[Donnchadh MacGarry]

I must agree with Simon, if you can't do starts then you shouldn't race online as you'll only end up causing an accident for everyone else. Its very easy to set up an offline race against a field of AI with you starting in the middle of the pack. You can practice your starts there and repeat it as often as you like. Before each race I do on SRS, I like to do an offline race against the AI where I so my practice start and then spend the opening lap holding my position, even if I could easily make an overtake. This allows me to figure out how much earlier than usual I need to brake to avoid the cars ahead of me and which are the corners are most likely for cars to bunch up on, the first turn being the most obvious one. For tougher car and track combinations, I do more than one if I feel I need to.

On a similar note, and this might or might not apply to you, I think if a beginner (or any driver really) can't do multiple laps in a row without crashing, spinning or going off track with a particular car and track combination, then they really shouldn't be racing it online and would be far better off doing some offline practice. When I first got my wheel, I spent my first few months practicing offline. It allowed me to develop an understanding of a racing car's physics and finding my limit with that car so I could drive it for many (and I really mean many) laps in a row at a consistent pace with no spins or crashes. It took plenty of purposeful practice but was more than worth it, as I felt I had become a relatively consistent, safe and reliable driver which is more important than anything else when racing online. It was only after that point I felt I was ready to begin to push myself for pace and started racing online. Even now after over two years since my first online race, I still make sure I've got some offline practice time done with a car and track combination, until at minimum I feel I can lap safely and consistently, before I race online.

I feel its important and the responsibility of every driver to practice these things before racing online, so we don't cause accidents that ruin the race other drivers. If you were learning the guitar, you would do plenty of practice alone before trying to perform in front of others, so as not to make a fool of yourself. The same applies here.

[Jay Gabriel]

You don't need to try and time the starting lights. Just be ready, when all 5 red lights are on, keep the RPMs up and be ready either pop the clutch or drop it into gear.(depends on the car)
It's not like Drag Racing where a .010 reaction time.

[Florian Wolfsgruber]

1) Get familiar with how to setup your car even if you want to race in a locked setup event. This genrally gives you some deeper understanding of how grip works and the different ways to generate it.
2) Do some long races (1 hour+) to deal with tire management. This might not be as much fun as hotlapping but if you never deal with tires you will be the typical fast qualifyer but slow-when-it-counts racer.
3) Do some short races with 100% agression AI to practice starts with reckless drivers.
4) Play other challenging sim games as well. I personally profitted from driving Rally. Might not seem like the most obvious choice for someone wanting to drive taramc events, but it helps you to quickly adapt to difficult circumstances and significantly change your driving style to be at the top of your game (Quite a few amateur sim racers don't ever adapt their driving style at all which is just extremely ineffective)
Last but not least, practice makes perfect. Just keep going and your times will eventually improve.

[Donnchadh MacGarry]

1) Get familiar with how to setup your car even if you want to race in a locked setup event. This genrally gives you some deeper understanding of how grip works and the different ways to generate it.
2) Do some long races (1 hour+) to deal with tire management. This might not be as much fun as hotlapping but if you never deal with tires you will be the typical fast qualifyer but slow-when-it-counts racer.
3) Do some short races with 100% agression AI to practice starts with reckless drivers.
4) Play other challenging sim games as well. I personally profitted from driving Rally. Might not seem like the most obvious choice for someone wanting to drive taramc events, but it helps you to quickly adapt to difficult circumstances and significantly change your driving style to be at the top of your game (Quite a few amateur sim racers don't ever adapt their driving style at all which is just extremely ineffective)
Last but not least, practice makes perfect. Just keep going and your times will eventually improve.

I like your point on using a rally game, it really teaches how to control a slide with throttle and wheel inputs since its happening all the time there. So then when it happens driving cars on Assetto Corsa that aren't ideally meant to slide, you know how to tell when the slide begins and what to do to catch and correct it before you spin out. I used to drive the Lotus 49 a load early on. It was very tough as a beginner, but like a rally game it really teaches you on how to control turns and slides with your pedals and wheel.

[Andrea Piovanelli]

Along the lines of improving as a total beginner is there anywhere you can go to say practicing starting against the lights etc as opposed to trying to come to grips with it at the start of a session. For us beginners its all happens pretty quick on the start line and if you are not sure what's coming next etc things happen. I find I am getting penalized for jumping the start because I am still not quite sure of the exact sequence and timing etc. Are there tutorials for SRS?

Don't worry too much about perfect starts, most of the times you don't really need your reaction to be perfect because, based on what I see on SRS streams, even super fast drivers don't seem to care too much about that particular skill.

