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

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.

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.

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/

FormulaSL - Round 7

Round 7 found a little smaller field of 23 drivers attending , cause of the holliday weekend , this time at the PSU 1 track at Motorato Ware's Hotwire racetrack sim . Just check archives if you wanna know how i feel about my luck at this track hehe.

Annie Gufler took her 6th Pole and 6th win of the season , but this time just ahead of Jafo Tendaze looking for his first win of the season . Jafo was hunting Annie for the last 8 laps of the race, closing the gap in the last 3 , but Annie held on for the win . Jafo 2nd , and Laney Recreant with her 2nd podium of season coming in 3rd after advancing from the B group race and putting on a very nice performance in the A group race.

I got a rare glimpse at the front and led for a few laps before my old friend PSU 1 badluck paid me a visit , and i finished 4th overall . Silk Bamboo shared in some of my luck , there was plenty to go around , with a early lead at start of race, Silk looked strong to finish 3rd, but ran into troubles ending up in 5th .

One car i thought would finish higher was Racers Island's own Brave Ashbourne , i heard his engine buzzing close in my ear a few times over several laps , i think Brave was held up sometimes by my shaky driving at that point in race, but he drove much like a racer in RL would without charging thru at first chance no matter what , unfortunately Brave ran into some troubles and fell back before getting by me , finishing in 6th.

Caz Freschi and Yuriko Nishi rounded out the field also having races with heaping helpings of bad luck and technical difficulties. Annie Gufler now leads the points championship by a large margin , with Yuriko in 2nd and Jafo 3rd .

Other highlights of day started in D race , where Amber Raceway veteran Kelly Grumiaux had a good race, driving steady in 2nd place, looking like she would get the advance with Rattra Raymaker who led the whole race, but Kelly ran into trouble, and her own team mate Tracy Torok got by and finsihed 2nd .

C race might have been most chaotic of the day , with alot of collisions alot of off roading and mayhem . The story early in the race was Race island's Nella Bocarra, on a mission to score some points was in 2nd and even led for a bit in early laps of race before falling back , unfortunately finishing 8th after more troubles.

Around laps 5 and 6 the field settled down some , with returning veteran Yamaha Harley holding onto a steady lead, untill he pitted, Yamaha seemed to be in the pits forever before finally exiting in 5th place, Yamaha ended up finishing 3rd and a very good performance despite being rusty .

After the pits DYG driver Darko Revnik took over and led the rest of the 20 lap race, winning his first FSL group race, grats to DYG team they certainly have put in the practice in effort to improve steadily during this season.

The other story of C race was Shoshin racing's Ford Roffo, who has been qualifying well lately but unable to bring home the bacon in the main races, this time was different, Ford hovered around the top 4 all race , driving steady enough to grab 2nd and a pass to the B race.

B race was punctuated mostly by Caz Freschi running a tight race, leading nearly the entire thing , Motorato Ware gave chase early in the race, but contact with traffic put her in trouble around lap 10 . In the end Caz ran into enough problems to get 2nd behind Laney Recreant who filled the void when Moto fell back .

Final results were Laney 1st, Caz 2nd , Moto 3rd , Molly Fitzgerald 4th , and Indrive's Zaria Falconer 5th . Just 1 week till round #8 ...on the oval at Greg Drayman's Kokopelli Raceway . The FSL cars on the oval is always mayhem , and im sure this one wont disappoint.

Formula SL , Round 6

The 6th round of the current FSL season brings us to the RD Motosports sim and the Wide track. Last raced on during MotoSL season 4. Its a fast wide open track , with the Formula cars this means danger, spins and crashes. Another full field for this one, as 27 show up for the challenge.

Annie Gufler showed a fast hand today , grabbing her 4th pole and eventualy 5th win of the season. Yuriko Nishi also using a supercharged setup finished on the lead lap after some trouble about mid race where she fell as low as

Yuriko started out well chasing Annie close and eventualy taking the lead on lap 7, but Annie regained the lead again lap 10 and ran away with this one , Yuriko was able to finish on the lead lap , currently in drivers points Yuriko is 2nd by 25 points , with overtaking Annie, atleast possible on paper still.

Remon Franizzi was also running a turbo charged package, but he was tested by a 8th place qualify and had to race the 35 lap B race before the 50 lap A race. He dominated the B race untill a tangle with traffic allowed Moto Ware to charge ahead on lap 19 and lead around for 6 laps before she had her own problems in traffic, Remon got by and took the win in the B race.

As far back as last place during the 50 lap A race, Remon stayed steady and patient and , breaking thru to 2nd place on lap 33 and finished strong in 3rd.

Myself qualified 3rd , and for most part had my usual fall back then tunnel vision racing with hopes of being able to move thru field some and finish as well as possible, i was somehow able to grab 4th overall on the day . I was as far back as 7th for a bit and got as high as 3rd, some handling troubles in the closing laps allowed a very close finish between myself , Caz Freschi and Moto.

Caz Freschi for the InDrive team has certainly made his home up in the A group race, and once again proved why with a good start , he chased Annie and Yuriko from 3rd. Staying strong Caz moved up to 2nd after Annie had troubles in early part of race, after the 1st pit stop Caz was still in 2nd , with Yuriko falling back to 3rd. But after the pit Caz' fortunes changed, he held onto 2nd for a bit , then falling back and finishing strong in 5th overall.

