New GridLife Touring Cup series
#26
So was the news that event at NOLA? I've been there once with GTA, they had poor turnout for two years and didn't go back. The best part was definitely being able to go party on Bourbon Street at night with everyone, I liked the event. Gridlife will probably have a better chance of drawing a crowd, the facility is large and the track is halfway decent. Just wish it wasn't 100% flat and way less bumpy.
#27
The news was NOLA. Great venue (paddock is yuge) and track is actually really fun, hopefully #GRIDLIFE can breathe some life into the place since like you say it's typically not a well attended track. I'm planning on throwing myself and doggo in the van and headed out for November road trip and going to NOLA whether car is ready or not (going to TC in Oct).
#29
The one thing I will say for sure is do not get caught outside at that track near dusk or dawn. If you camp out prepare to seal yourself inside your trailer/van/truck whatever and possibly invest in a mosquito net. They have the WORST mosquitoes I have seen in my entire life, huge clouds of them come out and swarm everything, bug spray and citronella candles aren't going do to ****. We learned the hard way on setup day when we got attacked and ended up running to a bunch of rental cars and hiding in there trying to kill the handful of mosquitoes that got inside with us. Luckily we were staying at a nearby hotel so just ended up heading out to go party at that point. During the day though it was fine.
#31
2022 rules posted.
2022 rules “provisional”
They're here https://docs.google.com/document/d/e...WZLvgjgv3u/pub
Tire rules changed drastically.
No more Hoosier, no more nankang CR1, or Goodyear 3R. GLTC has gone in the “traditional” 200tw direction, but stopped just shy of a spec Falken RT660.
Tire width chart by competition weight also removes the street tire width credit, so it’s previous Hoosier-sized 200tw moving forward.
Transmission options now pretty open and penalized accordingly. PDK/DSG/DCT/Sequential/Dogbox/whatever.
Any flat power/engine de-tuning is now penalized. 1-7% depending on the severity of detune. (Without an avg power formula, this penalty is subjective assessment by the rules folk)
Forced induction gets a stand-alone/additional .5% penalty.
Splitter rule re-worded to close an underbite allowance and now 3” max blade regardless of bumper overhang.
2022 rules “provisional”
They're here https://docs.google.com/document/d/e...WZLvgjgv3u/pub
Tire rules changed drastically.
No more Hoosier, no more nankang CR1, or Goodyear 3R. GLTC has gone in the “traditional” 200tw direction, but stopped just shy of a spec Falken RT660.
Tire width chart by competition weight also removes the street tire width credit, so it’s previous Hoosier-sized 200tw moving forward.
Transmission options now pretty open and penalized accordingly. PDK/DSG/DCT/Sequential/Dogbox/whatever.
Any flat power/engine de-tuning is now penalized. 1-7% depending on the severity of detune. (Without an avg power formula, this penalty is subjective assessment by the rules folk)
Forced induction gets a stand-alone/additional .5% penalty.
Splitter rule re-worded to close an underbite allowance and now 3” max blade regardless of bumper overhang.
#32
Assuming a standard 3% for good flat tune I think it's still the way to go. Using mini-bore + turbo modifer I come out to 184whp at 2350lbs (cut off for 225's) or 178whp for 3% flat tune. Would think flat tune would still be way faster in most scenarios, but it's certainly better than the exclusive 2% FI mod from last year, which made the 3% flat tune a no brainer.
#33
Yeah some interesting changes. I like most of them.
Anybody got any idea what the "spec tire" is going to turn out to be? I'm not familiar with every choice on the list... but looking like everyone will be on Falken? And for full wets maybe Extreme Contact Sport or or Pilot Sport 4S?
Falken RT660
Hankook R-S4
Maxxis VR-1
Federal 595RS-Pro or 595RS-RR
BFG Rival S
Bridgestone RE-71r
Kumho v730
Cooper RS3-R/RS
Continental Extreme Contact Force
Michelin SC2 Connect or Pilot Sport 4S
Transmission Penalties, good because dog boxes were previously no modifier. Interesting they allowed sequentials but they're penalized so hard probably not worth it, also it's by "approval only" so who knows what that means.
Interesting that they don't allow swapping in DCT's to other cars but maybe it was to stop a BMW DCT war so that's fine by me.
Splitter bumper overhang loophole closed. Cool.
The turbo modifier moving to 0.5% is cool but also kind of useless, if you're turbo and not manipulating your power curve for some degree of flat tune then I don't know what you're doing.
The wide range of totally subjective penalties for flat tuning is kind of lame. I wish they would just use math here for power under the curve.
Rewards weight also got changed to a percentage based system, which is good because the heavier cars were definitely effected less by a flat rewards weight system.
