2021 NARS Virtual F3 Sprint Series
Introduction
F3 is a third-tier class of open-wheel formula racing. The various championships held in Europe, Australia, South America, and Asia form an important step for many prospective Formula One drivers. It has traditionally been regarded as the first major stepping stone for F1 hopefuls – it is typically the first point in a driver’s career at which most drivers in the series are aiming at professional careers in racing rather than being amateurs and enthusiasts.
Our short series will provide a great opportunity to try out this challenging form of open-wheel racing, using the Slow Motion Modding Group F3 mod that replicates the 2019-2021 versions of these cars with the final physics and tuned to the performances of the real cars, validated and tested by F3 engineers and drivers. For our races, we will be using the 2021 version of the cars only.
Race Format
Following the general form of the real-life races, each venue will feature a qualifying session and then 2 standing start sprint races of thirty minutes each as well as live weather. As in the case of the 2021 season, the top 12 qualifiers will be reversed for Race 1, and for Race 2, the Race 1 finishing order will be used with the top 12 also reversed.
Race Schedule
The 4 venues for the series will be as follows:
September
September 23 – Barcelona
September 30 – Hungaroring
October
October 7 – Zandvoort
October 14 – Circuit of the Americas
Car and Track Mods
Drivers wishing to race must be subscribed to the NARS Steam Workshop item at:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2341079087
This will ensure the cars and tracks will be downloaded and installed for the series.
Drivers Championship
There will be two classes of racing – PRO and AM as follows:
Both classes may use AUTO CLUTCH
PRO: (intended for more experienced drivers or those who are aiming to compete at the top of the field): may not use any other driver aids.
AM: (intended for those new to racing, still working on their skillsets or finding that ‘finding the time’ for preparation is a struggle): may also use AUTOBLIP/LIFT as well as ABS and TC on LOW. NO other driving aids are permitted.
Settings will be verified post-race using SimResults. A driver who has used aids in excess of those permitted for their class will be penalized 2 class positions in the race for each additional aid or level of aid used.
Choosing your Class
As this is a short series, there will be no ‘tailoring’ of the mod and so drivers will need to declare their PRO or AM status before their first race.
Drivers failing to declare their status before racing will automatically be classed as PRO. There will be no changes in driver class once a race has been completed.
Drivers may join in the racing at any time during the series without penalty.
General Information
Open setups, but we encourage everyone to share!
Custom Liveries
The series will use the liveries provided and drivers are encouraged to paint their own custom liveries.
Templates are available as follows:
Custom livery loading will be through the use of loose skins (or .mas file if the driver decides to paint more than just the car); please log onto the server a couple of days before the race so your file will get uploaded properly and avoid clogging the server on race day.
Car Numbers
Drivers choosing to design a custom livery are also encouraged to use their NARS number.
You may find/register your NARS number here.
Event Schedule
- 7:00 PM/1900 Eastern – Server Reboot / Practice
- 9:00 PM/2100 Eastern – Driver Brief/Announcements
- 9:05 PM/2105 Eastern – Qualification (10 minutes)
- 9:15 PM/2115 Eastern – Warm-up
- 9:25 PM/2125 Eastern – Race 1 (30 minutes)
- 10:00 PM/2200 Eastern – Race 2 (30 minutes)
Points
Points will be allocated separately in each class as follows:
- Pole Position from Q for R1: 4
- Pole Position R2: 0
- Race: 15, 12, 10, 8, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
- Fastest Lap each race (finisher in top 10): 2
- Hard Charger each race (gained the most positions from starting grid to chequered flag): 1
Drivers must start and complete 50% of a race to be eligible for points.
Drivers that DNF at any point in a race lose their eligibility for points.
CMS LiveRacers at https://cmsracing-com.liveracers.com/League will be used for race positions
Race Starts
- Standing starts will be used for all races in the series.
Orange Zone (OZ)
There will be an OZ designated for each race in the driver notes that will be posted to the NARS #F3-info channel and noted again in the pre-race brief. There will be an automatic review of the OZ post-race.
Pit Stop
There will be no mandatory pitstops.
Settings
- We will use the latest retail build of rFactor 2.
- The damage setting is 75%.
- Crash Recovery is off. That means your car can fly off the track and land upside down. Drive carefully!
- Driving View is open.
- The weather will be live.
- The server name will be “CMS F3 Track Name”.
- The practice server will be active 7 days before race day with no password.
- The race server will be password protected and the password will be available on the CMS Discord NARS #F3-info channel before server reboot on race day.
Race Communications
- We will use the CMS Discord rFactor 2 voice channel for race communications. CMS Discord is available at https://discord.com/invite/4ckmjPX. The voice channel is only required to monitor race control during the event. You do not need a microphone if you do not want to speak. If you have a microphone, please set it to “push to talk”. If that just doesn’t work for you, PLEASE set the voice-activated audio level up considerably so your coughing, wheezing or sim controls grinding isn’t “shared” with everyone else. Don’t be “that guy/girl”.
- Chatter during free practice is permitted and encouraged! For qualification and races, please be brief in your communication on Discord and talk only if absolutely necessary. One sentence then quiet is requested. No text chat AT ALL during qualification or race.
- Abusive and/or profane in-game chat, Discord, or forum post language may lead to that driver receiving a sanction up to and including a ban from CMS.
- Should a driver join the event server without being in the Discord channel, they will be sent 3 text prompts in rFactor 2 text chat to join the CMS Discord server. After the 3rd prompt, they will be removed from the race server by race control until they rejoin with Discord active and monitoring the race channel.
Competition Rules and Stewarding
- This series will conform to the CMS General Competition Rules that may be found on the CMS Discord Server. All drivers are expected to know the GCR and shall be required to abide by them.
- There are no live stewards. A post-race Incident Review Request may be submitted for adjudication with any resultant penalties to be served in the next race competed by the driver(s) at fault. The IRR form may be found at https://cmsracing.com/incident-report/.
- rFactor 2 system delegated penalties during races must be served. Race control will ONLY have the capability to clear penalties and driver DQ during practice on the race server and then AFTER qualification but before the race.
Connection Notes
- Drivers are strongly advised to reboot their computers just before joining the server on race day.
- Don’t use a WiFi connection. Only Ethernet cable connections are permitted for NARS events.
