Round 16: Russia - Sochi Autodrom (30Jan19 @ 9pm EST)

[AaronWebb85]

Last Season's Results: 
1st: Darklol
2nd: Sucuri
3rd: DEADZERO
Pole: Darklol (01:34.498)
FL: Darklol (01:36.979)

 

[Normand]

Checked my work schedule and wont be there

 

[moogleslam]

This track reminds me a bit of Valencia.  Didn't love that track back in the day, but kinda miss it now.  Got me wondering what other tracks have we lost since Codemasters first got this license.  I thought of:

[ul]
[li]Turkey[/li]
[li]Malaysia[/li]
[li]Valencia[/li]
[li]India[/li]
[li]Korea[/li]
[/ul]

That all?  Plus we only see each German circuit every other year, or not at all, depending on how well they have their act together.

I maybe didn't love all of those when I raced on them, but I miss them all now, for nostalgic reasons  

 

[Fruitsalsa]

This track reminds me a bit of Valencia.  Didn't love that track back in the day, but kinda miss it now.  Got me wondering what other tracks have we lost since Codemasters first got this license.  I thought of:

[ul]
[li]Turkey[/li]
[li]Malaysia[/li]
[li]Valencia[/li]
[li]India[/li]
[li]Korea[/li]
[/ul]

That all?  Plus we only see each German circuit every other year, or not at all, depending on how well they have their act together.

I maybe didn't love all of those when I raced on them, but I miss them all now, for nostalgic reasons  

I don't remember India and Korea at all... I'll have to look it up!

 

[moogleslam]

This track reminds me a bit of Valencia.  Didn't love that track back in the day, but kinda miss it now.  Got me wondering what other tracks have we lost since Codemasters first got this license.  I thought of:

[ul]
[li]Turkey[/li]
[li]Malaysia[/li]
[li]Valencia[/li]
[li]India[/li]
[li]Korea[/li]
[/ul]

That all?  Plus we only see each German circuit every other year, or not at all, depending on how well they have their act together.

I maybe didn't love all of those when I raced on them, but I miss them all now, for nostalgic reasons  

I don't remember India and Korea at all... I'll have to look it up!

I loved India, and I think it's the only circuit I've won multiple times on at PRL.  Most people don't love it though, and even less people like Korea.  Turkey is most likely the favorite from that list.

 

[Bobino12]

Codemasters have not updated the Sotchi track with the 2018 changes in real Championship. The First DRS zone is supposed to be closer to the Start/Finish and way before turn 1. Also, the pit entry panel should be placed on the entry line and not before it. There's maybe other sections I didn't notice yet though.

So basically, we will race on the 2017 track configuration.

 

[moogleslam]

Codemasters have not updated the Sotchi track with the 2018 changes in real Championship. The First DRS zone is supposed to be closer to the Start/Finish and way before turn 1. Also, the pit entry panel should be placed on the entry line and not before it. There's maybe other sections I didn't notice yet though.

So basically, we will race on the 2017 track configuration.

I haven't done a lap here yet, so it makes no difference to me!

 

[moogleslam]

Not 100% sure I can make this race. TBD.

 

[iceman153]

Not gonna make it today either. Enjoy the race guys!

 

[Zephyr]

I wont be able to race today due to having hardware issues with my wheel.

 

[Normand]

I am able to make it, will be there at 9pm

 

[moogleslam]

Not 100% sure I can make this race.  TBD.

I'll be there!  Totally unprepared though.  If I finish ahead of anyone, shame on you

 

[patlessard]

:mrgreen:

 

[nickthequick]

I must say the race last night was probably one of the most enjoyable I have had on this game. Tron and I were battling pretty much the entire race. Just want to give a shout out to him as well because we were both giving each other plenty of room and it was a ton of fun. I will have to post some highlights of it later!

 

[patlessard]

I must say the race last night was probably one of the most enjoyable I have had on this game.  Tron and I were battling pretty much the entire race.  Just want to give a shout out to him as well because we were both giving each other plenty of room and it was a ton of fun.  I will have to post some highlights of it later!

Please do would love to Watch this !!

 

[moogleslam]

Qualifying

I thought I'd just put on the hardest tire, and run laps to continue to learn the circuit, as the TT laps I'd done weren't enough to get me completely comfortable.  I haven't really figured out the tire selection screen, and when I got to the garage, the hardest tire wasn't available, so I fit the Ultra and headed out with 10 laps of fuel on board.

I managed 4 laps, and improved my time on 3 of them (corner cut on the other).  Despite still looking at the circuit map to know which corner was coming up next, I felt like I was in a good groove, so thought about pitting to fit a faster tire.  I also thought that was a good idea because it was about time to learn where the pit entrance was!  Thinking about this might have been why I lost focus and crashed into the wall.  Qualifying over, and I'd ultimately drop to last.

