Prototypes and GT cars in the same races

[Aspergillo]

I'm not an expert on real-world cars and racing so I'm probably missing something, but I'm wondering: what's the point of having GT cars compete in the same races with prototypes? This is something I see quite often, both in lobbies and on various servers.

Already the races are often a mess; this way it seems to me that the mess increases...

[Lightspeed]

IMSA, WEC that's how they race in real life and yes it's also a mess in real life... It's all part of the fun of endurance racing...

[Aspergillo]

Originally posted by Lightspeed:

IMSA, WEC that's how they race in real life and yes it's also a mess in real life... It's all part of the fun of endurance racing...

Ah, ok, so the point is really to increase the mess... -LOL-

[Shoestring]

The challenge of racing faster/slower cars, too, like dealing with traffic, etc, is super fun once you get into it.

[Aspergillo]

Originally posted by Shoestring:

The challenge of racing faster/slower cars, too, like dealing with traffic, etc, is super fun once you get into it.

I suppose among those who drive prototypes some may find fun and challenging to handle slower traffic, but perhaps for others it is just a pain.

For those who drive GT cars, however, I see more hassle than anything else...

I tried a few races (even on LFM) driving a GT3, and I was terrified of these prototype-missiles passing me at full speed. On top of that, I hate prototypes (LOL).

[dbond1]

You'll want to steer clear of LMU then.

I'm not a big fan of multiclass racing myself, other than it is realistic so has that going for it. If you drive GT you gotta watch out for kamikazes in faster machines. If you drive prototype you have to watch out for moving chicanes, and drivers have diverse views on things like right of way and responsibility for safe overtaking, making this part guesswork most of the time. This is especially true in sim racing, and you see it sometimes too in the real thing.

Even though I'm not a big fan of it, I still drive it, race it, in LMU and AMS2. Like Lightspeed wrote, this is how those series operate. Not a fan of all sorts of things, like chicanes, five-second penalties and BoP, but that's not going to stop me :)

[FaultyJawa]

Originally posted by Aspergillo:

Originally posted by Shoestring:

The challenge of racing faster/slower cars, too, like dealing with traffic, etc, is super fun once you get into it.

I suppose among those who drive prototypes some may find fun and challenging to handle slower traffic, but perhaps for others it is just a pain.

For those who drive GT cars, however, I see more hassle than anything else...

I tried a few races (even on LFM) driving a GT3, and I was terrified of these prototype-missiles passing me at full speed. On top of that, I hate prototypes (LOL).

There's definitely an adjustment period needed for multi-class racing. It takes time to not get nervous when getting passed by faster classes, but the most important thing is to just hold your pace and hold your driving line. The responsibility lies on the faster cars to get by you safely, and the best thing to do for yourself is to be predictable while not losing too much time as you're being passed.

[Sir Revz A Lot]

When Sports car racing really got started in 1920's, it was almost exclusively for production cars as a test of quality, as very few cars could make the 24 hour distance. This meant there was a enormous rule set, with a whole bunch of different classes based mostly on engine size and body style, to fit in whatever car showed up. All the cars ran at once because races were held on shutdown public roads, and could only be closed on the weekend for racing.

In the 1950's this had been mostly simplified to strictly engine size. 2L, 3L, 5L, and +5L all racing in their individual classes. However with the simplified rules came manufacturers building specialized cars solely for racing. This continued until the 1960's when "Prototype" joined the lexicon.

Prototype cars where those built solely for racing, however they had to be street legal, have a passenger seat, a spare tire, and a trunk large enough to fit a suitcase. The Other types of cars where called GT, for Grand Touring cars, and had to be production models anyone could buy. Once again these cars were further split unto multiple sub classes based on engine size. So P 2L, GT 2L, P 5L, GT 5L, so on. In Europe this continued until the 1980's with only one major hiccup

IMSA, the US sports car racing sanctioning body owned by NASCAR, greatly simplified their class system in the late 1960's with GTU for cars under 2.5L, GTO for cars over 2.5L, and GTX for super silhouette group 5 cars and Group 6 prototypes. This also would continue with little change until the 1980's

In the 1970's in Europe, the fuel crisis caused the classes to open up again to increase car counts, even allowing NASCAR Stock cars at Lemans at one point. That was the bump in the road I mentioned earlier and the 1980's would bring about a Motorsports revolution the world had never seen. Group C was a class centered around cars using a certain amount of fuel over a certain amount of time or distance. Normally you would get 600L of fuel for 1000km of racing, with no more than 5 fuel stops allowed.

