How to know which cars to upgrade? How much to upgrade?

[Gibson]

As someone who does not play many racing games I am really enjoying this game. However I have 0 clue what I am doing regarding picking/upgrading cars. Does anyone have a guide or something to help me figure this out?

The game recommends which cars to pick in a race, so I pick the best one based off the stat numbers. But I just went to upgrade the car it always recommends for road racing, and now it does not even recommend it any more. Did I upgrade it too much? And if so how do I know how to balance that out? I am really struggling to research what cars to pick and which upgrades to get. Heck I can't really find any helpful info on car classes and how that even works in this game.

Thanks for any help in advance. Really enjoying the game so far despite the minor frustration!

[CunkFeatures]

What PI number, PI being that score (performance index)? A race will ask for A800 for example.

[admiralRus]

It is not necessary to try to remake the car into the most accessible class. It is better to take the car you like and so pick up the details from it, so as not to go further than two classes above and at the same time maintain a balance between handling, acceleration and speed. For example, I took a Chevrolet Impala (Class C), put all-wheel drive, rally box, semi-road tires on it, picked up the engine, brakes, and so on so as to preserve both off-road qualities and not lose control and acceleration. Then I painted the car so that it glitters before the race, and during it it gets covered with dust (as if to say that I'm not just handsome). Then I checked the car in the races. The result was a Class A car designed for a confident victory in dirt competitions.

[kireta]

Example is me prepping today Mustang 68 (D class) for B class championship.

Always start with tires. Because it's a B class, Sport tires are enough. Race are better, but they're overkill for this level of power.
Because Mustang is rear wheels driving car with strong engine, I made rear tires as thick as possible, so they grip well on acceleration and in corners.
Weight reduction is another thing you never can go wrong with, unless you have more important things. It's pure gain to acceleration and controllability of a car.
Engine, obviously. Mustang starts with good engine, but more power (you can control) is always better, see what you can afford in term of points.
More power means you need more gears in transmission, otherwise you'll run out of gears and hit your speed limit too soon. You can have less gears and stretch them, but 7 feels perfect for racing.
If you don't know how to adjust differential, just get one already adjusted from upgrades. They cost to PI.
If you still have few points to spare, you may consider getting wider front wheels (they'll make turn radius better), or better brakes (you can brake later), or maybe just lighter flywheel, powershaft, or rims.

Once you're done upgrading, always go to tunning menu to see if you can adjust gears for better acceleration. If it's too much headache at least adjust final drive, it's a single slider.
If you bought race brakes, you can adjust power and balance of brakes. 50/50 gives best overall braking, adjusting for vehicle balance will make it perfectly stable when braking. Setting brakes to brake rear wheels harder will make rear wheels lock faster, which can be used to turn it during braking, to enter corner better.

Differentials are essential in AWD cars, by adjusting how much power goes to front and how much to rear. Perfectly balanced car will (almost) never oversteer or spin out, but it will be sluggish when turning. Moving more power to rear will make front wheels grip easier, and will let you powerslide to rapidly turn car around corner, but more you send there, harder it will be to keep car under control.

[Gibson]

Thanks! That is starting to make a lot more sense. But can I not downgrade my car now?? So its useless for that race type now.. I am super bummed if that is the case.

[Acidic__Thought]

Originally posted by Beep Boop:

Thanks! That is starting to make a lot more sense. But can I not downgrade my car now?? So its useless for that race type now.. I am super bummed if that is the case.

Just take parts off to lower its rating.

[Zach the k1ller]

so the A.I will always match your class. In other words, if your car is class B all of the A.I will also drive class B in the race. If you do not care about the tuning part of the game, you can select auto upgrade and it will take you to the top of that class. Also I am on game pass so it does not show but if you want to play together so I can teach you I am more then willing.