The LeMans Adventure

Live broadcast from Long Beach

2010-03-26T20:43:00.002+01:00

Hopefully I will be able to stream live from my race @ Long Beach thru Livestream.
GRCE Live

Second Race for the season

2010-03-26T18:14:00.002+01:00

Tomorrow night we race the second race of the GRCE season.
We will be going to the narrow, damage inducing track @ Long Beach.

We have the following drivers lined up:

LMP1:

Paul Joseph, Dark Horse Racing, Epsilon Euskadi EE1
Emanuel Gaczella, Team KR3W, Epsilon Euskadi EE1
Rando Muru, Backmarker Brigade, Creation CA06/H

LMP2:

Gary Gray, Backmarker Brigade Tryard, Courage c65 - Ford
Jukka Kirveskari, Courage c65 -Mazda
Hans Birgander, Porsche RS Spyder
Rik Briant, TEAM BACKWARDS RACING, Courage c65 - AER
Nico De Bruyne, Dark Horse Racing, Courage c65 - Ford
Mike Ward, English Racing Knights, Porsche RS Spyder
Allan R Dean, Courage c65 - Judd

GT1:

Stacey Greensall, Team KR3W, Aston Martin DBR9
Martin Jones, Mountain Dew Racing, Corvette C6.R
Joonas Puhakka, Red Speed Grand Prix, Corvette C6.R
Hans Brauer, GRCE Ichi, Aston Martin DBR9
Steve Parsons, Aston Martin DBR9

GT2:

Priit Valja, Porsche 997 RSR
Kyle Williams, Torrent Motorsports, Porsche 997 RSR
Freddy Fuller, Porsche 996 RSR
Steven Martin, Porsche 997 RSR

Long Beach is one of the least forgiving tracks in this season. If you loose your car you will be forced to go into the pits for repair. There are only two places on the whole track where you can go off and still have a car to race with. Expect several drivers to have an extra stop to make.
My strategy for the race is to keep out of trouble.

This is the only race of the season that will have no time acceleration at all, 1 hour and 40 minutes just like the real one in April.

Comments from the Sebring race.

2010-02-19T20:16:00.002+01:00

"Worked it out last night. My shoulder is still hurting so I figured I'd work out how many gear changes I made.

Taking an average lap (and I did spin on a few of them) I changed gear 2280 times.

No wonder I hurt! "

"I had fun despite all the spins and one extra pitstop to repair damage. At last I´m in a right place in just about the right time, I have searched for a proper endurance league, and GRCE feels like a dream come true. This mod is just spot on above everything else... "

"I quit my previous league due to being tired of the driving standards getting worse and going unmentioned, so it was great to drive 2+ hours with some of the best driving I've seen online.

The fast guys weren't impatient, the slower guys didn't make things difficult.

Too bad it's a month until the next race!"

"At least there is plenty of time to recover from Sebring and to get to know Long Beach...Must think of something to fill my racing needs during this "layoff" though. You are absolutely right on the racing etiquette, very nice, clean racing. Enjoyed that very much, thanks!

First race of the season starts tonight

2010-02-13T16:33:00.000+01:00

This evening marks the start of the 2010 grc mad dog endurance league.

It's a small field of 14 cars in four different categories.

In the LMP1 class we have Paul Joseph racing for Dark Horse Racing, Marco Vandenbroeck for VDB Motorsports and Emanuel Gaczella in Team KR3W, all in the epsilon Euskadi EE 1.

The LMP 2 class has the most drivers tonight.

Mike Ward for English Racing Knights in a Porsche RS Spider,
Gary Gray for Back Marker Brigade Tryard in a Courage C65-Ford
Nico De Bruyne for Dark Horse Racing in a Courage C65 - Ford
Jermaine Venhorst for BackMarker Brigade in a Courage C65 - Mazda
Jukka Kirveskari in a Courage C65 - MAzda

In GT1 you'll find four entries all running the Aston Martin DBR9.

Hans Brauer for GRCE Ichi
Stacey Greensall for Team KR3W
Daniel Beck for Racingmates.se
and finally Steve Parsons.

