[Simon Meisinger]

That race was great, if I would have been able to get Martijn at the end of the race, it would probably have been the podium I'd be the most proud about so far. Definitely not the most deserved, but the one I had to work the hardest for

[Andrea Piovanelli]

Hi ladies and gents!
Any intel on Spa strategy? I tried a bit of practice and can do decent lap times (meaning I'm not completely ashamed of myself, still need more practice for consistency). If I can find some time to practice in the next days, I may try and join a race in the weekend, but I never did an endurance race, neither a race with mandatory pit stops.
Thanks!

[Simon Meisinger]

Start with 85l and add 15l while you change tires.

It's possible to race the whole distance without changing tires if you start with the hard compound, so get into the pits whenever you feel like it. I needed ~90l in my race, so those 15l come with a high safety margin.

Don't forget to set your pit strategy before the race in the setup menu.

[Andrea Piovanelli]

Thanks, Simon! Today or tomorrow I will try to do a one hour practice, apply your suggestions and possibly save the setup.

[Donnchadh MacGarry]

I'm using Patrick Brown's setup for Spa that I linked to in the first post of the thread, he has one specifically for Spa. Its really nice, stable and fast. Fuel usage averages at about 3.4L per lap with that setup, the race is 27 laps long so that's 92L, so maybe use 95L just to be safe. You can add 16-17L in the time it takes to change tyres (10 seconds), so if you are definitely changing tyres you can start with 95L-17L=78L of fuel. However I recommend starting with the 95L, as it gives the option of not changing tyres when starting on hards and only adding 1L of fuel in the pitstop, which means you are stationary for 9 seconds less and can make a big undercut. So depending on how the race is going, you can decide to either switch from hard to softs, or not change tyres at all. See my post earlier about Imola where I go through strategy 1a and 1b, its the exact same here.

I made a huge mistake in last nights race, where I forgot to listen to past me about starting with the 95L to keep the strategy options flexible. Last week in Paul Ricard I couldn't make hards last the full race, they were awful for the last 10 minutes and I lost so much time while also struggling to not lock up and go wide off track. So at that track changing tyres in the pitstop was absolutely worth it in my opinion. I didn't have time to test making hards last for an hour at Spa, so I just (foolishy) assumed it would be the same as Pual Ricard, start on hards and switch to softs. Since I was thinking I would be changing tyres, I decided to start with 78L of fuel in the race last night. During that race, I was in a three way battle with Austin and Hugo for the lead. Hugo pitted early at the 35 minute mark and changed tyres. Before he pitted he was in first 2-3 seconds ahead of me where I was 3rd, with Austin in between us in 2nd. Austin pitted the next lap and didn't change tyres but I think he accidently added more than 1L of fuel which cost him some time, but he still undercut Hugo. I stayed out until the 45 minute mark keeping an eye on lap times. I noticed Hugo wasn't running much quicker than me and thought I could undercut by not changing tyres and adding 1L of fuel. I did that completely forgetting that this would leave me roughly 17L short on fuel. The undercut got me about 1-2 seconds ahead of Austin and 4-5 seconds ahead of Hugo I think. I was going well over the next two laps, I was managing the tyres without losing much time and felt I could keep it up to the end and hold onto first. Then I realised my mistake when I had less than two laps worth of fuel left with over 10 minutes to go, so I had to pit again for fuel which knocked me out of the opportunity for the win. In that second pitstop I changed to softs since there was no point staying on old hards and managed to set a lap 0.4 seconds quicker than my qualy lap. Austin ended up holding on for the win, beating Hugo by roughly 0.3 seconds, so that was a nail biter between those two and showed that not changing tyres is a possible strategy here.

