Just under 24hrs to go, peeps, until the end of season awards.
If you're nominated in a category, be advised you'll be expected to say a few words in response to your award if you win it. For the audience, of course.
Afterwards, we're going to run around 10-15 laps each of Pillbox Hill GP and Sandy Steep Banks. These are new tracks that will debut in Season 5. I'll do a formation lap around Pillbox Hill before we grid up, and talk through the corners as we go. Iceman can do the same on formation for Sandy Steep.
Speaking of...
Season 5 updateWe've laid groundwork for next season, with the calendar 90% done. Tracks wise, we're looking at around 14 - 16 tracks in total and have about 12 of those locked in.
The challenge with planning this season has been not only Christmas/New Years disruption, but track balance.
The cars we have are, on average, balanced but there's a bit of a gap between performance. By which I mean, no one car is going to be dominant this season. The history of results in SATCC shows us the Comet and Surano were the most successful and strongest cars, but having said that the Verlierer only really got to shine in Season 4 at the midway point.
Now, let's take a track like Monza. The five fastest race laps times - all sub 1:20.1 - were:
Smithy - Verlierer - 1:18.998
Stepa - Banshee - 1:19.514
Michiski - Coquette - 1:19.821
fab.ICEMAN - Comet - 1:20.036
Endersai - Comet - 1:20.079
Not withstanding how awesome Progen are
, these are all very quick laptimes.
The other day, Ovivo/Iceman/Darn and myself took Seven70s around the track and were all 1:17s. The best I've done is a 1:16.8 in the Seven70.
The 4/4 9F was about 2/10ths off the Seven70s pace so it's a viable competitor (from memory, the Comet was up there too). But the Jester? The best Iceman and I could do - and I mention us because we were among the fastest at Monza - was a 1:20.
So the Jester is shit, right?
Ha! No. Because the Jester at more technical tracks, like Monaco or Iceman's new Hill Ary Clinton or Darn's Val-de-Grace is easily 2s faster than the Seven 70.
The results suggest that the cars will be balanced on a number of older tracks like BCNW or Zan Cudochamps. On prop only tracks, or tracks with straights, the Seven70 will be quicker. On technical tracks, i.e. lots of heavy braking and bumps, the Jester has an advantage.
The Comet, 9F, and Surano all seem to be very balanced options. The Elegy? Not really tested.
So what we're trying to do is not front- or rear-load the calendar with maps that are all technical or all speed. Tracks will be carefully set up so they're not handing the trophy over prematurely to the person who picked the best car.
What this means is that you'll need to really figure out which of the cars suits you best, noting there will be times when the car is strong, weak, and totally on pace with the rest of the track. You'll get some pre-season testing to see how you fare against other cars on two types of circuits.
I mention all this because the two tracks we're going to see previewed are similar in terms of the cars they favour, so don't assume if you aren't as quick the car is a bad one.
, these are all very quick laptimes. 
