My Pursuit and Win of the Radical Challenge Division 9 Championship at iRacing.Com

[davidan]

Well I ended up doing it. I was able to win my division (Division 9) Radical Challenge Championship in iRacing 2009 Season 2.



I would score a total of 547 points and have a pretty good battle with Andrew Short (490) and Albert Coito (433). I would finish in 1st in the division out of about 55 drivers or so ... I missed the first race of the year in the Radical at Sebring and I missed another race a few weeks later at Birmingham. I would manage 2 Top 5 finishes in the 8 weeks scored, and my highlight races were Lime Rock Park, Road America and Homestead all where I scored really good points in those races with good strength of field.

At any rate this was pretty hard for me as I had to really find the time to practice for each track a little during the week as the iRacing Physics Model has proven to be challenging in the Radical. I have to admit I really did not like the way the car felt after the first couple of races, but once I learned how to drive it a bit better and was able to get a couple of comfortable setups it definitely became a lot funner car and I really ended up liking it quite a bit in the end.

This year in Season 3 I am planning to run in the Riley Prototype Championship. Not sure what Division I will end up in yet, but we'll have to see and I can set some goals to see how I do.

[BuckG]

[vendsale]

Congrats David! Hopefully you'll get one of those cool Divisional Championship Certificates. The radical is definitely a tough car to get the hang of, great job on sticking with it!

You'll love the DP after racing the radical. It's just as fast but a lot less nervous. I am still have a lot to learn about driving the DP.

[Rickypro]

Congrats David! Well done!

[davidan]

Congrats David! Hopefully you'll get one of those cool Divisional Championship Certificates. The radical is definitely a tough car to get the hang of, great job on sticking with it!

You'll love the DP after racing the radical. It's just as fast but a lot less nervous. I am still have a lot to learn about driving the DP.

Kris would you say that the DP and Radical have similar laptimes or is the DP faster or slower?

[vendsale]

The DP is faster but not by much. On tracks with longer straights where the DP can stretch it's legs it will take a couple seconds out of the Radical. The laptimes are pretty similar for the most part though. It will probably take a few practice sessions to get the hang of the DP after driving the radical all last season.

Here's a few of my thoughts on the DP.

The first thing I noticed when I jumped into the DP was the weight of the car. It's easy to over drive it into corners and interpret the setup as tight. Easy in, early on the throttle out, is the best way to find time in this car for me.

Studying the fast guys replay videos on youtube is another way I have improved my driving. It really helps me get acclimated to tracks faster.

One thing I noticed is how much the fast guys slide the car around slower turns. It's not a drift or anything but you can really feel it (and hear it) when you get it right. It requires going the perfect speed and turning in at the right place. It really only applies to very slow, sharp corners. For example, the last turn at silverstone, the last turn at Infineon, or one of the sharper turns on the infield of Daytona. The slow corners were definitely a place where I felt I was losing time. I felt like I never could keep enough speed up through the slower corners. This may change with the new tire modeling though.

http://www.orionraceteam.com/ has some great setups by Shawn Purdy. They can be quite a handful sometimes though.

Ian Lake also makes some great setups that seem to suit me a little better because they aren't quite as "on the edge" as Shawn's. You can find his setups in the DP forum, http://members.iracing.com/iforum/fo...pa?forumID=435

[davidan]

Thanks very much Kris that is very helpful ...

[TimCollier]

Congratulations David!

[Joe Owens]

Congrats! David!

[davidan]

Thanks Guys I really appreciate it!!! Was a fun journey! Thanks for all the support. I wish a few more of you were over on iRacing too -- but maybe we can get things going a bit more when they offer a private league option -- on a Saturday night or something.