many dream of winning races on the Sim in their first few weeks of playing, but if you've never done any racing before, it can be an overwhelming experience. There's so many new things to learn, and it can be easy to get stuck and not know where to improve. Luckily, I'm here to help. I've got seven techniques to learn that will set you off on the right foot. [Music] So you've plugged in your new wheel and pedals, and you're loading into a rookie Mazda race or your first lfm race or maybe a daily race, and you're not sure where to focus your driving on first. My first technique to improve on is braking. It's not the most exciting pedal, but it is the most important, in my opinion. So, for starters, learning to get good on the brakes is gonna give you a heap of time in every braking Zone, and it's also a great place to be able to pass other drivers. You can break breaking down into two separate steps: the initial hit of the break and the trail off of the break.

the first bit to get good at is that initial hit of the brake pedal. In most cars and some racing, you want to go straight to your target brake pressure, whether that's 80 or 100, as quickly as possible. I often see a lot of new drivers in some racing, uh, building up their brake pressure slowly and taking a little bit to get up to 80 or 100, and that's just a wasted lap time. Generally, you want to get on the brakes as hard as possible and go straight to that target pressure and hold it in the braking zone until you need to start trailing the brake. The second bit is at the end of the braking zone, where you're getting off that initial hit and you're starting to trail the brake into the apex of the corner. A lot of new drivers I see brake in a straight line, which is perfect, but as they start to turn into a corner, they'll release all brake pressure and just roll in towards the apex. And while this can work in some games like GT7 in

most Sims, you're just wasting lap time. I've drawn a very accurate paint drawing. I'm such an artist. And on the left, we have braking with no Trail break, and on the right, we have braking with a trail brake. So for this call now Apex speed is 100 kilometers an hour. And on the left drawing, you can see that they need to get to 100 kilometers an hour by the time that they come off the brakes, which is well before the Apex. Whilst on the right, because we're Trail breaking, we can break an extra 20 meters or so into the corner, which means we only need to get to 100 kilometers an hour by the actual apex of the corner. What this means is that you can break later and just move your braking phase later because you're carrying the brake further into the corner. If you're braking 20 meters into the Apex, you can get rid of the 20 meters at the start of the braking zone. So yeah, that was maybe a little bit too confusing, but basically Trail braking is super important. And if

you're trail breaking in your rookie races, you're automatically better than 90% of the field. I actually did a more in-depth video on the differences between ACC and iRacing a couple of weeks ago, and you can check it out. Yeah, so my next technique is the other very important pedal in your pedal box, and that is the throttle pedal. Getting on the throttle is something that I see a lot of new drivers struggle with in some racing. Often the issue is that drivers go straight to 100% throttle really quickly and induce wheel spin into the car, but I also see drivers really taking their time to get to 100% and just slowly ramping up the throttle, which is often just a waste of time. If you're in a straight and you're not using the engine, when focusing on getting better with your throttle control, you really want to get to 100% throttle as quickly as possible. The only limit is really wheel spin, so if you're not wheel spinning in a car, you can just slam the throttle straight to 100% and get out of

there and that's really useful in low-powered cars. If you're racing like the Mazdas or the V in iRacing, going straight to 100 will often give you a fair bit of lap time. You can be really aggressive on the throttle. Don't be afraid to be aggressive. Technique number three is using all of the road on the track. Often, drivers new to the same kind of break somewhat in the track and then don't cut the apex or the corner enough. You've paid your money buying the entire laser scan track in-game, and if you're not using all of the road, you're just not getting your money's worth. And apart from being economical, using all of the roads can equal a big boost in lap time as well. If you're using all of the road, your radius is more shallow, and you don't have to turn the wheel as sharply. What this means is that you can carry a higher minimum speed through the corner. Speed is good, so basically opening up the road means yeah, you don't have to

turn the wheel as much, and you don't have to slow the car down as much. Here we are at Spar, and you can see that I'm driving a GT4 car, using all of the road, and it lets us carry way more speed through every corner. Technique number four is standing starts, and my for this is always remember to turn your engine on and put the car in gear. One day you'll forget, and you'll regret it, trust me. Technique number five is to be consistent and focus on doing the same lap times and not making mistakes. Often the fastest driver in Sim racing doesn't win the race, and that's because they're making mistakes or other little things that just cost them a lot of time. Let's say you're pushing really hard, and you're going two tenths a lot faster than another driver, but every 10 laps you run wide and lose two seconds. You're actually going exactly the same speed once it all kind of evens out, so basically being consistent is more important. It's more important than being

