What Sim Racers Don't Understand About TC & ABS

Traction control is a controverse topic in sim racing. Should you turn it on, should you even push it to the max or should you turn it off to have the best racing experience? In this video Ermin is going to guide you through all the different options to help you improving your lap time.

How do you handle traction control? Let us know in the comments! 👇✍️

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#simracing #tractioncontrol #abs

[asawyer]

Just a quick correction on ABS, it isn't there to shorten braking distances. ABS and the fact it prevents locking, allows you to continue to steer to avoid a hazard.

[alphaorg]

As said at the end: GT3 cars are designed to be driven with TC and ABS. [edited] Real life GT3 drivers are using a lot more TC and ABS than we do in ACC.

[Shakshuka]

TC and ABS to a racing driver are like calculators to a mathematician.

Should you be able to do without them? Yes. Those are the fundamentals. But it's always going to be faster to use them.

[frostblght]

I guess my next question would be if you practiced without assists, would there be a point at which you can actually go faster than someone who practiced the same but who has assists on? Would be interesting to find out

[MegaDanielSK]

Important thing to mention especially for newcomers: TC and ABS are there to be fiddled with, just like car tuning. A circuit like Monza will reward using less TC because there are lots of straights. When you have a feel for the throttle, you can put more power down and have a higher top speed as a result. If you then switch to a circuit that's intensive on chicanes and turns, more TC can improve your consistency in a race because small mistakes can be mitigated and your line will therefore stay roughly the same.

What nobody seems to mention is rain. Depending on rain intensity and tire choice, even professional racers sometimes turn TC and ABS up to max. Of course, the lower you can keep it, the better, but you should definitely increase it compared to your dry setup.

All in all, it's something you should be ready to change on the move. Even your rhythm can influence its' effectiveness, so being able to constantly rotate these settings and mastering them can most definitely help you become a better sim racer.

[cody]

I think the word "assist" is what gets everybody. Simracing is full of so many high ego'ed [just like every passion] people that want to feel better then someone. For them to race with no "assists" makes them feel entitled and "better". In reality I think things like TC and ABS only become a "assist" when it's something not designed for the car [IE TC and ABS on F1 cars]. But to paint TC and ABS as an assist to make it easier for a GT car is absurd given that they are designed for the car and used in real life by professionals.

[goodlookinouthomie]

I must remember to thank my grandmother as she has evidently inspired all kinds of motoring safety technology.

[planestrainsandautomobiles]

Don’t think of assists as “you can’t stay on the track otherwise”, think of them as “doing a faster lap” assist.

[pyyy]

Great video to point it out!

But I'd like to mention the reasons why it's faster: ABS and TCS can brake wheel individual and the driver inputs are always for the whole vehicle. If you lock up the front right tire while braking, it means that the other 3 tires are still not above their grip capabilities. A car without ABS need to reduce the overall brake pressure to avoid locking up the front right and hence loses deceleration in the other 3 wheels. An ABS can lower the brake pressure at the locking wheel and the 3 others can continue to work close to their limits.

And the other thing is important for endurance racing. The risk of having a flat spot due to locking is highly reduced, which allows longer tire use, less risk and hence better overall results.

[larryhouse]

TC and ABS are great to have as a safety net. In a minimal setting, not intrusive to the point you're just putting the gas or brake to the mat. But to the point where TC might catch you if you come over a crest and lose grip or abs catching you if you catch a curb accidently and upset your balance. When they're on minimal settings, if you're driving properly, they should never interfere.

[AidanMillward]

People seem to have a hard time differentiating between a tool and a talent replacer. It’s the auto-tune of driving.

TC and ABS are tools. And if having them in bothers people that much, they can turn em off.

[Kiramitsuoka]

I remember back when I was a freshman in GTR2 the prayer was a bit like this "Learn to drive without assist first to be able to utilize the assists to their max potential" like, if they kick in, make sure they kick in as little as possible.
Or a bit like "know/learn the limit of your car, then see how much the assist systems can extend that limit" if that makes any sense.
I still handle it like that, but I don't race that much anymore and I don't know how that would fit with newer SimRacers like Assetto Corsa and the like.

[jr]

1:3 for TC:ABS is the sweetspot for the 720s. I remember I was using 4:6 when I first began, I was losing so much time. Trailbraking is key in the 720s tho, and that was something I overlooked.

[ConnorLHW]

I don’t think Assists =/= lap time. Ultimately depends what you are doing in terms of the motorsports.

Rally = No Assists pretty much.
Track racing = dependant on what you are driving. GT3 equals yes for ABS(because the ABS in these cars are advanced) and somewhat yes for TC. ACC for this patch have said if the situation calls for it you can run 0 TC and it could be faster than 1 TC in the right situations ofc.
Street cars depend on power and age and also that basics of these systems. As lower power and more understeering handling means you might need to power slide or use the power a lot more than TC might allow to find that ability to slip the tires for its max grip

[rajgill]

When you meet a sim racer capable of going without abs, and using it to his advantage, it's amazing. The type of person out there who can squeeze better braking than abs is talented

[flameburstgt]

With so many people saying learn to drive without TC and ABS made me felt like a noob, but considering i don’t have a steering wheel and only using a controller, I’m not afraid to use TC and ABS as I need them to drive properly. Anyways great video

[diplomatofthesosbrigade]

The main reason I drive with assists off is because most of the racing series I like, say, Le Mans GTE, don't allow them. I think it's less about pace and moreso showcasing the skill of car control.

[BadgerOff]

I also argued this point till I was blue in the face on GT Sport. So many people would say "Turn off TC!" as if it was some kind of one-size-fits-all solution to simply 'going faster', when it's not. It's far more nuanced than that.

GT Sport had 6 TC settings, 1 to 5, with 1 being mild and 5 being strong, and of course 0, for off altogether. You'd never want it set to 5 because it would cut far too much power in corners and would definitely handicap you, but in many cars you also wouldn't want it off entirely either as it made some cars VERY difficult to drive. It was always a case by case basis. Setting it to 2 or 3 in a race was usually beneficial.


I'll use the Mazda Atenza (my main race car) as an example. In the GR4 version of car you could easily turn off TC entirely because it had a 4WD system that would drag you round corners no problem which made it very hard to spin it when exiting corners, but if you turned TC off on the GR3 version of the Atenza (which was a RWD) it became a real handful to drive, and was quite prone to oversteer if you gave it too much throttle out of a corner. I normally had my GR3 Atenza TC set to 2.

I'd usually tell people, "try turning TC off when setting your qualifying time, but turn it back on for the race. That way you give yourself a little extra safety net when you're pushing the car hard. You don't want to lose a race because you pushed the throttle a millimetre too much on one corner and spun it. Then, if you need to throw caution to the wind and find some extra speed, you can turn TC off to find a bit more, but you'll also have to be hyper aware of your throttle inputs if you do"

[DK-xrjc]

Awesome video! This really needed to be said, I remember this being one of the first things I learned when getting into GT racing and more of the sim focused games coming from F1 codemasters having all assists off - I was so confused with how people were driving so well because I thought everyone drove with assists off 🤡

[AppicGamePlayer]

very good video, though i still think its good practice to turn off the assists in acc and try to nail a lap, but ofcourse in the actual race its more about consitency so its absolutely smart to turn the assists on to the lowest level you can handle. As you get told at the start of acc, racing starts from being safe and consistent, not from being fast. have a good one yall.