Racing Happened, but not THE Race. Here's why

Yesterday was interesting. I started by running some of the newer cars, as I hadn't had much opportunity to get them on the track yet. As I was running, there were things that would bug me enough to need to work on them. As those things mounted, I realized that I wasn't at the place I wanted to be just yet. If I were to race the cars as-is now, there would probably be close to 20 that weren't in a place that I would prefer they'd be. It wouldn't really be fair to the newer cars to have them start when they weren't ready.

There wasn't much of a chance to race after seeing the stack of cars I needed to tend to. I suppose I could have started from the other cars, but then I'd need to run these ones sooner or later. 

I have noticed a little bit of a trend, and that is that every Thunderslot car I own seems to be improving rather than aging. They need little to no encouragement or extra setup. They just kick ass.

I have a little bit of everything to finish up before I'm ready for racing: A few NSRs, a Revoslot, a Slot.it, a Policar, a couple or three Thunderslots. I'll get those up and running shortly. 

I had a modified version of the layout I started with, but don't have any specs on it yet. I might modify it a little more, but I have to most a few things in the living room first. 

Okay, that's it for now.

A Few More Potential Podium Threats

 As I was giving the cars the once-over in preparation for the upcoming race starting Monday, I started thinking about all of the cars that have yet to race under the timer at my track. Many of the cars have been casually driven ONLY. That all changes in a couple of days. I'm excited by the idea, as it's something I've been wanting to do for awhile, but things. So now we're here, knocking on the door to race day, and here are some of the cars that could make a difference:

Whenever I see this car, I think about how beautiful it is. What I always seem to forget is just how fast this car runs. It's not a slouch, by any means. It's lightning-fast and quiet as can be, which is a lethal combination. And to think I've got two others. That makes the Ferrari a Top-10 finisher for sure.

This page consists of a handful of cars that came out and kicked ass right away. This Thunderslot Lola T-70 was one of them, often topping everyone else without much trouble. It excels at middle to long tracks, and still has the handling to compete on the short tracks. I expect this car in the Top-10 as well.

The Porsche 908 makes a great package for a slot car: short, tight, maniacal, head-snapping handling and speed. Short burst king. Doesn't slow down in the corners. I have FIVE of them, ready to go. This #1 might just end up #1.

Of course this is going to be on this list. There's no way I could keep this GT40 off this list in good conscience. This car is my benchmark racer. It's the car all the others look up to. It was the first car I got, and it's still one of the best cars I have. It's clocked way more miles than any other cars I have by far. I would be surprised if this car didn't land in the Top-10.

If you've been following things around here, you'd know that the Slot.it Matra 670-B is the car that I think makes for one of the best slot car racing packages available. Although a middle and long race special, it's short front end gives it much tighter handling than you'd expect. Couple that with a nice long wheelbase and you've got a mighty fine all-rounder. Top-10.

And then I pick up this car. Holy crap. NSR's GT40. That right there should scare the pants off most competitors. I couldn't even begin to tell you where this guy is going to end up, other than it'll be very near the top, I'm sure. From early laps, the sky's the limit with this guy. Contender.

Another selection that very much wants to remind me that there's no way of telling whose going to win this, one of the FIVE NSR 917/10's that I have will certainly have a say in who does. Basically the big brother to the 908, except with a harder head and a more aggressive attitude. Another great racing package. Contender for sure.

The Alfa. There's always the Alfa. Sleep on this one and you'll regret it. It has won so many races, set so many lap records, beat cars I never expected it to beat. And it still does it. Not afraid. Very not afraid.

Well, there you have it. A handful of cars, for your consideration. I think the winner is somewhere in these last few posts. 

I've decided that each race is going to be a single, timed 100 lap race. At first I was thinking 50 heats with eliminations, but there will be a lot of cars, and I want to have some time with each of them. I've been through this before, and I always swear to myself that 100 laps is the way to go, so I'm going to do that. It'll make the overall race a little shorter, but that's okay. The field will spread out a little, which is needed as they're running so close to each other. The length also gives each car a chance to run as many good laps as it can. It's easy to fall in and out of a groove 3 or 4 times in a 100 lap race. The car that stays most planted and can get a good flow is going to win it all. 

Also, scoring. I'm going to go ahead and give points the entire way through the field. from 0-54, with single point gaps up the field until you get to the Top-5, where extra points will be available. This will make the race to the top much more worthwhile. So Top-5 cars will get their standard points, with 5th getting 50+1, 4th getting 51+2, 3rd getting 52+3+1 podium point, 2nd getting 53+4+2 podium points and First getting 54+5+3 podium points added. So it goes up steadily and then curves pretty dramatically. That's an 11 point difference between 1st and 5th. That should make for some interesting challenges in later races. 