GT2 has two drivers signed up for this evenings event.

Freddy Fuller in a Porsche 996 RSR and Steve Martin in a Porsche 997 RSR.

Will report back later with a small race report and perhaps some screen shots.

First race of the season

2010-01-28T12:16:00.003+01:00

Sebring 12 H : Sebring
Florida, United States February 13, 2010, 20:00 UTC This is the start of the 2010 GRCE season. Nine hard races on the American soil with a stop at Le Mans in France. Prepare for the hard and unforgiving airport surface of Sebring. Cope with the dying daylight and race into darkness. Race length: 144 minutes Game start time: 10:00 5x time acceleration February 13, 2010, 7:00PM

First test race GRCE

2010-01-28T12:15:00.004+01:00

Test race 1 : Laguna Seca
California, USA January 30, 2010, 19:00 UTC 120 minute test race. In game 12.00 start time, 3x Time Acceleration

GRCE Mad Dog Endurance League

2010-01-28T12:08:00.004+01:00

The GRC Mad Dog is an endurance series that consist of ten races beginning with Sebring 12 hours. We race up to 144 Minutes and accelerate the race accordingly. The series will start with a test race in January 2010 and start the 2nd week in February. There is also going to be AI present set to 77-90% to fill up the grid if necessary to the 2007/8 numbers in ALMS. We will follow the order of the races in the 2010 season. A total of ten races including Le Mans. This is a good way to get some license points as well since its open for B-licensee drivers.
Meeting Info
Meeting Format for races 17:00 GMT Practice 1. 18:35 GMT Qualifying. 18:50 GMT Warm-up. 19:00 GMT Race start. The event will start at the TrackLocalTime (TLT) and will be accelerated to simulate the change in day and night racing. As a test we will try to align with ALMS rules Traction Control Level 2 will be allowed, and 60-75% damage will be enabled.
Scoring Info
Each class have the same points: 1st: 25pts 2nd: 20pts 3rd: 16pts 4th: 13pts 5th: 11pts 6th: 10pts 7th: 9pts 8th: 8pts 9th: 7pts 10th: 6pts 11th: 5pts 12th: 4pts 13th: 3pts 14th: 2pts 15th: 1pt Bonus points are awarded as follows: (Awarded for each class) Pole Position: 2pts Fastest Lap: 2pts Most Places Gained: 2pt
Rules and Regulations
Teams Teams can enter as many cars as they like. Each team must nominate a captain who will be responsible for all communication before and during the event. They will also be responsible for there drivers behavior, so in extreme cases bad conduct by one car\member could result in all cars being disqualified. Drivers may only be entered for 1 car. General rules All drivers are expected to behave in a respectable fashion towards other competitors. Swearing in game will not be tolerated. The first instance will be punished by a stop and go and further instances will result in a team being removed from the server. Anybody causing an intentional accident will be removed from the server and banned for a period of time decided by the race administrators Chat box No using the chat box during qualifying or the race. At the end of session please make sure all drivers have finished before talking. Teams are encouraged to use the team speak system. Driving area Drivers must have two wheels within the boundaries of the track at all times. For clarification see GRC Driving Rules Drivers are expected to be aware of there surroundings during all sessions. It is forbidden to drive a car in the opposite direction of the race except and only to remove it from a dangerous position. Passing It is the responsibility of the following driver to make a clean pass. The leading driver may make 1 defensive move only Definition of a defensive move A lead driver may take a defensive line into a corner to make it harder for a passing move to succeed. You may make one defensive move eg. to the inside of the track or a tighter line. Once you have made the move, you must stay there and take the turn from that position, you may not move defensively again, this is weaving and is not permitted. A defensive move is one that begins before the car behind has moved to begin a passing attempt. If you move after the car behind pulls out, this is blocking and is not permitted. If the car behind gets an overlap with yours at the turn-in point, however small, you are expected to leave room in the turn for that car. If you are leaving room, you may not squeeze your opponent off the track at the exit. Drivers being lapped are expected to hold a consistent line and make it clear very early if they are moving off line. It is the responsibility of the lapping car to make the pass clean, however it is the responsibility of the car being lapped to allow the lapping car past at the first safe opportunity. At some points in the race a situation may arise where a car is able to un-lap itself. In this situation the lead car does not have to let the faster car through and it is the responsibility of the car behind to make a clean pass. Any driver who, in the sole opinion of the Stewards, alters their racing line more than once based on the actions of pursuing competitors, or uses an abnormal racing line to inhibit or prevent passing may be considered to be “blocking” and may be warned or penalized Pit Stops Drivers entering the pits are expected to move off line early and make it clear they are entering the pits. Drivers who when they can exit there pit stall find a car about to pass them must allow the car to pass before exiting there stall. When exiting the pits the blend line must be respected by all four wheels for its full length. Once the line have ended you may rejoin the racing line only when it is safe to do so. Classification Cars have to complete 70% of the distance covered by their class winner to be classified. Server failure Although we do not anticipate any problems if for any reason the server fails during the races, all competitors will have 15 minutes to rejoin the server. The race will then be started again in the order the cars were running at the time of the failure. The two parts of the race will be added together to determine the final result.

