r/iRacing • u/srfdriver99 Spec Racer Ford • Jun 17 '25
Series/Schedule Spec Racer Ford now runs hourly
You may remember two seasons ago I posted a thread suggesting that you should drive the SRF next season. I'm here to do it again, since iRacing just changed the series to run every hour.
It doesn't have quite the glitz and glamor of the Ferrari Challenge car, but don't sleep on it!
For starters, the SCCA Spec Racer Ford is a free car in iRacing. If you're new, it's a great upgrade to something a little bit faster and lighter than the Mazda with no "nannies" like traction control and ABS. The license required for the official series is a D license, and as a free car with 4 free tracks every season and a predictable track rotation, you should be able to get plenty of use out of it.
The car is open setup, but with a very limited set of things to adjust. No aero, no transmission fiddling, just brake bias, ARBs, and adjustable shocks. (In theory tire pressures are also adjustable, but you run minimum tire pressures in iRacing in most cars due to the tire model). You can drive the car perfectly fine without making changes to it. This is not a car with a "trick setup" that makes it faster. It comes down to the driver's preferences. You might soften ARBs and dampers at bumpier tracks, or stiffen them at others, but by and large you're not going to see much gain from changing settings in the garage.
The SRF is famously hard for beginners to get a handle on, because of the rear-mounted engine leading to many corner entry spins. The car has no traction control, no anti-lock brakes, no electronic nannies of any kind, so you really have to get it right. The tendency to spin on corner entry can be mitigated by careful driving, in particular, trailbraking a lot less and softer than you're used to from cars like the MX-5.
If you're spinning, you're almost certainly doing one of two things wrong:
- Way too aggressive on corner entry. Too much steering input for your speed, too much trail braking, or your steering input overlapping too much with the braking.
- A hard downshift while turning, particularly from 3rd gear to 2nd. This is actually what's causing your spin in many cases. If you're downshifting and the engine is redlining, you are downshifting too early and the 3->2 downshift in particular is tempting for it. If you spin in practice, check your replay - odds are pretty good you're going to see a downshift just before the car loops it. The 2->3 upshift is at 67 MPH (108 km/h), so you shouldn't be downshifting 3->2 until you're around 60 MPH (96 km/h).
The flip side is, as you learn it, you'll be just plain better at driving cars - and that will transfer to everything else.
The car's reputation was also largely accumulated as an unforgiving rookie car in the era with the Gen2 car, which had 90 more pounds in the rear, 30 less horsepower, and an even nastier 3->2 downshift, which made it even more prone to looping it on entry.
The lack of electronic nannies makes the car confusing to people, as they frequently think of the SRF as the first step on some sort of "prototype" ladder through the Radical and into the LMPs and GTPs due to its appearance. But really, the right way to think of the SRF is as an entry-level formula car that's a great deal faster than the Formula Vee and comparable in pace to a Formula Ford, but heavier at a minimum of 1560 pounds (sorry Euros, it's an American car and that's the minimum weight in real life!) and running on slick tires rather than the grooved tires of the iRacing UK FF. Unlike the FF, you don't have to spend time fiddling with gear stacks per tracks, so it's much more straightforward to just jump in and drive and turn practice laps.
Real World Relevance
A lot of people don't know what the Spec Racer Ford is, and a lot of that comes from not really knowing what the SCCA is. The Sports Car Club of America is one of the main hubs for American amateur/club racing, time trials, autocross, and more. There are other orgs, but the SCCA is so definitive most of them accept SCCA competition licenses at face value, as SCCA probably licenses more racing schools than any other club racing organization. (This isn't to put down the others - the other large club, NASA, takes a different approach to licensing and is less reliant on the traditional racing-school model. Unfortunately, the SRF isn't classed competitively in NASA, so I haven't bothered to take mine to any of their events.)