Track Design for 1st Race

The layout for Monday's race will be one of the following tracks. I haven't decided which one yet.

 

This track works mostly due to fit. I don't usually like having one end a boring 180° turn. We'll see.

This layout is good, and would probably be better if I replaced the 1/60 Switchback with a 3/30 or something a little quicker.

This one purely for that backstretch. I mean, it's practically straight. You should be able to haul ass through that without cracking up.

The Mind-bender. Seriously though. It bends your mind. I've never had a layout do that before, but the effect is really something. Fun track, slightly longer lap times.

This one I probably won't run due to how much space it would take up. Bummer too as it's a really fun layout. Very fast with those massive curves.

This might be the one. It's got the massive curve element like the one above, yet a slimmer overall design, which helps where it's going to sit for at least the next few days while I try not to trip over it. 

And yes, my daughter did come to stay the weekend, so plans have changed until Monday. Cars are ready. I'll spend Sunday evening building the track and getting everything setup for an early Monday start. 

Delay of Game and Quick Track Re-Think

 A few real life things got in the way of starting this morning. By the time I got back, I knew I wasn't going to be able to start, so I'd at least get the track down so I don't have to worry about it tomorrow. Long story short: since I changed my living room around a little bit, I have a little more length but a little less width than planned for the layout I wanted. 

So I'm going to redesign the layout. Nothing special. I'm going to go through some designs from the past and see if anything sticks out. There might be a thing or two. If not, I'll do it on the fly. Basically long with a little flow to the straights to keep it going in the right direction. I can blossom out one of the sides to give it a little more technical challenge on one end. I'll also probably take out the Poang chair and tip the sofa on its side. That'll give me the most room. 

There's about a 20% chance that my daughter is coming for the weekend, which will postpone all of this. That'll only happen if my ex's plans change, which they could. If that was the case, I'd probably wait until Monday to start. Otherwise I'll finalize the track plan tonight and hopefully set it up too.

Various Championship Notes

The Constructor's Championship

 I wasn't originally planning to add a Constructor's Championship because I kind of didn't want to have a particular brand stand out amongst all the others. But the more I thought about it, that's what's going to happen anyway if I didn't do it, so I might as well do it and get a definitive answer. After all, for most of the brands I have a pretty good representation of their lines. With the exception of Carrera and Policar I have over 10 cars of each from the big manufacturers: NSR, Revoslot, Slot.it, Thunderslot. I should be able to have a fair constructor's championship from this batch. Here's how it'll work:

Each manufacturer will take their top car's point totals at the end of each race as their constructor's numbers for the race. For example, whichever NSR car scores highest in the race, that race's point totals are transferred into the Constructor's Championship point totals, and so on for all six brands. This way there are six competitors. Some brands only have one car to choose from. The Policar will always be taking the points from the Ferrari, and the Carrera will always be taking points from the 918, no matter where they finish in points. 

If I was going to make any predictions, I'd say this: since this is a race where some brands have so many cars possible to score high, I don't expect Policar or Carrera to have an advantage. Based on the driving I've done with the various cars, and considering that many of them haven't even raced yet, but only ran development laps, I'd have to say that I think Thunderslot probably has a slight edge. I expect NSR to be very close to them, however, and it could come down to the last race before it's decided. Slot.it should also be right up there against everybody, and I expect good things out of some of the newer cars. Plus there are always cars like the Matra and Alfa that could win it all. Revoslot is the tricky one, because what I've noticed when running them is that they all do pretty well against each other, but none have raced competitively yet.

__________

The Team Sponsors Championship

At last count I have somewhere around 8 different race teams: Gulf, L&M, Shell, Sunoco, Rothmans, Tergal, Jaegermeister, Chaparral, Kausen, the Hippies, and maybe one or two others. Some teams have gained more teammates as time has gone by, and some teams are an exotic collection of various cars. The rest are single car journeyman teams.

This will be treated similarly to the Constructor's Championship in regards to points carrying over from each race, but in the Team Sponsors Championship, the top TWO cars from each team carry their points over. A team consists of minimum 2 cars. 

More Notes...

I'm going to change the points to cover all the cars. The last car will get 0 points, then they'll work up by one until around 5th place, where they'll start to jump a little. It'll end up handing out a crazy amount of points, but that's the way it goes when I'm racing 55 cars. I don't want any of the cars to be left at the end of the race with no way to explain themselves, and point totals are going to matter more than anything else. 