Race

From being outside the top 10, I got free tire choice, an advantage I'd probably rather take at this point in time vs being mid pack while not knowing the circuit very well.  In the strategy screen, I thought I'd do something radical, and try and run the Ultra then the Hyper, and avoid the Soft all together.  Little did I know that everyone else was also going to avoid the Soft, so not that radical after all, other than I would invert the strategy compared to most other drivers.

I had a really good start and passed two drivers on the run down the straight  Briefly got into 9th, but then at turn 1, my front left made contact with the right rear of a Red Bull, and I lost my momentum.  I think I dropped back to last, and I just wasn't comfortable enough with the circuit to be pushing hard in a pack, so I just chilled at the back for a few corners.

Jonathan ran wide and I took 11th before the opening lap was over.  Soon after, I caught Fruitsalsa and was looking for a way past.  It took quite a few attempts, but I got him down the home straight with DRS.  A lap or so later, I caught and passed Norm when he ran wide for a corner.  Then it was Falco.  I caught him, and was thinking I was in position for another pass down the home straight, but when going around the last corner, he vanished from the track, and then appeared behind me.  Okay...

The next car ahead was Pat, and he had some good pace here.  It took me until lap 9 to catch him, but just as I did, he pitted.  At this point, most of the drivers who started on the Hypersoft tires did the same, and it was good info for me and my inverted strategy.  As I raced down the home straight to start lap 10, Dark was coming out of the pits, and I actually led the race for about 2 whole seconds before he took the inside for turn 1 to retake the lead.  This obviously wasn't my fight, and when Nick & Tron caught me soon after, I made it reasonably easy for them to both pass me as well.

During the rest of that stint, Sucuri & Mega both passed me, also not my race, but I had been losing focus, and getting sloppy anyway.  I was ready for some fresh tires to make me happy again!

I pitted from 6th on lap 17, thinking I could do the last 10 laps on fresh Hyper's.  I was a little disappointed to see I'd fallen to 10th after pitting, but was confident I could make up some places with my fresh Hyper's while most of the others were on worn Ultras.  Sure enough, I was a lot faster than the drivers in front, and caught Falco within a couple of laps, and had a fun battle with him before making the pass on the back straight.  A lap later, and I caught Pat, but when the back end got away from him at turn 13, and he almost lost it, I couldn't avoid hitting the back of him, and I damaged my front wing.  I did make the pass on the next lap with DRS at least.

Then it was Fruitsalsa.  I checked with my engineer, and was told he had 6 seconds of penalties.  I was at 3 seconds at the time.  I wasn't sure if I could catch and pass him with my front wing damage, but I wanted to at least get within those 3 seconds to finish ahead of him.  He was 7 seconds ahead, and I was closing the gap, but not quite at the rate I'd have liked.  I checked with my engineer again, and now he was up to 9 seconds of penalties.  I thought I had it if I just avoided any more myself, but as soon as I thought that, I had picked up another penalty!.  Now it was 6 vs 9.  I had to get it under 3 again, and I was pushing so hard.  It was about 4 seconds as we started the last lap, and I think I checked with my engineer one more time, and was told Fruit now had 12 seconds of penalties, but yet again, I picked up another one!  It was the 3 second battle once more!  As I crossed the line, I would see that I missed it by just 0.324 seconds!  Ugh!   My bad for picking up those extra corner cutting penalties.

Summary

I loved this race.  I was leading it at one point (haha), and I had some super fun battles on track.  It always feels great to be on the fastest tire at the end of the race.  Really think I like this circuit too, but glad I don't have to learn the next two; Suzuka & CotA.  What do you guys think of Sochi after having raced here for a few seasons?

 

[nickthequick]

This was honestly one of my least favorite tracks in f1 2016 and f1 2017, but in 2018 it seems a lot more fun to me because we have much more grip and can take the corners in the middle sector much faster.

I think one thing that helped was turning down the curb effects, because its fastest sometimes to brake on the curbs and to exit on them to use the maximum width of the track but with the default curb effects setting in the game that makes it really hard with your wheel shacking every where. Once I turned that down it made it more tollerable for me.

It used to drive me mad though on PS4 in the previous games because everyone was using ABS and they would have no issue with locking up on the curbs, where I had to completely stay off of them. So i think that was my assist hate flowing over to the track itself

 

[moogleslam]

Lap 1

[youtube]xv9o7GMi9qY[/youtube]

 

[patlessard]

Finally a good race for me Here's my first lap ! also My first good clean pass on someone since I don't remember when ! Also don't remember when I finished on the leader's lap !!!

https://youtu.be/Ig8lqnqQgHM