[Andrea Piovanelli]

I'm using Patrick Brown's setup for Spa that I linked to in the first post of the thread, he has one specifically for Spa. Its really nice, stable and fast. Fuel usage averages at about 3.4L per lap with that setup, the race is 27 laps long so that's 92L, so maybe use 95L just to be safe. You can add 16-17L in the time it takes to change tyres (10 seconds), so if you are definitely changing tyres you can start with 95L-17L=78L of fuel. However I recommend starting with the 95L, as it gives the option of not changing tyres when starting on hards and only adding 1L of fuel in the pitstop, which means you are stationary for 9 seconds less and can make a big undercut. So depending on how the race is going, you can decide to either switch from hard to softs, or not change tyres at all. See my post earlier about Imola where I go through strategy 1a and 1b, its the exact same here.

I made a huge mistake in last nights race, where I forgot to listen to past me about starting with the 95L to keep the strategy options flexible. Last week in Paul Ricard I couldn't make hards last the full race, they were awful for the last 10 minutes and I lost so much time while also struggling to not lock up and go wide off track. So at that track changing tyres in the pitstop was absolutely worth it in my opinion. I didn't have time to test making hards last for an hour at Spa, so I just (foolishy) assumed it would be the same as Pual Ricard, start on hards and switch to softs. Since I was thinking I would be changing tyres, I decided to start with 78L of fuel in the race last night. During that race, I was in a three way battle with Austin and Hugo for the lead. Hugo pitted early at the 35 minute mark and changed tyres. Before he pitted he was in first 2-3 seconds ahead of me where I was 3rd, with Austin in between us in 2nd. Austin pitted the next lap and didn't change tyres but I think he accidently added more than 1L of fuel which cost him some time, but he still undercut Hugo. I stayed out until the 45 minute mark keeping an eye on lap times. I noticed Hugo wasn't running much quicker than me and thought I could undercut by not changing tyres and adding 1L of fuel. I did that completely forgetting that this would leave me roughly 17L short on fuel. The undercut got me about 1-2 seconds ahead of Austin and 4-5 seconds ahead of Hugo I think. I was going well over the next two laps, I was managing the tyres without losing much time and felt I could keep it up to the end and hold onto first. Then I realised my mistake when I had less than two laps worth of fuel left with over 10 minutes to go, so I had to pit again for fuel which knocked me out of the opportunity for the win. In that second pitstop I changed to softs since there was no point staying on old hards and managed to set a lap 0.4 seconds quicker than my qualy lap. Austin ended up holding on for the win, beating Hugo by roughly 0.3 seconds, so that was a nail biter between those two and showed that not changing tyres is a possible strategy here.

Thanks for sharing your experience, I'm hardly going to race for the win, so I'm probably going for the safest option of changing tires too, probably around the 40 minute mark. But I will in the next day try to practice for the longest session possible and see how I feel.
Thanks again, good luck for the next race and I hope to see you soon on the track!

[Simon Meisinger]

Off Topic: there are daily IMSA races (Audi 90GTO, Nissan 300ZX, Mustang GTO) at Raceroom right now. So if you always wanted to try Raceroom but not interested in modern GT cars, now's your chance (it's really great, btw.)

[Donnchadh MacGarry]

Off Topic: there are daily IMSA races (Audi 90GTO, Nissan 300ZX, Mustang GTO) at Raceroom right now. So if you always wanted to try Raceroom but not interested in modern GT cars, now's you chance (it's really great, btw.)

I won this weeks ranked content in a DDF stream giveaway so I want to give it a try.

[Hugo Hekkenberg]

Austin ended up holding on for the win, beating Hugo by roughly 0.3 seconds, so that was a nail biter between those two and showed that not changing tyres is a possible strategy here.

Yes it was. Unfortunately i was just to short. I also had a bad strategy. I did a pitstop half way. Started on hards and changed to hards. Not a good idea.

[Donnchadh MacGarry]

Austin ended up holding on for the win, beating Hugo by roughly 0.3 seconds, so that was a nail biter between those two and showed that not changing tyres is a possible strategy here.

Yes it was. Unfortunately i was just to short. I also had a bad strategy. I did a pitstop half way. Started on hards and changed to hards. Not a good idea.

Ah, I wasn't sure did you switch to fresh hards or go really early on softs. That explains why you weren't gaining at a really rapid pace on your first few laps of the second stint.