- 1,054
- Braga, Portugal
- pedrocor
Apart the fact they do indeed use A LOT of shortshifting in real world racing. In some forms of racing more than others. And, as already said, depends on the engine torque curve to loose (or not) lots of torque when you shortshift, and of course the gear ratios have to be adjusted. The diesel engines usually are great to shortshift, as they have plenty of torque at low revs and not so much at the max revs, a high rev naturally aspired engine usually is the opposite. But also, in many forms of racing nowadays, it's used air intake restrictor rigs, that mess up with everything, because engineers and mechanics have to tune engines to deal with that, p.ex. old WRC cars should have lots of torque at mid revs, but because the restrictor rigs, they had to tune the engines to higher revs and not so much torque at med revs.
In particular LMP1 cars, with maximum amount of fuel per lap, they use it. In other endurance classes in less extent. Of course that, this year, on LM24h there was a regulated number of laps per stint, so there was no really need to save fuel.
Some years ago, when Indycars had a lot less aero, the 6th gear on ovals was only used to save fuel, in fact you had to shortshift to engage it, because the 5th gear usually was set to get the top speed a little before the rev limiter.
