GR86 Cup car in iRacing
 

The news broke earlier this year, but didn't specify the release date.

Here's a fresh announcement:
https://www.iracing.com/iracing-stre...ar-two-tracks/

Some long-time iRacers that I know interpret this article as "should be available next calendar week / 2022 Season 4 Week 13".

Been looking forward to this. Will actually get me back to using the service. I've got a $6k rig sitting in my home office I haven't touched in a long time because of all the fu---y on the platform lately.

Anyone know if the car is going to be an H-pattern or sequential?

Once they killed the ND2 and you only had an option of sequential, I pretty much dropped off iRacing. This would be a nice reason to return!

The GR86 Cup car specs sheet says "SADEV 6 Speed Sequential", so if the real car has a sequential I'm sure iRacing will be the same.

I do agree with you- I've had a ton of fun with the Formula Vee, then as I started going up the classes I realized there were almost no competitive manual cars to use. After my SCCA 3 months subscription ended I went back to Assetto Corsa.

Although to be frank it's not iRacing that killed the manual ND, it's the ND Cup car that moved to a sequential. Very few modern race cars come with a manual and iRacing just reflects the real world.

Downtime is tomorrow morning, so I'm thinking sometime tomorrow we can test out the car. It is coming free too :) I'm hoping the fake engine noise is not there!

I wish there was the ability in iRacing to override a sequential into an H-pattern, even just in solo, but I get that it would be going against their quest for realism.

I guess its back to the Solstice for 6-speed fun...

https://youtu.be/5PCiJ2GATEM

Pretty psyched!

I haven't touched iRacing in 4-5 months. I guess I should go turn on the gaming PC and let it spend the rest of the evening downloading and installing updates.

Does anyone know if tracks for the series are part of the "entry level" free stuff, or will we have to buy some in case we don't already have them? I'm not that worried either way as the tracks are cheap and I've bought enough cars/tracks since my first run with iRacing years ago I think I have a permanent 20% discount.

Bad news - it is sequential, and there is no way to force it into a H pattern. Oh well.

Why is it bad news that its like the actual race car?

Fair enough, I should clarify - its good that it is like the actual car, but I wish these "cup" cars had stuck to traditional manuals, especially at the lower price points.

Edit - just did my first race, the series at VIR.

This thing is a blast! I think it has the "edge" that I find sometimes lacking in the Miata. Not to say the Miata isn't fun, but this is a different challenge. I've long felt in iRacing that there was a missing step in the progression after the Miata, and to me this fills it.

Thanks for posting this! I totally forgot to go get the download/update going. Guess I'll mess with that in the morning.


Side note about the Miatas, have you tried the longer, open setup C-class races in the Miata? Bump drafting down the front straight at Monza in a 50 minute long race is hilariously fun.

15GB or so - big update!

That's the "Advanced" one right? I have not tried it - I have too many series on the go already haha. Primarily I do GT3 (things like Petit Le Mans), and then dabble in ovals, rally, and then the Miata for things like the Production Car Series (incidentally, the GR86 is replacing the Solstice in that series which is awesome).

I think the most fun race I've ever done was 20+ Miatas at the short Silverstone circuit. We went 4 wide through every corner for lap after lap - it was a riot. That's what I love about those cars - they are spectacularly slow in a straight line, so you have more time to enjoy just how dangerous the situation is lol. I don't think the GRs will be quite like that, but will be fun in their own way (I will submit the attached as evidence - and I got bumped off, I wasn't just casually mowing the grass...)

That's fantastic! Yeah, that's the advanced Miata class. That's what I liked about the Miata's is that you could do Rookie/D/C class races, so you could jump on at almost any time and find a race.

Glad to hear the GR's will be in D class races as well. I need to get my C back. That's part of why I haven't played in a while. The amount of idiotic dive bombing and other stupid crap of guys that don't care about their SR and don't seem to have expensive setups or pay for a service just ruin other people's fun? Weird kind of sociopath.


The GT cars, I haven't been willing to put in the time on learning the brakes on cars with downforce. Braking is already my weakness and the downforce and having to bleed off the brakes as you slow down, takes a lot of time to get decent at that.

The reason this was done is painfully obvious if you look at the ND GMX5. The stock boxes were straight not reliable and a revision didn't solve it.