FWD handicap got cut in half, from -2% to -1%, good news for us RWD guys.
Rain lights, was thinking of doing one but guess I'll add that to the shopping list now.
Aftermarket ABS (like Teves mk60) is currently under observation, sounds like a modifier might be incoming. Not cool for the people that went through the effort to develop and install that stuff.
Also I don't really like how they did the season championship points. It's your average finishing position of a minimum of 20 races. But if you do more than 20 races, all those races still count towards your average. So if you only do 20 races you get a boatload more "drops" than someone that participates the whole season.
Anybody got any idea what the "spec tire" is going to turn out to be? I'm not familiar with every choice on the list... but looking like everyone will be on Falken? And for full wets maybe Extreme Contact Sport or or Pilot Sport 4S?
Falken RT660
Hankook R-S4
Maxxis VR-1
Federal 595RS-Pro or 595RS-RR
BFG Rival S
Bridgestone RE-71r
Kumho v730
Cooper RS3-R/RS
Continental Extreme Contact Force
Michelin SC2 Connect or Pilot Sport 4S
Transmission Penalties, good because dog boxes were previously no modifier. Interesting they allowed sequentials but they're penalized so hard probably not worth it, also it's by "approval only" so who knows what that means.
Interesting that they don't allow swapping in DCT's to other cars but maybe it was to stop a BMW DCT war so that's fine by me.
Splitter bumper overhang loophole closed. Cool.
The turbo modifier moving to 0.5% is cool but also kind of useless, if you're turbo and not manipulating your power curve for some degree of flat tune then I don't know what you're doing.
The wide range of totally subjective penalties for flat tuning is kind of lame. I wish they would just use math here for power under the curve.
Rewards weight also got changed to a percentage based system, which is good because the heavier cars were definitely effected less by a flat rewards weight system.
FWD handicap got cut in half, from -2% to -1%, good news for us RWD guys.
Rain lights, was thinking of doing one but guess I'll add that to the shopping list now.
Aftermarket ABS (like Teves mk60) is currently under observation, sounds like a modifier might be incoming. Not cool for the people that went through the effort to develop and install that stuff.
Also I don't really like how they did the season championship points. It's your average finishing position of a minimum of 20 races. But if you do more than 20 races, all those races still count towards your average. So if you only do 20 races you get a boatload more "drops" than someone that participates the whole season.
#34
The wide range of totally subjective penalties for flat tuning is kind of lame. I wish they would just use math here for power under the curve.
Also I don't really like how they did the season championship points. It's your average finishing position of a minimum of 20 races. But if you do more than 20 races, all those races still count towards your average. So if you only do 20 races you get a boatload more "drops" than someone that participates the whole season.
From purely competition standpoint the new championship rules might not make sense, but from GRIDLIFE standpoint of just wanting people to come out and race their homies clean for the sake of good racing it makes sense.
#35
There’s also thoughts that the best tire may be temperature dependent…like one might be better in the heat of the summer versus the spring or the fall.
I’m probably just going to order a set of RT660s and go from there…
#36
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The Conti ECF apparently is the quickest out of the options, but rumors that they chunk.
It seems like there are always rumors for tires though, so who knows. I certainly prefer the price of the RT660 too and I know Tom was having his fastest laps on them in GLTC towards the end of the race.
Not sure if the v730 will be a contender or not, but here's a TireRack on those 3 plus the excluded Yoko: https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests/testDisplay.jsp?ttid=273&tab=TestReport
For the bigger cars I'm wondering if one of the Michelins will be the wet setup
It seems like there are always rumors for tires though, so who knows. I certainly prefer the price of the RT660 too and I know Tom was having his fastest laps on them in GLTC towards the end of the race.
Not sure if the v730 will be a contender or not, but here's a TireRack on those 3 plus the excluded Yoko: https://www.tirerack.com/tires/tests/testDisplay.jsp?ttid=273&tab=TestReport
For the bigger cars I'm wondering if one of the Michelins will be the wet setup
#39
the rival s is still a very quick tire when setup well... still goes under the radar imho.
which street tire everyone uses will need to be more based on track temp, vehicle weight, and setup rather than put on a set of r7's and go.
the season points change is very good - emphasizes what's important to the series.
which street tire everyone uses will need to be more based on track temp, vehicle weight, and setup rather than put on a set of r7's and go.
the season points change is very good - emphasizes what's important to the series.
#40
Edit: I'm clearly not going to actually do that, but the idea of saving money by going to street tires have been rebutted by both top level autocross and "budget" endurance teams. Disallowing 40-180tw tires isn’t a magic money saving silver bullet, IMO.
Last edited by doward; 10-31-2021 at 03:51 PM.