Why SMOOTH is Actually FASTER Racing Games...

If you want to drive fast in Racing Games, being smooth is almost as important as pressing the throttle in sim racing. I’m sure every assetto corsa sim racer the phrase, slow is smooth, smooth is fast. But a rare few actually know what it means, and how to implement it in their driving.
Many drivers fall into the trap of overdriving their car. Take SupraBoy69 here, he think’s he’s the dogs bollocks, caining his BMW around the track. But, the faster he goes, the more tense he becomes, and his driving suffers because of this. His steering inputs become more aggressive, jolting the car into every turn in gran turismo or forza or even roblox. His pedal work becomes erratic, and he starts losing control of his car. Sure, from the interior, his driving may look fast, and indeed, if you’re a good driver, you can be this aggressive and still be fast. But, you’d have to be exceptionally skilled to pull this of – and spoiler alert, SupraBoy is not exceptionally skilled. *cameraman die*
Meet Dorothy. She’s driving to the shops in her Honda CRX, going to pick up some cat food. She calmly threads the wheels through her hands, and steps on the accelerator as if it’s a brand new carpet. Sure, it may look slow, but believe it or not. If Dorothy was on a race track, travelling at the same speed as Supraboy, she would actually win in a race.
This is because smooth inputs keep the car more balanced. As your car is in a steady state, such as stationary in the pit lane, it’s as balanced as it’ll ever be – all four tyres have an equal load on them. Let’s say for example, they have 10 traction points each at this point, totalling to 40 overall. However, when you corner, the outside tyres gain more traction, whilst the insides lose traction. This is because the more load you put onto tyres, the more grip they have, and vice versa. But, this gain and loss of traction is NOT proportional, and the inside tyres will lose more traction than the outsides gain.
So, as we corner, the outsides have 15 traction points each, whilst the insides only have three. Meaning, we have only 36 traction points total, as compared to our 40 when the car was totally balanced.
Whenever you brake, shift, corner or accelerate, weight is shifted between the tyres. SupraBoy chucks the car into the turn as aggressively as he can. But, this means that more weight is shifted to the outside tyres, resulting in far less traction points overall. But Dorothy on the otherhand, glides the car into the turn. The weight is more equally balanced between all four wheels, meaning she has more traction.
So how can you also drive like Dorothy, whilst also being travelling at a high speed? Most people would make the same mistake as that twat in the BMW. The faster they travel, the more nervous they become. The more stiff their arms are, and the more rash decisions they make.
Well, in my time in sim racing, I developed a technique that helps with this. If I ever feel like I’ve hit a brick wall in my lap times, and can’t go any faster, I use this technique – and it works all the time.
What I do first is stop the car. Relax. Take a breath. Let the anxious energy flush out. Honestly, I try not to care about going fast anymore. I get in the mindset of just driving to the shops to buy cat food.
And here’s the most important part, I steer only using my fingertips. Not only does this make my steering inputs much more smooth, because I physically can’t put much force through the wheel, but it also helps get me into that mindset MASSIVELY. Sure, at first, I may be slower. But, over the course of a couple laps, I get into a rhythm. I drive the car like it’s brand new, off the sales room floor. I suggest it to turn in, rather than telling it to, and I never use my palms to do so. I shift as smoothly as possible, like I’m placing a delicate wine glass on my bedside table.
Sure, using your fingertips may seem pointless, but to me, it’s an invaluable technique to driving a car as smoothly as possible. You should try it, just like you should try this video, in which I tell you all about how to shift up and down correctly.

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MY SIM RIG:
▶Fanatec Shifter
▶Fanatec CSL Elite Loadcell Pedals

[mclarenflm]

Smooth is definitely faster racing games

[nentor]

Definitly helps a lot to sometimes just stop the car empty the mind and then just drive for the sake of it.
No lape time to beat,
No race to beat,
just the car to experience :D

[thaizzz]

Even in rally where you often find yourself having to throw the car aggressively to even make the turns, must of the time not being smooth enough will literally end your run.

