04:56 GMT -5
Seems we lost keets ? well, maybe it's time to just pack it in after this season is over
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Roo
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Post by Roo on Sept 23, 2020 20:54:44 GMT -5
Seems we lost keets ? well, maybe it's time to just pack it in after this season is over That's a shame he just seemed to disappear. Hope everything is alright. I'll be perfectly honest and say that I was just about ready to take a break myself. Of course I have to see this championship out with the Group Bs and 2000ccs, but after that I was planning on a hiatus anyways. Nothing to do with how the rallies have been run (they're awesome!), but just the fact that I've been doing them for months on end and need a change of pace. I also didn't want to drop out when we were still trying to kindle the fire and get more people on board, so perhaps running this as the last championship is a good way to finish for everyone. Speaking of this week's rally, I will reiterate once again that I love the Peugeot 205 T16. I know it's not news to anyone, but that thing is just an absolute hoot to drive. New Zealand was also a very close battle with An70ny. I remembered from the previous time we ran the Group Bs here that the Lancia had a slight edge in the twisty sections, and my practice times reflected that. I ended up having the edge in the more open stages, from either being braver or more stupid, so it was a case of maximize my time gained in those, while minimizing time lost in the hairpin stages. We got through most of the open stages fairly early on, so I'd gained some time buffer, but by the last long open stage I was only gaining a few seconds. The tight stages were giving me problems, as the first one I was pretty close (less than a second down by the third and final split) but over-rotated into a hairpin and lost 5 seconds backing up. Did that a couple more times in later stages but was still 22 seconds up by the end of Stage 10, with just the two long twisty stages to go. The uphill version I just couldn't keep up and dropped 11 seconds, I think that gravity acting against the car plus the turbo meant it would just bog down too easily. Coming back downhill was much easier and I was less than a second down at the last split, so still had 10 seconds in hand. Two corners from the end though, less than 500 yards from the finish, I over-rotated the car again and had to back up to continue on. Cost me a good 7 seconds, so I crossed the line less than 3 seconds clear. A real nail biting finish that puts me back in contention for the championship. Looking forward to finishing up with another two great class/location combos.
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Post by an70ny on Sept 24, 2020 12:26:13 GMT -5
Wow 3 seconds gap after 12 stages is incredibly close (again!). I guess I should have pushed harder. I was too afraid of the speed of the Group B monster in the fast sections.
Okay with a pause. Also makes this current championship more valuable in a way
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Post by Mudcat on Sept 24, 2020 20:31:26 GMT -5
Yeah, we've been running each week since what, March? I mean, I've been guilty of late of not being motivated to get a rally in. I appreciate y'all for sticking around for this long.
I haven't touched F1 in awhile, would be nice to finish a season for once there lol. Maybe I'll finally put up a fight here one of these weeks haha. Who am I kidding, I'll fall off a cliff again this week.
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Roo
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Post by Roo on Sept 24, 2020 21:15:19 GMT -5
Wow 3 seconds gap after 12 stages is incredibly close (again!). I guess I should have pushed harder. I was too afraid of the speed of the Group B monster in the fast sections.
Okay with a pause. Also makes this current championship more valuable in a way
Well, I was measuring my pace and adjusting (somewhat) based on your speed, so if you'd pushed harder, I would have too. That said, not sure I had much more to give. Setting that initial time without any references is always tricky though, as you do have those "what if" thoughts afterwards. The fact that the Group Bs are such monsters is what makes me love them so much. Not only are your results based on how good your lines through the course are, they're also dependent on how brave you are! I think the Pug did have an advantage in the faster sections though, which balanced the Lancia's advantage in the hairpins. Since the fast sections were so narrow, you needed a very precise car to get the best times. The Pug is very twitchy, but it meant I could place it and get it to switch directions with very little response time. From what I remember of the Lancia it took just a little more effort and time to get the direction changes, so it probably doesn't inspire the same confidence as the Pug. Of course, because the Pug it so twitchy it doesn't give you much confidence either, but that's another story!
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Post by an70ny on Sept 25, 2020 13:32:49 GMT -5
Well said! This is so core to rallying, the tradeoff between pushing harder and risk crashing. Ultimately, great driving in NZ @jmroo I started ARG - feels like I can push harder, but then I've gone down the cliff a couple of times, luckily without major damage so far. I have run half of the course. So we'll see how it shakes out!
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Roo
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Post by Roo on Sept 28, 2020 19:26:06 GMT -5
Well, I think you may have the measure of me in Argentina an70ny . I got a bit lucky in the first stage and gained a few seconds, but since then I've just been bleeding time. It's very close, but I just don't have anything left to give. No major mistakes until Stage 6 where I did a half spin in one of the narrow sections which took me 10 seconds to extract the car from. I was hoping to gain a bit back as you'd mentioned you went of a cliff a few times, but I didn't see any of that. If you can push harder, I'm really toast! I just couldn't get comfortable with the Citroen on this course. The C4 doesn't like hairpins as much as some of the other cars in the class I think, in that it takes quite a bit of momentum in the right direction to get it to rotate around. This is especially tricky in Argentina due to the extremely narrow sections which means precision is absolutely key, plus the bumps which throw off any precision you did have to start with. As a result, a lot of times I'm almost stopped in the middle of the hairpins, instead of drifting gracefully around them. In the one fast, open section I can actually stretch the car's legs and claw a few seconds back, but otherwise I just can't keep up in the hairpins. Out of curiosity I re-ran Stage 6 in the 2001 Focus and it felt pointier and easier to handle around the tight sections, but my time ended up being almost identical. Just seems that I need more practice in the low speed stuff. I didn't even try the other cars in the class before starting this rally as I thought the C4 was the best from some other locations, but this might be the one place where it isn't the ideal choice. Of course, anything can happen in the last 6 stages, but unless some major mistakes are made, I don't think I'll manage the win this week. Hat's off to you an70ny, your driving is impeccable so far.
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Post by an70ny on Sept 28, 2020 23:57:11 GMT -5
Argentina is probably the one rally where I feel I can drive to the limit with a low probability of crashing! In part this is something I need to set up the car to achieve. Mainly, stiff differentials, biased to the back of the car, and softer front suspension. The other thing that I think helps me is that I drive in VR, and that allows me to get a good feel for the position of the car relative to the rocks in the canyons of Argentina. I think SS1 or SS2 are the stages where I remember having done my little off-track excursions. After that, it was pretty consistent. A couple of bad moments in the straight and fast section, probably in part a result of my car setup being optimized for the twisty and slow. Fortunately I managed to keep from falling down the cliff (if in doubt, flat out!).
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