I'm going to run an exhibition race between the F1 cars. I don't have enough to make a complete class out of them, which is why they aren't in the big race. But if, as time goes by, it starts showing that the Revoslots are going to run in the own lap time bracket, then I'll include the F1 cars and give them their own class so they can run laps too. I'm expecting the Revoslots to be, for the most part, competitive with the other brands.

So yes, things have changes since the last couple of posts, but as usual I'm going to leave them there to document the process. Nobody reads this anyway. 

If you happen to be a manufacturer and don't see your brand car here and wonder why and would like to do something about it, contact me. I know you aren't reading this, so it doesn't matter, but if you were, then contact me and we'll discuss entering a few of your cars into this race. Gotta act fast, though. Once the race starts, that's it. No latecomers. 

Preseason Final Tuneups

 So far things are going off as planned. Yesterday I went through the last four cars and lubed/oiled and setup the chassis. Tomorrow comes the tire truing, and with any luck, track laying. It's cold outside, so I'm staying in and it's giving me a great opportunity to do this. 

The Ferrari and the M6B had already been lubed/oiled, so I flared the brushes and set the chassis to my standard "on the loose side of snug", with plans for fine tuning when the track is together. Before that can happen, I need to do some living room cleanup and organization so I can get the track layout down. I'm planning on going with this:

There are a couple of reasons I like this layout: first, the big loop is actually a bit of a brain teaser, as the entry and exit to the loop line up, so your eyes tend to keep going down the straight and not turn into the loop. I know you'd think "no it doesn't", but trust me, it does. The other straight goes under the loop, which I think adds to the mind-bendedness of the loop entry. Also, I like that I get a little bit more challenge out of the layout. I'll be able to go quite fast through the blue curves, but I'll need to be careful going through the brown ones. I'll be on the inside lane the entire way, which is also challenging. This is also a track I wanted to revisit after trying it the first time. There are a handful of layouts I want to go back to. This is just the first one that popped up. I think I might be able to add a straight or two.

The Ferrari is gonna be a hauler, no doubt about it. I expect good things from this car.

Timing of events are coming out well. I figure I've got about an hour's worth of tires to true and I'll be ready to set up the track. I'll of course be cleaning all the track pieces and making sure everything is up and running before race days begin. 

My plan after the track is setup is to begin a 'test and tune' session, where each car will get a handful of laps to get a look and have any adjustments made. This will be as much pre-race setup as I want to be doing to the entire field. After that it'll be dealt with on a more individual basis. So each car will get some untimed laps to work out on for a bit before the racing starts. I'll be taking a look at tires especially, and will go to replacements if needed.

oh....nothing. I'm just going to put this here....

A couple of quick observations:

1. I'm thinking that having only 20 cars receive points after the race might not be enough. I might extend that to 40 cars, so the rest of the field has a chance to sort themselves out a bit. Plus, having 15 cars missing out on points is a lot better than what I have planned now.

As of tonight's count, I have 55 eligible cars for these races. A full 35 cars will be eliminated and receive no points for the race, since a car needs to finish in the top 20 to score points. I can tell you that the cars run so close on my track that there are going to be a load of upsets. When more than half the field will be going off with 0 points, that's gonna hurt. We'll see how it works. If it's a disaster, I can change it on the fly and can back-credit points. The 20-car plan might sort out after a few races and actually work. If not, then I'll do that. Although the more I think about it, the more I like 40 as the cutoff point.

2. It's practically anybody's race. The track layout design is one that doesn't offer much in the way of long, fast straights, which levels the playing field for a lot of the cars. 

3. As I'm doing preseason testing, if I find the Revoslot cars are going to run off pace, I might consider the class addition. We'll see about that. They'll still race as they would normally, just their scoring would be slightly different. While still getting points for whatever place they come in, they'll also have their own separate group. So they'll have their own championship inside of a championship. Nice thing is I can make the decision to do it after the race has been run. That way I can see if it'll actually be needed or if the Revoslot cars will be directly competitive with the plastic chassis cars. 

4. Gonna be a long setup, but now that the holidays are out of the way, I don't have much blocking me. I might actually have a little more room these days, as I moved the drums to a practice room and pushed the TV back, as well as rebuild the Lego build area. 

5. I haven't done any photography lately of cars as I have been mostly setup for video and working on a project for a friend. I'll get that up and running when the time is right as well, and likely run video as well as pics. Still, I want to race, so I might not do any video so that I can focus on the racing for the time being. I miss it and want to do it. The camera will naturally come out, but I might not get wall-to-wall coverage of the first one. I am a one-man operation after all.

None of these cars has raced in anger yet.

