iRacing Basic Training: The Path Less Traveled – Chap. 6

iRacing Basic Training: The Path Less Traveled

Its time for chapter 6 of the iRacing “Basic Training Series”.  In this episode your host will explain some of the features in iRacing outside the sanctioned and official series. A good example are hosted races. These are races hosted by iRacing community members. Hosted races have no impact on your ratings. This has proven very interesting for iRacing members who might want to do a few races without the pressure and risk of losing iRating, and or Safety Rating. Also interesting is the fact that if a car is not running in the official series, you might still find competitive and exiting races in the hosted session list. If you want you can also host your own races, and invite members to your session. Hosted races can be setup to be open or private. For a private session you will be able to set a password.

A somewhat more serious side of the hosted session system is the league Racing part of the Simulator.  iRacing features all the tools you need to administer your own league. This way you can set up your own championship, and select the cars, tracks and rule set to be used. You can also set up your own League page within the iRacing system and include your own private message board and private messaging system. With a league you can make sure to have the same group of drivers competing on a week to week basis. You can define your own set of rules and set up the track schedule.

Another option for people to get involved is the Crew Chief option. From setting up cars, to directing the pitstops your team makes, it’s all possible. You can even download a telemetry package to analyze the drivers race performance in detail. There is also a spectate and spotter feature to try. You can spectate a given race and use all the available camera views. This is a great way to learn from the skills and mistakes by fellow iRacers. You can even take it one step further and join the race with a ghost car. This way you can drive your car in the ongoing race, without being seen of having any impact on the other users or the race itselves. This is a great way to practise handling traffic in an active race, and have a rough idea how your skills compare to the ones of the connected drivers in the race.

For the creative souls out there, the ability to paint custom livery’s for your cars, might become a hobby within the hobby. All the info and painting community recourses can be found on www.tradingpaints.com. Make sure to check it out if you are in to skinning cars.

So you see that iRacing can be much more than just a racing system. There are features available for just about every interest, turning iRacing into a full-blown virtual Motorsports system.