Updated builds of Racing Rivals (v2.3) for all variants (e.g. 32/64bit, normal and hosted edition) are now available. Please let me know if you experience login issues with these latest v2.3 builds.

Thanks!

As usual, delete your old version completely when upgrading to the new version. Your existing licence key unlocks ALL versions/flavours of Racing Rivals!

Head on over to the download page to get started!

v2.2 of Racing Rivals is a minor update to correct a bug and also add multithreaded race downloads (so the initial synchronisation is now a lot quicker). If you are having no issues with v2.1 you don’t need to install this new update (but of course you are welcome to!)

As usual, delete your old version completely when upgrading to the new version. Your existing licence key unlocks ALL versions/flavours of Racing Rivals!

Head on over to the download page to get started!

• Extra filters added for the track and vehicle tables. Can now filter by road/oval discipline and also by track/vehicle
• Application now remembers your setting for Road/Oval/Combined when you close down the program
• Minor bugfixes including localisation issues with countries using commas (,) in place of decimals (.)

As usual, delete your old version completely when upgrading to the new version. Your existing licence key unlocks ALL versions/flavours of Racing Rivals!

Head on over to the download page to get started!

Racing Rivals Hosted Edition is a completely standalone application (so save it in a different location away from your main Racing Rivals folder) and will only deal with races from the hosted racing section of iRacing.

New in this version are:

• Ability to save logon details between sessions
• Faster downloading of race results (especially if you have a large racing history)
• A new graph for tracking your average incidents over time. Makes a very interesting view to see if you are improving with practice Can also be filtered by Road/Oval and also on a vehicle by vehicle basis.
• A new graph for tracking your average points over time. Like the incident graph, this can be filtered by Road/Oval and also by vehicles
• A new Track history report. Find out which track you perform best at – and which you struggle. Which tracks are the most dangerous incident-wise for you?

Head on over to the download page to get started!

The last few seconds of my Daytona 500

My iRacing Daytona 500 (iRacing members only!)

The 2012 iRacing Daytona 500 was a huge event with over 1600 racers taking part. In previous years this volume of racers has caused major problems with the event (such as major delays and even postponement) but iRacing have invested resource into changing the infrastructure powering the event to handle the large volume – and this year it paid off. The event ran without a hitch as my race session saw 38 race splits for a truly epic event (I made split 6).

The race itself was good fun with everyone taking it pretty easy and keeping it respectful, and we had long green runs for large portions of the race. I had two major incidents during the race – lap 123 had a pretty big wreck that I made it through (reasonably) unscathed.

Towards the end of the race I was in very good shape and firmly in the lead pack racing for the win. As we saw the ten to go my luck ran out when a car on the inside line completely lost control, demolishing my car and causing “The Big One”, sending me down the track on my roof for 500m+.

A 5 minute tow followed by a 5 min partial repair and I limped it home in 16th place. Still, not a terrible result and I saw the chequers, albeit 7 laps down.

Started : 35th of 43
Finished : 16th, 123 points (9 incident pts)
iRating : +27
Safety Rating : A/4.96 (-0.03)

About to get speared by a wayward Solstice

2012 iRacing Roar Before The 2.4 Results (iRacing members only!)

The iRacing World Tour once again features in 2012 and the first event was the ‘Roar Before The 2.4′, a one hour race at the Daytona International Speedway. The event saw a 60 minute multiclass event where the VW Jetta TDi, Mazda MX5 and Pontiac Solstice shared the track to compete in three separate class races.

I was very much a Solstice racer in my early days in iRacing (~2008) so welcomed the chance to race it again in a main ‘marquee’ event such as the World Tour so the choice of car was very easy for me.

A total of 787 racers took part in the Roar and my race session had 11 race splits (I was in the second split). A full race list of 41 cars took part in my race, with 9 Solstices (including me) – not bad for an entry list.