New hardware

2009-09-29T08:31:00.001+02:00

At last, enough hardware to max out my ATI 4850.

I got a sweet deal on an upgrade:

From a e2180@2.7 Ghz & 2 GB of RAM to an AMD Phenom II 720 BE@3.4 Ghz & 4 GB of RAM.

The wait is over...

2009-08-09T10:46:00.003+02:00

At last, the wait is over.
Enduracers has released part one of the ALMS/LMS/LM24H mod.
Eleven types of cars and glorious sound. Testing will commence now!

Enduracers Series v. 1.00

The long wait...

2009-05-26T08:56:00.003+02:00

We @ GRCE have decided to wait for the Enduracers ALMS mod.
As soon as it is released we will start the testing together with L2R.

VirtualR Blog about ALMS mod

Imagine this....Live racing with Real drivers

2009-05-06T01:17:00.004+02:00

I've just signed up for the beta of Real-time racing. I can see this has a future.
Imagine running endurance races at the same time as the real race with the real drivers!

Real-time racing Beta sign-up

Videoclip from NRK

Something wonderful is going to happen...

2009-04-20T14:36:00.000+02:00

Good things will come to those who wait...

What is the common thing about these words?

Porsche
Aston Martin
Panoz
Lamborghini
Creation
Euskadi

LeMans
Midohio
Nürnburgring
Lime Rock
Road America
Road Atlanta
Laguna Seca
Daytona

Things getting better... A brand new car

2008-06-07T11:21:00.002+02:00

One of my favorite mod-teams have release a LMP1 Car that is based on real data.

The Epsilon Euskadi

First trailer

The real Car

This is taking longer than expected...

2007-12-17T14:20:00.000+01:00

Hi,

A long time has passed since I posted any news here.
The rFactor.org league didn't turn out to be anything I wanted to be a part of.

The consensus from my drivers was to get out of it before we got any more
agitated.

The plan for next year is this:

Wait until the new Enduracers Mod is ready, then I will start the new and improved
GRCE league with a mix of tracks from LMS and ALMS.
The race length will be from 2H45Min to 24H reflecting the real lengths in the corresponding
series.

Some more news to come soon...

2007-05-29T07:29:00.000+02:00

GRC Lineup and teamnames

2007-02-15T08:50:00.000+01:00

This is the current list of drivers and teams in the GRC Endurance Teams roster:

GRC Ichi: NGT Ferrari 360 Modena
Lars
Steve P
Hans B

GRC Ni: NGT Ferrari 360 Modena
Martin B
Pär Ökvist
Stephen Manning

GRC San: GT Lamborghini Murcielago
Arron
Will
Sam M

GRC Go: GT Maserati MC12
Mike W
Martin S

The GRC Endurance Teams

2007-02-11T01:51:00.000+01:00

Just wanted to give a heads up on the situation:

The interest at GRC was a lot bigger than I anticipated.
We have +10 Drivers and 4 cars in the teams.

This is going to be fun.

Some bad news with a good twist!