outright fast, so make sure you can bank those laps over and over again in a race. Technique number six is to learn your rules. Every Sim has different rules and things going on, and you should make sure you learn them before you get burned mid-race. Some examples would be starts in iRacing, especially in multi-class and ovals, and when you can pass on that start when the green light goes off, and if you can pass on the outside, and things like that. Also in ACC with their pit stops, you have to remember to turn your engine off, which I have forgotten multiple times. So learning the rules of each Sim is really important, and you should definitely do it. Technique number seven is learning how to not be killed by other cars. Now, for starters, you shouldn't be crashing into other cars, and if you have a positive KDA in Sim racing, you're probably doing something wrong. But I also see a lot of new sim racers complain about constantly being taken out of races. It's like, Ah, every race I get crashed into. Why are these

people so bad blah blah blah blah blah and the answer is sometimes people will crash into you. You can't stop it. That's just racing Toto. Yes, it's called a motor race. A lot of the time, you can actually avoid these incidents in the low levels of sim racing. Remember, you're often driving against people new to the Sim. And it's not only being a little bit slower than maybe experienced drivers, but being new also means you're not as experienced racing around other cars and you know, making moves, attacking, defending, things like that. You've got to make sure to give these people room. And you need to think if it's worth it when racing them. Do you need to be right behind them into a braking zone? The answer is probably not. They might break earlier than you do. Or do you need to run too wide with another driver around a corner where it's a little bit risky? Probably not. As my mum once said when I was learning to drive on the road, assume every other car is going to crash into you and give them

room. The same is true on the race track. Drive defensively and try to avoid incidents before they happen. Often, you can see a driver that's a little bit out of control, and they're going to cause a crash, so just make sure to stay away from them. If you do need to pass them, pass them as quickly as possible and then try and break away. A lot of these incidents can be avoided when you're starting in Zim raising cool. So, I've got a bonus technique as well, and this one needs to be used in conjunction with both the braking and the throttle techniques that I was talking about earlier. It's basically using the weight transfer to your advantage in a car and learning how to exploit that and go faster. So, basic rule: you have four tires on a race car, unless you're in a Toro Rosso, and you want to be using all four tires as effectively as possible. Now, a good way to visualize you using all these four tires is the traction circle. Essentially, when you accelerate, the

weight goes backwards over the rear wheels when you break. Take the wakers forwards over the front wheels. And when you turn, the wakers to the opposite side from where you're turning. Normally, this weight transfer actually helps us. When the weight grows backwards over the rear wheels, we're generally wanting more grip from the rear wheels, since those are normally the wheels propelling us forward. So, the weight goes backwards, it pushes the wheels into the ground, which gives us more grip, so more traction. And when we're braking for a corner, we want more grip out of the front wheels, as these are the ones doing the Turning. So, as the weight grows forward, it pressures the front wheels into the ground, which gives us more grip to turn the car. Knowing these fundamentals will make you a lot faster as you start to think about your driving and the techniques you're doing. It's a very basic overview, but it's important to be aware of that and also think about what car you're driving and how that plays into it, of course.

we're talking about rear-wheel drive cars, but front-wheel drive cars handle differently, as do four-wheel drive cars. It's important to learn how the different engine layouts can affect the way each car will drive. Normally, you'll be driving in a front-engine car like the BMW M4, M6, or a mid-engine car like the Audi R8. And if you're driving in a rear-engine car, you're probably in a Porsche. Now, I'm not Einstein with the physics, but basically, if you're on throttle, the engine's going to squat, and if you're off throttle, the engine's going to rise up. Because of this, you have to think about when you're on and off throttle and how the grip's being applied to all four tires. A front-engine car will normally be stable on entry to a corner but can be light on exit, and a mid-engine car will generally be pretty sketchy on the way into a corner, but it will squat down and be super stable when you apply the power. The way you can use

this to your advantage is if you're in a mid-engine car, and you're dealing with understeer, remember off-throttle is going to give you more steer. But if you're struggling with oversteer, you can just apply throttle, and it'll induce more understeer into the car. If you have this in the back of your mind while you're driving, you can deal with understeer and oversteer problems as they pop up during a race, instead of just panicking and not knowing what to do. So, this will start you off on the right foot, and you'll be better at dealing with those problems than other drivers. I've honestly barely even scratched the surface of this weight transfer stuff, so if you'd like some more on the traction Circle and all of that, let me know in the comments, and I'll do a video on it. Anyway, those are some things to focus on as you're learning to go faster in The Sims. And are there any techniques that you would recommend that we missed, feel free to

let us know in the comments. And if you liked the video, give it a like. As always, definitely subscribe to Overtake for more Sim racing and racing videos. We'll see you next time. Bye. [Music]

7 Techniques EVERY Simracer Should Know!

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