Unfortunately my race was severely affected by a collision on lap 2, just a few minutes into the 60 minute race. At the bus stop a fellow Solstice driver behind me lost control of his car, cut the bus stop chicane and speared into the side of my car leaving me with no chance to avoid their out of control vehicle.

Annoyingly that had me limp to the pits and repair my car, costing me several minutes of track time and put me a lap down. The rest of my race was reasonably uneventful as I just put the laps away and only gained positions when Solstice drivers ahead either crashed or blew up their engines! I was still pleased to make it back to 4th place out of the 9 racers in my class.

Started : 5th of 9 Solstice, 37th of 41 overall
Finished : 4th of 9 Solstice, 27th of 41 overall. 1 laps down, 106 points (6 incident points)
iRating : -6
Safety Rating : A/4.68 (-0.18)

2012 iRacing 2.4 Hours of Daytona Race Results (iRacing members only!)

The disappointment continued the next day with the weekends main event – the iRacing 2.4 Hours of Daytona. This main event has a chequered past for me. In 2010 (the first year of running) the event was not multiclass and generally was a big success. 2011 turned out to be a disappointment after not making it to the chequered flag. This year was unfortunately another disappointment but surprisingly (to me) it wasn’t due to it being multiclass, or me getting wrecked. The problem was hardware related.

1094 racers registered and formed 26(!) race splits. I was doing really well in split 6, having worked my way up to second by lap 11, only for my PC to lock up and blue screen! By the time I had restarted the PC I was mired in the back, around 30th place with a very long amount of racing left to do. I couldn’t really muster the enthusiasm for another solitary race just hoping to gain positions from the retirees so I called it a night and quit the race.

Started : 7th of 42
Finished : 42nd (last!) 81 laps down, 2 points (4 incident points)
iRating : -143 (believe this to be a record loss)
Safety Rating : A/4.40 (-0.22)

Here’s hoping the 2013 event improves on these results (it would be hard not to!). The next World Tour event is the fabled iRacing Daytona 500 on 25th February 2012.

Close encounters at the final chicane

The next event in the iRacing 2011 World Tour recreates the Formula One Belgian Grand Prix. Run on the same weekend as the real world series, this event sees the first time that the iRacing FW31 is used in a World Tour event.

Last years World Tour had a similar event to coincide with the British Grand Prix but unfortunately the FW31 wasn’t released fast enough to be used, so we used the Lotus 79 for a classic style event (my race writeup for that event is here).

363 racers participated in the event, forming 14 individual race events. I started 10th in my split (the fourth split). I was pretty concerned about getting wrecked in turn one (especially as I had been looking forward to this race for a long time and had put a lot of practice in) and sure enough it was a very messy start. Luckily I picked my way through the spinning cars and no-one hit my car.

I settled into what turned out to be a really enjoyable race. I had decided to go for a one stop strategy and it turned out that a lot of the field had chosen two stop strategies. So as the race progressed the cars that drove away into the distance at the start eventually came back into play once the pit stops had worked their way out.

In the final third of the race I checked the race order and found that I was in a very good position – all the cars ahead of me had another stop to make. Sure enough, I soon found myself in first place with a 10+ second lead, and brought it home for a very memorable win!

Belgian Grand Prix results (iRacing members only!)

Started : 10th of 26
Finished : 1st, 142 points (1 incident pt)
iRating : +50
Safety Rating : A/4.98 (+0.34)

There is a similar World Tour event in October to coincide with the Japanese Grand Prix at Suzuka – a great track.

The update is required in order to support the latest implementation of the iRacing friend/studied lists feature. Download the latest version 1.2.2 of Racing Rivals here.

I am also working on the feature list for the next major version of Racing Rivals which will include a wider variety of graphs and statistics reporting, along with bugfixes and sought after improvements. Look for that release later this year.

Finally, Racing Rivals is the product of hundreds of hours of development and maintenance, and is provided completely free of charge to the iRacing community. If you have found Racing Rivals useful, please consider donating to assist continued development – thanks!