This is going to be pretty monumental around these parts. I don't expect anything less than epic racing. One thing I did over the past 10 years is amass a pretty epic collection of racing cars. There are so many potential contenders that I really don't know how deep into it I should go. The more I think about it, the more I think that well over 3/4 of the field has a shot of winning this thing. That's really saying something. Considering how close previous races had been with the field before, I fully expect there to be more of that, with likely some pretty close calls coming forward. 

But when I look down the list of cars, it's just going to be crazy good. The tight track will slightly favor the shorter cars, putting all the 908 and Elva and such in a really nice position. I'd expect good racing from the 917/10s, the Lolas, the 512Ms....I could go on. It's insane to think about. I can't put a top 3 together, or even pick a winner. So I'll be focused on making sure each car is running well prior to the race, and they can sort out the rest of the details.

Why Do I Do It This Way?

 In the 10 years I've been doing this blog, I don't think I ever explained why I approach slot cars the way that I do. I don't think it's particularly weird or anything, just a little different. If anything, I'd say it's a slightly refined approach to what most people do anyway. 

My attitude with slot cars has been pretty consistent through the years: what comes in the box should be good enough for the car to run, and with tweaks it can run even better. Sounds realistic to a lot of people I'm sure. And I learned that, for the most part, that's true. I'd say the only thing that would probably be a needed replacement on many cars would be tires. Other than that, they should run well out of the box and better once set up. 

I guess you could say I have expectations, but if I'm paying 70 bucks plus for a car, I'd like it to not only run, but run well.

Naturally there are racers at clubs and even at home that go way above and beyond any of this, and that's great. This is in no way a claim that my way is better than anybody else's. In fact, I don't even think it's "my way." Feels more like just a way. And that way is to get the most out of the car that you bought without having to fork over for replacement parts just to get it to compete.

Thankfully many brands of cars these days run a similar setup, so it's possible to race other brands against each other fairly and competitively. This blog is proving that.

So I'd like to be able to buy a car from a manufacturer and know that it would run fine out of the box, and I think these days many manufacturers do just that. I will tune them and tweak them 'til the cows come home, as is my right. But I'm going to do so without motor swaps or expensive higher-performance parts. Sure, I have a handful of screws and such for when I lose one, and I have loads of replacement tires for when they are needed, but I generally don't do anything upgradey to the cars I run. I want to see if what the companies make will do the job. Sure, occasionally I'll get a car with problems, and I have before. But those were all individual events and not design flaws. And part of the fun is getting those cars to work well despite whatever problems they might come with. With some it's an uphill battle, but with others it's a success when they show improvement.

Something like this McLaren M6B, which has absolutely no design flaws, slips in all quiet like so nobody notices. Then WHAMMY! Wins it all and is Champion of Life [or something equally important]

I have enough cars now to do loads of different comparisons. Makes, brands, teams, constructors...and others that I'm sure I can come up with. I'm curious to finally find out what is the fastest brand on my track, and I think I have enough samples to come to some conclusions. Setting up a series of races and getting some good endurance challenges out of them should help figure that out. Running 57 cars can take awhile, so I'll likely do long races over multiple days. Short races are unsatisfying. I'd like to run 100-lap heats if I can, and do them in small groups so I can spend a little time with the cars as well. Then do updates here with pics and all that.

You might be wondering how the different brands of cars can compete against one another. Some are clearly more expensive than others, and some brands have the reputation of being the fastest and the best. But when cars across all manufacturers are made with similar motors and parts and construction, it's possible to tweak a car to get more out of it, which makes it more competitive. I've had plenty of examples of various brands being hundredths off from each other on lap times. After all, they might look good on paper, but they still have to race. And I will be trying to get the most out of each car. As the series goes on I'll tweak and tune the cars so they can remain on equal footing throughout the competition. I'd be hard-pressed to believe that anybody would run away with it, rather it could get pretty hairy towards the end. I have my suspicions and predictions going in, but I don't know how confident I am in some of them. I've seen enough with these cars to know that pretty much any car could win at any time. I can think of a half dozen "favorites" to win it all out of my collection.

So there it is. I hope this somewhat explains what I'm all about and why I do it this way. I'm excited to find out just how well these cars are going to do. Will it be some hotshot from outta nowhere or some 10 year-old car that's just going to spank the britches off the whippersnappers? Will the Gulf Team reign supreme? Or will it be some journeyman in an Elva? Do tires matter, and if so, will replacement tires give cars an edge over others? What about the cars running the secret gaskets? 

There is so much pre-season drama building. This should be an exciting series. I would expect more to unfold over the coming days.