Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Recruiting for G1-GP season 3

As the 2nd successful season of Second Life drivers racing on Rfactor is drawing to a close... I am doing some limited recruiting to expand our ranks for upcoming season 3 . Season 3 test races will begin approx mid July and the season will officialy kickoff approx early August . Here are some of the requirements to join us... for what has been some really fun racing ....

1.. need to be a friend or aquaintance of mine within SL , pre-race and post race happen within the confines of SL , so having a SL background is a must .

2. Need Rfactor program , costs anywhere from 20 to $30 US , depending on how you get it , ebay or amazon, or as a Download ect...

3. Need some level of controller above just a keyboard, Gamepad is cheapest , and has been used as a effective controller by several of the current racers, wheel is ideal but not a requirement...in fact if you can handle just driving with keyboard , your more than welcome too.

4. Some patience with the process, the technical nature of Rfactor does make you jump thru a few hoops in getting setup , Downloading and installing mods and stuff, this is something that becomes "old hat" after doing it a bit . We have a alot of people willing to help you also .

5. Official League times are Open practice monday and tuesdays at 6pm SLT to approx 8 or 9pm or so .. this isnt mandatory, just a good way to exchange setups , to make sure no one is having probs connecting to server , some race traffic practice and to compare times with other racers.
Races are held Wednesdays at 5pm SLT ....and are run in following format ....
----5pm SLT Driver meeting at G1-GP Clubhouse....at 5:10 Server will go up for Race practice
----Race practice lasts between 30 to 45 minutes depending on track and my own judgment of how much practice some people may need.
----Qualify session , usual format is 10 laps in a 20 minute session
---- Race....Races vary in length , but for season 3 , will last from 30 to 40 minutes .
----Post-Race wrap up and podium ceremony back at the G1-GP clubhouse, entire event lasts approx 2 hours.

Season 3 will be run using a mod , the cars will be LMP 900s (LeMans prototypes) , run in a series of 10 real world road courses. Some of the tracks are included with Rfactor , some need to be downloaded and installed ...all info for that will be supplied by me and everyone currently in the league are a great help to new racers if theres any help needed. I will be releasing the season 3 schedule shortly .

The following is a short demo video of the cars and game , showing off the sights and sounds that will be part of season 3 ... Contact me in SL if you are interested , thanks .....


We are only accepting a limited amount of new drivers ..so if interested send me a IM asap

Saturday, June 27, 2009

On the top step: Zaria and Katier

To catch up a little.... im gonna cover both the last FormulaSL race (round 10 at Amber Raceway) and the last G1-GP race (Round 8 at Lienz Hillclimb) with this post .

For a period spanning 44 rounds of FormulaSL and MotoSL , Archer racing had been in 1st place, but that came to a end with FormulaSL Round 9 at Bekstone raceway, Annie Gufler and AM Pro racing became the first team to topple Archer from the top spot since its creation back in season 1 of FormulaSL . Not a team to stay down when down, Archer put in the effort needed to regain the top spot.

Annie had her worst finish of the season at Amber raceway finishing 8th , Jafo finished 2nd and Yuriko 3rd. Needing to gain 4 points on Am Pro to regain the Team points lead, Archer gained 29 points on them. But the story of Round 10 was InDrive's Zaria Falconer who gave herself and her team their first RaceSL victory. Jafo and Yuriko both led the race at various times , but in the end Zaria grabbed the lead after the field took its 2nd pitstop and led the last 7 laps for the victory, her teamie Caz Freschi finished 4th .





Big grats to Zaria and her team on the victory, and big grats to my own team on their superb performance in regaining the Team lead. Round 11 of FSL season 3 will be at Racer's island Midnight track.

Round 8 of G1-GP season 2 ....Lienz hillclimb. The 3rd and final rally race of season 2 , promised to be prolly the most difficult , with average times of 3 minutes and 50 seconds a lap, the Lienz hillclimb mixed a combination of offroad dirt and paved racetrack .

Like previous Lienz Rally races, this one consisted of 2 seperate races, with the final results being compiled from the results of both races. Jafo Tendaze impressed all with his 3rd pole position of the season . But this was still not enough to stop a hard charging Sulla Looming from jumping as fast as possible to the front of the pack.

In the first race this was aided by most of the field overshooting turn 1 onto the dirt portion of the race track, Sulla raced ahead into the lead with myself at first following closely . But my luck soon ran out later on the 1st lap , i overshot a turn a little and was going to fast and too wide into one of the faster portions of the paved track, striking a portion of guardrail head on .

This put the kaibosh on the rest of my race, Sulla won it , with Katier close behind in 2nd and Jafo finishing 3rd.

Up next was the 2nd round with Jafo again on pole , again Sulla proved quick at the start... racing into lead, but it was Sulla's turn to run out of luck, running in 3rd i sorta saw what happened , but all i know is i saw Sulla careen far to the left into the woods and ..kapowww hit a tree which sent her flying back onto the dirt track sideways blocking the path of Katier who was at that point running 2nd .

I barely nudged my way past the mess and into the lead where i stayed for the rest of the race. Behind me Jafo and Katier were racing the real race , both of them battling back and forth with the possibility of whichever of them finished 2nd would get the overall win . But in the end Katier prevailed and thus captured her 1st G1-GP victory . Jafo was 2nd overall, with Sulla 3rd, Rattra Raymaker 4th and myself 5th .

Next Round for G1-GP season 2 is F3s at the venerable Monaco city street track , with 4 persons still very much in the run for the championship. Suku Ming currently leads..Sulla and Myself in 2nd and 3rd tied in points, and Caz freschi , unfortunately having missed the hillclimb..still not very far behind in 4th .