Imsa meanwhile would allow the same style of race cars, but without the fuel restriction limit (Because most Imsa races were short 2 to 3 hour races outside of the Daytona 24 and Sebring) under the then new GTP or Grand Touring Prototype class.

At lemans GT cars were disallowed through the 2nd half of the 1980's because of the sheer amount of Group C entires. In America GTO and GTU would only appear in the endurance rounds with GTP. Effectively multi class racing had been almost killed off by group c's popularity.

However by the 1990's it all came crumbling down as the FIA sabotaged group C to protect Formula 1 by forcing them to use engines that were interchangeable with F1 cars. (Driving up the price massively). This, combined with a scramble to find a new formula, and IMSA splitting into the ACO controlled American Lemans series and the Nascar owned Grand American Racing series led to GT cars making a return to endurance racing.

Today, world wide GT3 is the most popular Sports car racing class, and is used as the tinplate for other series like IMSA's GTD and Super GT's GT300 class. Meanwhile, the Hypercar\GTP ruleset finally reunified IMSA and the FIA and ACO to one unified Prototype class. (outside of the spec LMP2)

[EF_Neo1st]

Originally posted by Aspergillo:

Originally posted by Lightspeed:

IMSA, WEC that's how they race in real life and yes it's also a mess in real life... It's all part of the fun of endurance racing...

Ah, ok, so the point is really to increase the mess... -LOL-

Because "alone" these series would probably not exist so they gather together as many names, brands and sponsorships as possible to make the thing happen.

[ManJaro]

Originally posted by Sir Revz A Lot:

When Sports car racing really got started in 1920's, it was almost exclusively for production cars as a test of quality, as very few cars could make the 24 hour distance. This meant there was a enormous rule set, with a whole bunch of different classes based mostly on engine size and body style, to fit in whatever car showed up. All the cars ran at once because races were held on shutdown public roads, and could only be closed on the weekend for racing.

In the 1950's this had been mostly simplified to strictly engine size. 2L, 3L, 5L, and +5L all racing in their individual classes. However with the simplified rules came manufacturers building specialized cars solely for racing. This continued until the 1960's when "Prototype" joined the lexicon.

Prototype cars where those built solely for racing, however they had to be street legal, have a passenger seat, a spare tire, and a trunk large enough to fit a suitcase. The Other types of cars where called GT, for Grand Touring cars, and had to be production models anyone could buy. Once again these cars were further split unto multiple sub classes based on engine size. So P 2L, GT 2L, P 5L, GT 5L, so on. In Europe this continued until the 1980's with only one major hiccup

IMSA, the US sports car racing sanctioning body owned by NASCAR, greatly simplified their class system in the late 1960's with GTU for cars under 2.5L, GTO for cars over 2.5L, and GTX for super silhouette group 5 cars and Group 6 prototypes. This also would continue with little change until the 1980's

In the 1970's in Europe, the fuel crisis caused the classes to open up again to increase car counts, even allowing NASCAR Stock cars at Lemans at one point. That was the bump in the road I mentioned earlier and the 1980's would bring about a Motorsports revolution the world had never seen. Group C was a class centered around cars using a certain amount of fuel over a certain amount of time or distance. Normally you would get 600L of fuel for 1000km of racing, with no more than 5 fuel stops allowed.

Imsa meanwhile would allow the same style of race cars, but without the fuel restriction limit (Because most Imsa races were short 2 to 3 hour races outside of the Daytona 24 and Sebring) under the then new GTP or Grand Touring Prototype class.

At lemans GT cars were disallowed through the 2nd half of the 1980's because of the sheer amount of Group C entires. In America GTO and GTU would only appear in the endurance rounds with GTP. Effectively multi class racing had been almost killed off by group c's popularity.

However by the 1990's it all came crumbling down as the FIA sabotaged group C to protect Formula 1 by forcing them to use engines that were interchangeable with F1 cars. (Driving up the price massively). This, combined with a scramble to find a new formula, and IMSA splitting into the ACO controlled American Lemans series and the Nascar owned Grand American Racing series led to GT cars making a return to endurance racing.

Today, world wide GT3 is the most popular Sports car racing class, and is used as the tinplate for other series like IMSA's GTD and Super GT's GT300 class. Meanwhile, the Hypercar\GTP ruleset finally reunified IMSA and the FIA and ACO to one unified Prototype class. (outside of the spec LMP2)

Thank you for the useful information and explanation.

