In my opinion the Roadster is now easier to drive than the Cup Car. But I don't think there's such a huge divide between them as people are claiming. Both are clearly less benign than they used to be. And that's not necessarily a bad thing, as I think wit the OTM, they were a bit too stable to be truly realistic. But I think they may have gone a tad over-board. When driven moderately, they both feel more like real cars. The braking feels more realistic, they're smoother, for lack of a better term, when cornering, the handling just feels more natural. But when really pushed to the limit, the Roadster in particular feels very odd. And it's now very difficult to drive. The front end wants to understeer and the rear end wants to swap ends. It's like the front and rear of the car are at odds with each other. It feels decidedly unbalanced.
With the baseline setup in the Roadster, I was able to get within about 2 tenths of my Okayama full course record (1:50.1). But I had a difficult time doing it and I don't think I could drive at that pace and not send my SR crashing through the floor. I played around with it and by decreasing the negative camber all around, increasing the tire pressure to about 31~32 psi, all around, and pushing the brake bias a few clicks further forward, I was able to make the car much more drivable. Unfortunately, once the tires are warmed up, the understeer becomes worse and worse. With this setup, I struggled to get within a second of my PB and after about 10~12 laps, I was struggling to get put in times of under 1:52. I was losing almost 1/2 a second on the first left hander alone.
Eventually, people will probably be able to dial it in, but it's really miserable for Rookies. The MX5 was ideal as an entry level car because it was well balanced and relatively easy to drive. The baseline setup is pretty horrible and I think it's going to turn a lot of people off. I really hope they make some adjustments.
I'll have to put a bit more time into the Cup Car to compare it.