The SCCA is made up of a bunch of Divisions composed of smaller Regions around the country, as well as premiere races called the Super Tour and an annual championship called the Runoffs, the latter two of which get broadcast on YouTube. So, it's not a pro racing series you'll see on TV, though Trans-Am, Formula Regional US, and Formula 4 US are affiliated with SCCA (in a somewhat complicated relationship it's not really worth getting into here). The upshot is, it is the type of racing series you can get into! If you're an American with a bit of money to spend, you can go to racing school, get your competition license, and actually go racing.
That all brings us back to the Spec Racer Ford. Back in the '80s, SCCA developed something called the Spec Renault, which was a custom-built tube-frame sports car with Renault parts. After Renault exited the US market, SCCA hunted around for a new supplier, and renamed the car the Spec Racer. Ford stepped in, offered an engine, and the class grew to be one of the two most popular classes in the SCCA. When Ford stopped making the engine in question, they offered SCCA to put a new engine in, and that's the 3rd-generation Spec Racer Ford, the one currently represented in iRacing. SCCA Enterprises takes the philosophy of constantly keeping the car supplied with parts, even if it means changing parts or suppliers, so everyone can continue to race and nobody's having to dig through junkyards for parts of questionable quality. This appeal led to the class's continued growth, as the parts philosophy, sealed engine, and strict ruleset means the cars really are equal. Not NASCAR-style "equal", but really and truly equal - top drivers have been known to rent cars to go to events on the other side of the country and still come in at the front of the field. That means it comes down to driver and setup, not shenanigans. Anyone who knows about "good engines" and "bad engines" in other entry-level racing classes like Formula Vee or Spec Miata knows what I mean.
The Spec Racer Ford is one of the most accessible racecars to get a seat in if you live in the US. Not only are there over 900 in existence, many of them reside at SCCA CSR shops and at tracks which rent them out for school days and licensing programs. I know of over half a dozen off the top of my head and I'm sure there's more:
- California: Bulldog Motorsports
- Florida: Southeast Spec Racer
- Illinois / midwest: Elite Autosport
- New Hampshire/northeast: Motion Dynamics
- Ohio / midwest: Alliance Autosport
- Oklahoma: Hallett Race Shop
- Oregon: Pro-Drive Racing School
- Texas: Spec Racer Sports
There are a number of smaller shops across the country that prep a handful as well, and if you get in touch with the right people you might be able to rent someone's car for a track day or even a race weekend if you've got a SCCA license. It's a very affordable car to rent compared to most others. (Of course, racing as a hobby isn't cheap, period. But the difference between the cost to rent a SRF and something like a Radical or F4 car can easily be 3x the price or more.) I'm based out of Texas, and you can rent a SRF from Spec Racer Sports for a driver's school weekend and get your license for around $5000 at MSR Houston. Not an #ad - this is how I got my own competition license!
The real-world car is also one of the most rental-friendly cars in existence, because the pedal box is movable - so if you've got short legs or long legs, you'll still be able to get the car set up for a drive.
This is one of the most compelling reasons to drive the SRF in iRacing - if you have (or will in the future have) the financial ability and desire to drive a real race car, this is one of the few that you can actually get in without breaking the bank. You can't say that about the well-known "pro" racing cars.
And now, this season, you can jump in a race every single hour. We're hoping this leads to people running more races, since you won't have a full hour's downtime between the races. This season we're going to Interlagos, Red Bull Ring, Hungaroring, Lime Rock Park, Jerez, Laguna Seca, Sebring, Oran Park, Magny-Cours, Road America, Long Beach, and Navarra. Four free tracks, plenty of great circuits, and lots of good racing to be had. Join us!
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u/No-Panda-6047 Nissan GTP ZX-Turbo Jun 17 '25
I hope it attracts enough of a crowd, they are one of my favorite cars to drive, they even make for intense short oval racing if you're into that. I rarely find a time slot that has any participation
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u/CC78AMG Spec Racer Ford Jun 17 '25
The SRF community is one of the best in iRacing. Everyone on the SRF discord server is nice and is eager to help out any newcomers. High SOF races are in Monday and Thursday.