2007-02-09T12:11:00.000+01:00

Just got an e-mail from former teamboss, I'm not welcome any more as a member in SBRC.
The e-mail was polite and I have no problems with that. A bit sad to leave a team that I've called "My team" for three years. The good part of all this is that I got my ass off the couch and began to do what I really want, start a new team with me as team owner. So I'm recruiting at the moment and will participate in the new Endurance.rFactor.org endurance league with one car and four driver including myself. The team name is not yet decided, but I'm negotiating with GRC to be the official GRC Endurance Team.

Race over. Broadcast over. Last GTP race in the books.

2006-11-26T21:40:00.000+01:00

Hi all!

Didn't have the energy to post after my second stint.

When I was going in for the second stint I found out that the first and second gear had gone and we where down to 3 gear. No problem really and I was soon on the track making progress. I was doing a 3 fuel run and was tired afterwords. Got the car into top ten and kept it safe and sound.

After that I did get something to eat and when I returned we where down to 2 gears. 4:th and 5:th. My team mate did a short stint and I adjusted the gearing in my setup. Back out on the track for a single fuelstint. Kept the 10:th place and was doing 3.46-47. Back into the pits for a driver change. My team mate got into the car and drove off.

After about 25 minutes the disaster hit, he was trying to get out of the way after a puncture and
did a long U-turn and was DSQ for driving in the wrong direction. So the final result for us this time:

10th place, 3 places better than last time out. And we were the best jaguar in the field.

Congratulations to Vader Trophy for first and Sim Racing for Holland for second and third place in the race. Awesome guys.

Good bye GTP, I will miss you, sort of, but not your unforgiving physics and car behavior.
Onwards toward rFactor.

8 Hours into the race...

2006-11-26T00:40:00.000+01:00

This is my in-the-race-after-my-first-stint race report.
We are in 17 :th place and running fine. There is 20 cars out of 33 still in the race.

Only 2 days left to the race...

2006-11-23T21:52:00.000+01:00

Hi!
A lot of thing has happened since last time.

Lost one driver
Lost another driver
Got the new 2006 track completed, and yes now we are running
on the same track as Le Mans 2006.
Broadcasting prepared (Details below)
Driving consistently 3.40, even on this new track.
Got a new driver, yes we can use two cars this year to, but only with
three drivers in each one.

To bad Cali @ Geekbrief couldn't find the time to report from the race.
Perhaps she can find the time after the race. Anyway, I´ll be co-hosting the
live broadcast when I'm not driving together with two other gentlemen.
If anyone want to listen in you can find us on Skypecast. Search for wosec and
you will find us. Skypecast is in beta so this is just a trial run. To use Skypecast
just install Skype and look for the link in the client or use this link:

Skypecast

This race is also the last race on the aging GTP platform. Next year we will migrate
to rFactor with it's ability for real time day and night transitions. And perhaps even
more cars.

New Track

2006-11-03T21:24:00.000+01:00

Hi again,
I´ve got some great news, some crafty people on the WOSEC bbs has changed
the layout of the 2004 LeMans track to the current 2006 edition. So this time
we really are racing on the same track as the real cars! To bad i´m not up to speed yet.
Only 3.47 so far. But that will improve after I´ve learned the new track.
33 Cars signed up so far. Only 4 spots on the grid left. We are going to have 1-2 broadcast cars on the grid for recording purposes, and if Cali can make it happened we might have some
footage from the race on her show. We´ll see. Nothing confirmed yet. And by the way,
Cali DOES answer her e-mail. It might take some time but she does take the time to answer.

More testing and some news

2006-10-22T19:31:00.000+02:00

Hi again,

More practise this week and avg 3.40-ish.
I´ve been communicating with Cali at Geekbreif and are hoping she will
decide to make a show / broadcast parts of this years race.

This is hopefully the last year we will be running GTP. Things are a foot to make the
crossing into rFactor land. Depending on when the ALMS/LMES mod will be out.

First practise for LeMans 2006

2006-10-09T01:17:00.000+02:00

Hi again!

Now it´s time again for the WOSEC LeMans race.
Done my first practise and got down to 3.41.5, not to bad.

