iStruggle in Japan – iRacing Blog, Day 15

Day 15: June 8th, 2013

There comes a time where, despite all the racing games I’ve played and all the accomplishments I’ve managed in games like Forza Motorsport and F-Zero GX, I have to step back and admit that I’m just not good enough at racing.

The lap times aren’t good enough. The finishes aren’t good enough. I can and should do better.

Though the mumbling in the video above doesn’t tell the whole story (and yes, I’ll work on that in future recordings), I have struggled mightily to adjust to Okayama International Circuit from Summit Point. I thought it would be easy, and in a video that won’t see the light of day, I passed its turns off as basic and terribly easy to drive while spotting for Slowbird.

Then I drove the track.

The first right-hander hairpin seemed easy enough, and memories of Twin Ring Motegi’s opening turn flooded in as a form of instruction. Easy enough, I assumed. You’ve handled this style of flat, double-apex turn before.

Assuming that two tracks will have an identical turn is a very dumb mistake. This became evident to me when I discovered Okayama’s first turn ending a lot sooner than expected and starting downhill. The first mistake was a slide coming out of turn one. The second was a spin going into turn two.

This folly became a familiar habit for several practice sessions. Could I take two downhill lefts at a flying speed? No, that’s a good way to eat gravel or spin in a dangerous section of track. Surely I can attack the uphill hairpins with aggression, right? No, you lose control in an instant and ruin a good lap. These mistakes compiled, frustrated, and demoralized the hell out of me.

That was three days ago.

Such inexperience vanishes over time, thankfully, and by Friday (Day 14) I was running reasonably consistent laps again. I knew where the Miata would get upset in turns, and I had ideas on how to correct it should it happen in a crucial race. I wasn’t extremely fast, but stability and safety is more important, as I’ve often repeated, and hopefully my qualifying will put me in a good position to finish well in races.

Enter race one of the day, the wake-up call. Ten laps around Okayama.

I’ll discuss the psychological feeling of the start of a race another time, but position-wise, starting near the back with plenty of drivers able to pass me helped a lot. I figured a few turns in, the faster cars would be by me, and I could run my own race.

Turn two, the downhill left where I first spun out, seemed easy enough. I just had to stay to the outside of the track while being passed. Shame I wasn’t ready for this.

Loss of control. Dead last. Far behind the entire pack. Cursing at myself. At this point, I knew my best option was to run as safely as possible for the rest of the race and salvage some safety rating out of an already-pitiful performance.

So slowly I drove, making sure to be cautious and reasonable. Shame I was tempted to pass a slower car for position by the two downhill lefts, and on lap four, found myself having to demonstrate whether I’d learned anything about running an outside line.

Nope. Even worse, a backmarker behind me wasn’t able to adjust his line quickly enough, so my car was soundly ruined. The remainder of the race was spent in the pits or running slow laps of shame and disappointment on my own.

Time to take that step back and make an admission: I’m not as good at racing sims as my fanaticism for them would imply.

There was another important race on this day, but I’ll save its result for a separate blog and video recap. Instead, I’ll just leave my current license status below, and say I’m actually doing well thus far. If I surpass a 4.00, I will automatically get a D license. Failing that, I’ll have my D license in two weeks, barring a major disaster.

I’m safe, but I can and should do better. Given time, I’m still determined I will.