Again, thanks everyone, just practicing and understanding the car the ways you suggested is visibly improving my driving (now I'm only doing practice laps with MX-5 @Brands Hatch), my fairly consistent pace is now around 1.44, so still a bit slow, but going down daily.

[Michal Ringes]

You should mix some other cars to your practice, lets say you practice mx-5 a lot now, just try some laps in other cars on the same track. Choose cars that are very different from what you drive now, lets say some old f1, some prototype car, modern formula, gt cars. You will see that this will help you improve overall, feeling the differences, aplying things from one car to another even tho it might seem those cars have nothing in common, seeing the difference in how the driving style suits what car, feeling limits of those cars. it may easilly happen that you do this and then come back to your standart car and be much faster and feel that it is way easier now, also it will make you way better driver over time. it may become kinda hard at some points to improve when practicing all the same all the time, also it will feel like way more fun and not just a grind

[Andrea Piovanelli]

You should mix some other cars to your practice, lets say you practice mx-5 a lot now, just try some laps in other cars on the same track. Choose cars that are very different from what you drive now, lets say some old f1, some prototype car, modern formula, gt cars. You will see that this will help you improve overall, feeling the differences, aplying things from one car to another even tho it might seem those cars have nothing in common, seeing the difference in how the driving style suits what car, feeling limits of those cars. it may easilly happen that you do this and then come back to your standart car and be much faster and feel that it is way easier now, also it will make you way better driver over time. it may become kinda hard at some points to improve when practicing all the same all the time, also it will feel like way more fun and not just a grind

I'm currently mixing my practice with some more "casual" online races with GT3s (because those are the easiest to find full servers of) on Spa or Monza, two tracks I'm more comfortable in, just to have fun and a break.
I never thought about practicing in Brands Hatch with a different car, I'm definitely doing it, thanks!
Anyway, for the moment I feel I still have a decent margin to improve "easily", meaning just doing laps and rising the bar little by little, I'm not at the point where I'm looking at 0.10 seconds improvements, yet. Yesterday I improved my average times by ~2 seconds, for instance.

[Dominic ORourke]

So much good advice here, that is why I like this community. There are lots of good guides out there already so I am going to offer a different perspective because this topic excites me.

My key to improvement is: Get comfortable being uncomfortable

The way I improve is to keep challenging myself. If you use a car and a track you know all the time you will limit your potential improvement. Once I am feeling comfortable with a combination it is time to change something. Changing cars and tracks is an easy way to mix it up, but it could also be driving style. Try to drive more aggressively or less aggressively. Try to brake later or earlier and see how it affects the times and the feeling of the car.

I believe to be at the front consistently requires a combination of confidence and humility. During the race you need confidence in the car and in your abilities. Between races you need to accept where others are better and learn from them.

Part of my mindset is to decide how near to 100% I want to drive. The only time I use 100% is when I already have a good lap time in qualifying. Sometimes in a race I can be in a situation where I drive at 85% because I have a good pace advantage at the front. The hard part is to not drive at 100% when you are in the midfield and trying to catch the car in front. It is unlikely I will keep the car on the track for the full race driving at 100% so 95% is probably better.

To add more to what others have said about mixing up car and track combinations. The technical term for this is "variability practice", and to keep with one car and track is "block practice". Both are useful and should be part of improvement. In sports, block practice tends to be more for making skills natural. For racing if you want to practice trail braking you could go around one circuit with the same car and work on that skill. For beginners, block practice is particularly important.

Variability practice tends to transfer better to different situations, but performance during the practice session is lower. If you drive two tracks during a practice session your laptimes will probably not be as good as if you had focused on one of the tracks, however you are more likely to be able to take what you have learned to other circuits. If you drive around Monza a lot you will likely get better at Monza, but you may still struggle at other circuits. If you drive around multiple circuits you will be more likely to transfer your skills to any circuit. Drifting or driving rally are also example of adding variability.

Hopefully this gives some ideas and I am aware English is a second language for a lot of people here so if sections are confusing let me know and I will try to explain more simply.

[Andrea Piovanelli]

Everything is clear and every bit of hint from you all is very appreciated from me, thanks!
As I am a beginner, I'm focusing a lot on "block practice", even if I try to vary every now and then, mostly because of boredom than actual desire of different approaches.
In the last couple of days I'm trying Audi TT @ Nurburgring, to have a change. I'm sure I'm going back to Mazda in Sentul too and see if I can join both races the next days.

[Don Debienne]

Andrea, for basics there is a set of very good youtube videos done by Aris of Kunos Simulazioni called the Go Faster Series - can't beat this for the basics of setting up and driving  in Assetto Corsa.  His youtube channel is called Game and Track and here is the link:  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXjZ1nc...vUkCgWIx6Q