[Roddy]

Originally posted by Sir Revz A Lot:

When Sports car racing really got started...

Take my points...

[zerozerozero]

Originally posted by Roddy:

Originally posted by Sir Revz A Lot:

When Sports car racing really got started...

Take my points...

For AI post?

[4of25]

Group C was populated so much in it´s time cause it had two subclasses C and C2. C2 were prototypes with smaller engine and smaller bodywork like argus, tiga etc (like nowadays lmp2 the smaller subclass to the GTP/Lmdh sharing the chassis)

I can encourage everyone to watch this vehicles in live, when a historic race event is nearby. The sound of the cars is really amazing.

[FaultyJawa]

Originally posted by Sir Revz A Lot:

However by the 1990's it all came crumbling down as the FIA sabotaged group C to protect Formula 1 by forcing them to use engines that were interchangeable with F1 cars. (Driving up the price massively).

This is something I wish more people knew and talked about. As much as I like F1, the FIA has screwed over more than one series because they (and Formula One Management) were afraid that F1 would start losing money to a competitor series. This is my biggest fear with the growing popularity of WEC.

[4of25]

Originally posted by FaultyJawa:

Originally posted by Sir Revz A Lot:

However by the 1990's it all came crumbling down as the FIA sabotaged group C to protect Formula 1 by forcing them to use engines that were interchangeable with F1 cars. (Driving up the price massively).

This is something I wish more people knew and talked about. As much as I like F1, the FIA has screwed over more than one series because they (and Formula One Management) were afraid that F1 would start losing money to a competitor series. This is my biggest fear with the growing popularity of WEC.

The only thing that should really be canceled is FIA itself. This organisation is only destructive for motorsports.

[EF_Neo1st]

Originally posted by FaultyJawa:

Originally posted by Sir Revz A Lot:

However by the 1990's it all came crumbling down as the FIA sabotaged group C to protect Formula 1 by forcing them to use engines that were interchangeable with F1 cars. (Driving up the price massively).

This is something I wish more people knew and talked about. As much as I like F1, the FIA has screwed over more than one series because they (and Formula One Management) were afraid that F1 would start losing money to a competitor series. This is my biggest fear with the growing popularity of WEC.

Dont want F1 to lose popularity in relation to other series? My ideas and opinions:
#1 - dont allow paid drivers without results in the previous seasons (min of 5th place at the championship final standings + 3 consecutive seasons in 5th or better in F2 to be accepted or min of 2nd place at the championship final standings on the first season in F2), it only damages F1 with drivers that are not meant anywhere near what should be the pinnacle of motorsport (part of what F1 tries to stand for).

#2 - stop f***g around with rules and apply the rules with consistency (meaning teams are not to be allowed to talk to race director or he other people there helping with penalties, not during race also the rules should not be applied according to championship standings or according to "it caused drama last time sso now lets enforce it even beyond what the rule says", rules are rules and should not be bent .. unless it is for safety reasons - see #5)

#3 - stop f***g around with car regulations (if something is set then leave it as is and dont come up with "bandages" midseason unless it is some serious safety concern )

#4 - (controversial) remove sprint race OR do sprint qualify, sprint race and race where sprint qualify is quali for sprint race and sprint race becomes a first part of the long race (serving as a qualify for the long race and granting partial points) but dont do sprint qualify and race qualify, the sprint is meaningless and just a "not so important race" as the race where teams and drivers score more points is the day after, also drivers would drive more seriously fighting for positions instead of "I already granted a few points and dont want to risk my car or tyres" like what happen to most of the field aside from 1st to 3rd places in championship (that deénding still throw sprint away anyway not fighting for position looking for a safer and better chance at the race).
Honestly, just do the races a bit longer, an extra 30min to 1h race, instead of the sprint race, this way even more strategies would play and pay out.

#5 - there should be a limit to how much a driver can be clueless (yes I am talking about Stroll and a few others .. that should not even had joined F1 to begin with ... but most recently Stroll being clueless all around ever since god knows when should be a wake up call to that) as a quota/race and those drivers should first be suspended for 1 race then 3 then full season after they go beyond the limit the first time, being replaced by anyone else the team can have available. Same if driver crashes far too often too, racing takes risk but some decide to go beyond what is possible and right like it was normal breathing.

#6 - no team orders, any teams found doing team orders or purposely scrrewing with a driver pitstop on purpose for more than 2 races should be penalized with removal of any points from that/these races (yes, some teams screw up occasionally and not intentionally .. learn to do it better and not be a clown - Ferrari).