This year I have three goals:

Get the car to the end of the race.
Get Cali Lewis to cover the race http://geekbriefwp.podshow.com
Get my own Pod show up and going, covering sim sports and WOSEC.

Race report WOSEC LeMans 2005

2006-06-24T22:41:00.000+02:00

Due to formatting issues will the report be here instead as a PDF.

LeMans Racereport 2005

Sorry about that.

One of the teams

2006-03-29T14:19:00.000+02:00

Fun while it lasted...

2005-12-02T02:33:00.000+01:00

Hi again it´s me.
Haven´t had the time to post because of RL issues.
What has happened you ask? Well to make a long story short we lasted for 16 hours and was in 8:th place as best. At 8:15 CET 27/11 my NR2003 program took a nosedive and I discoed. Result, a big crash into the tire barrier at the end of mulsanne at 200+ Mph.
And a car that got into the pit as a wreck. Neil C did a heroic effort to save the car by going out with the smoking remnants of a racecar and did a slow agonizing lap back into pit for repair but the crew just took one look at it and stated "That car won´t race no more today". How many cars lasted? 11 out of 34 entrants. We placed 13:th at the end.

This has been a fun adventure and I will get back to Le'Mans next year!
The WOSEC 24H Le'Mans race is one hardest races one can attend. And as one of the drivers stated: The only thing that is different with this and the real Le'Mans is
$1000000 and your life at stake. Same commitment and same team effort. I also want
to congratulate the two SFH (Simracing from Holland) cars that took first & second place, awesome work guys!!!

First stint ever in a GTP car is over

2005-11-26T20:49:00.000+01:00

First stint over and we are 5 hours into the race.
We have lost 1:st gear but we are in 17:th place.
I´m going to bed.

Practise and some news.

2005-11-25T00:50:00.000+01:00

Back from the track again, same laptimes and no problems running.
The bad new is that we are down to 7 drivers so we can´t use 3 cars.
We´ll be using the #2 and #4 car for the race. We are 5 drivers in car #2
and I got the honour of driving 3 stints unless something happens during the race.

Preliminary times, all in CET:

Driving:
18:00 - 20:00
06:00 - 08:00
12:00 - 14:00

Shotgun/replacement driver:
16:00 - 18:00
04:00 - 06:00
10:00 - 12:00

That´s all folks for now, I´m off to bed.

Practise, practise, practise....

2005-11-22T16:33:00.000+01:00

Yes, it´s me again.
Had a good session last night. One hour and 20 minutes of ok driving.
Avg lap 3.40-ish.

4 days to go!

It´s goin to be interesting too see if the Saubers really have that probplem with their engine lifespan. They are about 5-7 secs faster.

Good news and not so good news

2005-11-17T01:08:00.000+01:00

I´m back. After 2 weeks of XP and Server 2003. And the not so good news is that we still haven´t
got any new drivers. The good news is that I can run with 60 tape and 3.37 or better and keep that elusive 3.40 racepace :-). Starting to get a bit exited, only 10 days left...

Missing drivers...

2005-11-07T20:12:00.000+01:00

Hi,

Well practice goes on and I´m not improving really. Going for a fueltest with 80 tape on the car Tuesday morning. Just got the word from my teamboss that we are still lacking drivers. We desperately need two more drivers. So I´m using all my connections to get hold of someone that can drive. But this cool picture just arrived in my mailbox. One of our team cars #6, the one I drive in.

Short practise report

2005-11-04T01:26:00.000+01:00

Qual setup 3.39 despite the fact that I´m tired. 3.40 avg.
Race setup, not geared properly yet, 2:nd and 3:rd is not tall enough.
3.41.

Objective: Get down to racepace below 3.40.

And I´m getting there slowly. :)

Tonights practise

2005-11-02T01:13:00.000+01:00

Ho ho ho! I am so pleased tonight, did 9 laps with a new setup and behold!
3.37.9 and a new PB. And I feel that I have more to give in this car. The interesting part is that I should be able to keep a 3,40 race tempo with small modifications on the setup (grille tape, gearing).

Firewall trouble...