[dylanf]

the editing and cinematics are underrated, simply lovely

[cmbaileytstc]

Is that BMW of yours as tail-happy as the mod version of it you featured man? Because wow, that's fun.

[mikeraphone]

I'm happy to see tire load sensitivity talked about for once, I find that it's rarely talked about in these kinds of summaraised racing theory videos.

I often hear "weight is transferred to the outside wheels where it's needed" and I almost scream at my monitor thinking "NO, you don't NEED more load on the outside wheels!" Ideally the load is equally distributed across all tires, but this isn't realistically possible (your car's centre of mass would need to be on the ground). However reducing body roll will help with even out the load. Smooth driving will help with this, but will help even more with brief spikes in load transfer or simply exceeding grip limits by demanding too much of the tires all at once.

Anyway, good video, concise and accurate.

[RogueBeatsARG]

Damn didnt know Toyota made body kits for the Z4

[LZ_Protogen]

Me: *getting nervous while driving*
*remembers this video and its advice*
*stops my car to get into the mindset*
*causes a 25 car collision killing 5 people and injuring 11 spectators*

[ghislainjezequel]

I totally agree with your analysis. When I hit that wall you talk about (as well as actual walls around the track), I try and lift and coast. It's ridiculous how I can gain about a second (mostly on tracks or cars I don't know, otherwise its more like some tenths) while I had the feeling to be sending it around the track a couple of laps before.

In addition to the fact that it can lower the lap times (or at least keeping them the same), it helps relaxing as well as completing more consistent laps, thus improving actual track time before a mistake and finally optimizing your training time. You end up less frustrated and having completed more laps that gives more info for for a potential upcoming race

[xreide]

Meanwhile me, a broke keyboard player: yes, this will help.
(Great vid, once i save up for a sim setup I'll put this knowledge to good use)

[christopherjohnston]

This might explain why stiffer springs and ir sway bars can help even though they technically don't increase mechanical grip by that much?

They will better distribute the load between tyres so you don't transfer as much load in a turn?

[DancingWithChickens]

That’s pretty interesting, I play on controller and sometimes I drive as if my inputs are in slow-mo, which in turn leads to smoother inputs, stability improvements and better rotation

[LudditeK]

I’ve always thought smooth and calm is faster. Until I watched your videos on 4 wheel drifting around corners
At first I was like “no waaaay”
Then I tried it around Tsukuba and my lap times tumbled like crazy, then I was like “oh my God, no

It’s not consistent by any means, so I don’t do it for races. But I reckon I need to find a way to be mega aggressive as well as calm

[tanman]

It is so counterintuitive to drive smooth like that. Thanks for the tips.

[blazi]

There should be a new Initial D stage about Dorothy on her way to buy cat food in her Honda CRX but every time she gets on the touge, street racing noobs appear

[chippi__]

"his bmw around the track"
😆🤣

[jonaszahid]

I consider myself as a smooth driver. One day I did a bit if hotlapping around Bathurst in a 2014 V8 Supercar. I quickly got a best time of a 2:07.8, but I knew I could be faster. But everytime I went into tryhard, I overdrive the car and bottled the lap (mostly at Skyline Corner). So I decided to do only one more lap and stop. Throughout the lap I refused to look at the delta and said myself „it‘s just a cruise lap, keep calm“. At the end, it was a 2:05.9, almost 2s faster than my previous pb and only 2 tenths or so off the irl 2014 pole time. In the replay you can really see how smooth I was, especially on the throttle. So yes, smoother is waaay faster in racing games.

[Thebridgecommander-ee]

Of course the goal and have a smooth resumption if you don't use traction control systems in yes racings, I used to put cars aside in the past, but now I use Smooth! Just enjoy the tour!

[Bazoozoos]

I have also come up with a technique to relax while driving

*glances over to bottle of jack daniels*

[TsunamiSephi]

Flying with your fingertips is a common adage for those that are learning to become a pilot. You don't want a ham fist your inputs