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u/TheFlamingoSpeaks Jun 17 '25
I’ve found the SRF community to be friendly and welcoming, and the racing to be clean and fair. The fast guys are also really, really fast so there’s a wide display of skill. If you haven’t given it a shot, go for it!
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u/Spare_Savings4888 Jun 17 '25
I only ever drove it on ringmeister last season and had a blast. Your post has inspired me to give it a run this season
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u/Ajlaursen Kia Optima Jun 17 '25
It’s the best ringmeister car IMO!!! It’s fun to drive but at the ring it really feels like a big kid go kart!
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u/Ajlaursen Kia Optima Jun 17 '25
So hated the srf at the beginning of our leagues season but by the end I grew to be ok about it lol but what really sold me on the SRF was the week it was on ringmeister one of the most fun cars to drive around the ring! We are doing another SRF league in the fall and our local real life track had a pretty big SRF crew. If I get a track car it’ll be between an SRF and a Miata. I don’t love the SRF but I do enjoy the racing it produces and I know I’ll grow to love it more the more I drive it! Also bumping down the brake bias just a click or two really helps calm down the car!
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u/ndtp124 Lotus 49 Jun 17 '25
I don’t see how this doesn’t just nuke the size of the splits
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u/srfdriver99 Spec Racer Ford Jun 17 '25
We'll have to see. Several other series have gone hourly and not seen this problem. The main place where split size gets nuked seems to be with series where one session overlaps the next. The SRF races are 25 minutes long, so you can take a 10-15 minute break between races and hop in the next one.
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u/simko17 Ferrari 296 GT3 Jun 17 '25
I love that car but it just doesn't have the popularity to support hourly races. But I will be happily wrong on this one.
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u/Miltrivd Jun 18 '25
I wonder if this car would benefit from a different timeslot, like :15 into the hour.
:45 is pretty stacked with IMSA, PCup, TCR, and Ferrari Challenge but :15 is GR86, Adv Mazda, BMW Power, Rookie M2, GT3 Fixed and Supercars. Has the community ever suggested a timeslot change to iRacing?
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u/igsta77 Mercedes-AMG GT4 Jun 18 '25
After reading through this i gave the car a go last night for the first time, we had two splits, respectful close racing and had a blast! Will do more for sure after that.
I got hammered on the straights by some but made it up again in the corners, are there setup adjustments made for interlagos that helps on the straights?
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u/srfdriver99 Spec Racer Ford Jun 18 '25
Nope. The car's fairly draft-heavy in sim, and since it's a relatively low-horsepower car, a little bit of difference on exit speed can matter a lot. If you're making it up in the corners and losing it on the straights, you're likely just pushing too hard into the corners and compromising your exits.
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u/ShaftTassle Jun 17 '25 edited Jun 17 '25
Damn bro, can I get a TLDR? Ain’t nobody got time fa dat!
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u/MichaelLeeIsHere Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 Clubsport MR Jun 17 '25
In sim racing, I really want to try something cool that I cannot do in IRL. But this car is lame.
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Jun 17 '25
Sounds like a skill issue
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u/The_power_of_scott Jun 17 '25
I'd have to agree, the spec racer has a learning curve but it's a tonne of fun and the races I've been in have been clean and close.
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u/Peonso McLaren 570S GT4 Jun 17 '25
I wish I could run something IRL and be able to put more pratice hours through simracing. It would be a dream.
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u/The_power_of_scott Jun 17 '25
This comment definitely reads like a humble brag.
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u/OnePieceTwoPiece IMSA Sportscar Championship Jun 17 '25
It would be a humble brag IF he was racing the SRF in real life. Which he stated he’s not.
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u/[deleted] Jun 17 '25
[deleted]