2005-11-01T22:01:00.000+01:00

Yesterday was full of troubles. :( I did manage to get a new PB on Lemans, but a couple of hours later my firewall gave upp on me. Or should I say its harddrive. And I had no new harddrives that the really old computer could use. I was using an old P166 as my Smoothwall, three years of perfect service and now it´s gone. After several hours I had assembled a "new" one. So no driving for me. I wasn´t finished until after 0300 in the night. Hopefully I can drive some more laps tonite
and get that elusive 3.35 I´m after.

Short test

2005-10-31T14:15:00.000+01:00

Did a new short test with the Qual setup. Down to 3.39 and lots more to get.

Sunday Start practise?

2005-10-31T00:47:00.000+01:00

Didn´t happen :(
Only 10 or so drivers showed up and I got a wee pit pissed off and insulted one driver totally out character. My bad. Tried my "new" Qual setup and realised that I´m faster in the race setup.
Drove a couple of laps and was makin the same time as usual around 3.42.
Talked to one of my co-drivers for the first time on ventrilo tonite, Neil. Very nice chap!
A bit faster than me too, down to 3.32 if I remember correctly. What else?
Yeah, been studying like mad for the exams tomorrow, shouldn´t have driven but couldn´t resist LOL. I´m going to be on the server every night from now on to hone my l33t skillz. (Big fat joke)
I´ll be lucky to get the car back into the pits for the next driver in one piece.

Tonites tests

2005-10-30T01:49:00.000+02:00

Well, this was the first short test at the server. Avg 3,48 not too bad. I´m better at staying on the black stuff. :-)

Only drove 8 laps. I´m still learning this difficult track, way to slow into both Dunlop Curves and Michelin Chicane. Must try too keep the speed thru the turns and accelerate sooner w/o spinning out. Got the top speed ok 208-209 Mph (334-336 Km/h) on Mulsanne. The climb into Porsche is fast 195 Mph(313 Km/h) and trying to stay above 135 Mph(217 Km/h) until I can accelerate out of Karting. Up to 183 Mph(295 Km/h) until braking for Ford Chicanes. Still haven´t figured out how fast I can go there? 85-90 Mph (136-145 Km/h)? Anyway, I got plenty of time after the exam on Monday 31th for practise.

Later this Sunday it´s time for some Race Start Practises, hope they are better this time. Last time was a total mess, got rearended by the same car TWICE. Hope people can understand that this is not a 6 hour short race but a loooong 24 Hour race. So there is no point in racing for the flag at the first turns.

Yesterdays night practise.

2005-10-29T12:56:00.000+02:00

Hmm, not so good tonite. Having trouble keeping the damn car on the black stuff.
Tired I supposed. I´m studying for my Netowork+ exams on Monday so that could be the cause.
Running 3.43 at the best but still avg below 3.50. I´m really waiting for tomorrow so that I can go online and practise "live".

Good looking cars...

2005-10-28T17:07:00.000+02:00

Just wanted anyone that reads this to have a look at the cars...
No, no pitbabes :-)

http://www.wosec.co.uk/sbrcphp/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=942

We will have access to the server 24/7 from sunday 7pm CET, good. I´m getting bored with driving offline all the time. My concentration just don´t last as long as it should when I´m not online. Practise online is the way to go.

/m00ndancer

Ok, first attempt at blogging :-)

2005-10-28T15:08:00.000+02:00

Ok, this is my first attemp to Blog parts of my life. This particular part has taken over my life recently, annoying wife and kids :-).
Whats the part? Racing for 24 hours on LeMans. I know many of you will think I lost my marbles (Is this guy for real?), but stay with me for a while. Ok, here´s the deal:

150+ People, 40 Cars and 27 Teams make up the Virtual Le´Mans 24H Race.

Driving what? GTP-mod cortesy of Redline. Think about it for a while, 150 mad simracers racing on a classic circuit for 24 hours, sweet! I´m going to report most of what will happend up to the race and then maybe report stuff during the race if I´m not to tired.

Atm, my time around Sarthe isn´t that great, only 3 mins 40,5 secs. Have to keep practising to get down to 3.35 at least.