Some quick facts after 8 races, 5 different winners , 9 different people having been on the podium, only 1 polesitter of 8 has taken a victory.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Farewell Mooz , FSL round 9

It was just over 2 years ago i strolled into Mooz looking for the MotoSL 2 season. I found out i was a few weeks too late , instead i found RaceSL, a close knit group of fellow racers , 5 seasons of Formula and Superbikes. But alas a struggling economy and a struggling technology takes another victim with the 3rd major RaceSL track, the home track , lost in 2009.
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The first being Snowpeach, home track of Museum of Robots owned by Count and Bibi Bayliss, long time supporters and contributers. This was one of my fav tracks on the circuit. Next was RD Motorsports sim, owned by Raver Bellow and home of the Canyon track and Raver's own Wide track. FormulaSL season 3 , round 9 is the final race at Mooz , on a new track located high in the sky, designed and built by Bikey Bekkers.
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Zaria Falconer and Caz Freschi of Kokopelli's InDrive team did great, battling each other back and forth for 2nd and 3rd, Zaria prevailing in the end .
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Caz actualy qualified into the B group, but ran that race solidly getting the advance. HotWire driver Suzy Cuddihy looked like she would get 2nd , but it wasnt to be . Frutopian Mango Birdbrain getting up for 2nd and the pass to Group A instead.
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Ashe Revnik and Abacus Mimistrobell got 1st and 2nd in the C race, with Molly Fitzgerald just missing out after tangling with non-yielding traffic while in the lead. Molly got back to 2nd , fell to 3rd last lap .
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Abacus handily won the D group race. Although gone , the history of mooz lives on, as does the track, with Les Whites handy track rezzers, Mooz can be put down anywhere a friendly low lag sim will let him....the same with Snowpeach, Canyon and the Wide Track, so the hope is that all that is lost is a bit of a inflated monthly bill and ....a sim , although classified and class 5, seemed to often be sick and not quite performing up to its advertised potential .
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Round 10 moves us to host Amber Raceway , a multi-tiered track , with a club, drag strip, airplane pylon racing , a resort and alot of fun things to do.

Monday, June 1, 2009

G1-GP Update

Finaly doing a overdue update on the how the G1-GP season 2 is coming along since i havent posted since Round 1.....we are up to Round 5 with Round 6 just around the corner .

Round 2 at Lienze GP short... the first rally race of the season was well anticipated cause this is a small fun track. Consensus was that it would be crashed filled with alot of people finishing the race crashed out ...but actualy quite the opposite everyone did quite well and finished the race in its entirety.

Sulla Looming proved unstoppable here , winning both races that comprise the event . Caz Freschi gave Sulla a run for her money in the 2nd race, but once Sulla got by she was gone . Caz finished 2nd overall, myself 3rd, and Yum Divesadero scored a G1-GP career high finish of 4th .

Round 3 at Miami Bayfront ...for round 3 we switch to F3s at the small tight Miami track . I had hopes for a pole position after driving well during the weeks practice rounds, but things dont always worked out , Remon Franizzi grabbed pole , and i was all way down in 5th .

Caz Freschi didnt disappoint his fans in the crowd that were waving signs that read "Green means go !" , "Pit Limiters, not just for the pits!" , "Chill out!!" and "Milk does the body good" , as the greens flashed , Caz was waiting for a 2nd opinion on the matter....meanwhile much to the chagrin of everyone behind him, Remon, Sulla and myself on other side of grid, got good starts and raced ahead to turn 1 .

Remon led around for a good half the race, Sulla in 2nd till she spun and smacked the wall and pitted for repairs, into 2nd i went and after Remon . After a nice pass if i do say so myself , i was in the lead and never looked back grabbing my first win of season . Remon got 2nd, Jafo Tendaze 3rd , Caz eventualy joined in the fun after his mis-start and got up for 4th, Katier Reitveld rounded out top 5.

Round 4 at Joesville ....Round 4 brought us back to the Legends cars at the 1/2 mile oval at Joesville. Jafo nailed his 2nd pole position of the season on the ovals . But it was Suku Ming who got the the best start and led the pack around for all 50 laps for her 2nd victory of season , Jafo hot on Suku's heels for 2nd and myself 3rd. Nella Bocarra and Sulla Looming both had incidents resulting in big crashes .

Round 5 at Lienz GP....the 2nd rally round of the season , brought us to maybe arguably the hardest track of the season , the 3 minute a lap Lienz GP , and prolly the most mayhem of the season . There was no shortage of wrecks and questionable driving in this one . Favorite Sulla Looming crashed out on the 1 lap qualify round setting her back in the pack for both races.
While i was out front with my first pole of season and i made the best of it running out front as hard as i could .

It wasnt enough in the first race though , leading the whole thing i spun once in the final lap , allowing Sulla who had worked her way up to 2nd early on to pass and take the win . Race 2 was much the same me out front , Sulla worked her way up to 2nd , but lost concentration and crashed out early . Highlights of this race was a nice racing battle between Suku and Rattra Raymaker for 2nd place.

Suku did a great job holding off Rattra for awhile , but eventualy he was able to get by, but just long enough to get spun by lapped traffic allowing Suku by again where she finished 2nd in the race. Fortunately for Rattra his points in both races was good enough to get him 2nd overall. Suku finishing a impressive 3rd overall , Remon 4th and Katier 5th .

Next round is this wednesday , back to F3's this time at Long beach .
G1-GP stats can be found at http://g1gpracing.blogspot.com/