Motorato Ware had a long day this round, having to race 3 races totaling 110 laps. Qualifying 13th , Moto started the racing day behind the wheel in the C group , 25 laps , of which Moto led for all but 1 lap, at the very end Ashe Revnik of the strong rookie Midnight Lotus team passed her , but Moto got lead back and beat Ashe by less than 1 second.

Onto the B race, 35 laps , Moto had a bit more trouble this go , and was caught up in hard charging traffic early on , but bided her time , moving from 7th to 4th after one pile up and 4th to 2nd after another. Leading laps 19 thru 25 , Moto crashed out and fell back to 4th again , then 5th for the next , needing to get atleast 2nd to advance to the A group race, Moto stayed steady late in the race, moving to 4th then 3rd, a final lap spin by the other skilled Midnight Lotus rookie, Laney Recreant, gave Moto the slight chance she needed to get by and grab 2nd . Moto got 6th overall in the A race, again having problems early, but staying steady and moving up for a strong finish, less than a second out of 4th place.

Jafo Tendaze had a bit shakier day than im sure he would have liked to have, qualifying 6th , just making it in the A race. Jafo started strong running steady in 4th chasing the lead group of 3 closely . Jafo also had problems after 1st pit , falling back to 7th . Jafo got back to 4th after i needed a 3rd pitstop , but had some misfortunes in the final laps landing him 7th overall .

There were several other strong performances on the day , most notable being Ashe Revnik , who qualified way back in 20th and also like Moto raced in 3 races, for a total of 75 laps .
Ashe won the D race handly, start to finsih , with a closer race for 2nd being won by Racer Island's Brave Ashebourne. Ace Crabe in 3rd, Nella Bocarra 4th.

Ashe had to over come more adversity in the C race, where he fell back to 4th early on , but kept his eye on the prize, working his way to 2nd on lap 8, and was able to lead for a lap after Moto spun, Moto won but Ashe got 2nd and the advance to B group.

Saori Otsuka of Racer's Island, once again showed her skills in the C race, chasing Moto in 2nd for the first 7 laps of the race, but crashed big lap 8 falling back to 7th and eventualy finishing in 6th . Brave Ashebourne got up for 3rd, just beating Ramrods chief Ram Pharoah at the line , Ram 4th, Molly Fitzgerald finishing 5th just ahead of a late charging Saori.

Ashe did well in the B race , never further back then 3rd most of the race, was in 2nd a few laps , and even in the lead for a lap , but had a hard last part of race , eventualy finishing 4th , putting a commendable end to one of the better driving performances of the day.

The racers are off for a week but will return to race at the venerable PSU 1 track , thought lost at one time , but ressurected by Motorato Ware at her Hotspot sim. For me personally the word redemption first pops to mind, but mostly having bad luck at PSU 1 , makes me think again. It will be another good one .

A very nice video of this race and several other races this season, can be found at......
http://www.slodcast.com/

FormulaSL Round #5 in the Desert

This week we raced at Les White's brand new Desert track , a fast curvy track with fast times and lots of action. 28 drivers came out to brave the heat , with the Italian team in particuliar having a nice size cheering section, once everyone was descripted and ready, Race Director Yum Divesadero got the proceedings underway.

Annie Gufler grabber her 4th pole position , her AM Pro pit crew is honed to a knifes edge with the drivers championship already in sight , a 1 stop strategy scored her a 4th win of the season.
Racers Island Remon Franizzi finished 2nd after qualifying 3rd. Myself 3rd, after qualifying 6th,
Caz 4th, Jafo 5th, Yuriko 6th, Laney Recreant 7th and INDrive's Zaria Falconer 8th.

The A race was a bit of a wild one , lots of spinning and lead changes with Remon Franizzi and Caz freschi taking over the lead from Annie for several laps . At one point on lap 17, the top 5 cars were all very close to one another, at one point 5th place being 2.3 seconds behind the leader. Both Remon and Caz held the lead at this late point in the race, but in the end it was Annie's 1 stop strategy that go her the win, a very good race by everyone.

Yuriko qualified 7th overall and dominated the B race, leading wire to wire to advance, Zaria Falconer was strong in 2nd the whole way too . A closer battle for 3rd between Brave Ashbourne, Ashe Revnik and Ram Pharoah, with Brave getting 3rd in the end . Ram 4th and Molly Fitzgerald 5th .

The C race was all Ashe Revnik's... leading the whole race , with Ram grabbing 2nd for the advance . This race was another good one for places 3rd and down , with alot of good driving and passing, AM Pro boss Abacus Mimistrobell got 3rd and Racers Island's own Nella Bocarra 4th .

The D race looked like it was gonna Suzy Cuddihy and Rattra Raymaker easy for the advance to C, but Rattra fell back some and it was a race for 2nd , between Rattra , Abacus and Ace Crabe.
Ace fell out , but Abacus just barely beat Rattra to the line for the advance and the closest finish of the day .

Round 6th is in 1 week at Raver Bellow's own "Wide Track" in the RD Motorsports sim, we raced there last Bike season, but this is first visit in the cars , should be a fast close race.