If you follow these steps, you WILL become a top racer quicker than you think. Don’t ask questions, don’t doubt yourself, just follow these steps and come thank me when you start dominating.
1.Turn off Assists.
Don’t give me that look. I know… Assists are one of those things that once you get comfortable with them on, its scary turning them off. From Forza 1-3 I used pretty much all of the assists, and I sucked (I’m not saying you suck if you use assists, I’m saying I did) Forza 4 came out and I decided to turn them all off at once and just go with it. At first I hated the game, and was so much slower. But I kept at it, and soon I was actually becoming a decent driver. It’s amazing how much turning them off forces you to learn and feel new things about the car. Within a few hours I had completely adapted and was a ton faster. Assists muddy the driving experience and turning them off unlocked a whole new world of Forza to me, which felt amazing. When done right, you can brake harder without ABS, turn better without Stability control, shift faster with manual/clutch (yes it is much faster)… You get the point. Turn 'em off.
“But what about…”
“…Braking line?” - Nope. First off the braking line is wrong. Second, you become reliant on it. When you turn it off, your brain panics, and has to find a new way of determining where to brake. Visual cues, such as a sign or mark in the road are things you will suddenly take note of. Furthermore, you will develop an almost “sixth sense” - No, you won’t be seeing ghosts - You’ll brake better because something in your brain tells you when to brake. It’s just a feeling you get, and it almost never fails me.
“…Traction control?” - Alright here comes the elephant in the room. A neanderthal will look at the leaderboards and see nearly everyone in the top 10 using TCS. “Well then I will use it too!”. Hold the phone. Sit down. Listen. TCS is for those who know how to use it. Think you’re just going to mash the throttle and let some magical force take you through the corner the fastest way there is? Think again. All those top ten times up there people are getting because they know how to feather and delicately apply throttle. TCS is there for when they put too much into it. It lets you ride the line between not enough power and too much, without stepping over it. I am telling you to turn it off. Same as with the braking line, it will tune your brain to use the correct amount of throttle and that will get your through the corner faster. TCS is for after you’ve mastered this and only when you are faced with cars that are extremely powerful.
“…Normal or Sim Steering?” - Alright, this one is tricky. I’ve done many tests, asked a lot of top racers, and the consensus is that this is down to preference. One is not faster than the other. Sim steering does not have better turn in and is not advantageous in any way. The only reason people should want to use it is because they prefer the feel of it. The problem that I, and many other more skilled drivers than myself, have is that its just too damn snappy. Sometimes you’ll spin out by simply fondling a curb, smelling grass, or groping another car. (that got weird) Sometimes these things are unavoidable and even necessary, and normal steering helps with all of that. My entire motive for telling you to turn off assists is because it will force you to learn which will make you become a faster driver. This just doesn’t apply to Sim steering. Neither is faster. One offers you a more twitchy, sharper feel and the other is slightly softer and won’t have you spinning out over-obnoxiously when you haven’t even done anything wrong.
A note about damage: When practicing your lines and braking/accel points, turning off damage stop your tires from getting worse from lap to lap. The whole point of the next section of this guide is to teach you consistency, and the constant degradation of your tires will mess it up. Make sure to turn off damage for now.
At first, the game will seem much harder, especially if you are used to having the assists on. This is the nightmare phase. You will be slower for a while - until you’ve adapted. You might even hate the game for a bit. Seriously though, just power through it. Learn how hard you can push the throttle in each corner without spinning the tires. Same with braking. Learn how far you can pull the brake trigger without locking up the tires. Don’t turn one off at a time to “ease” yourself into having no assists. Turn them all off. You will adapt within a few races. I know its uncomfortable to turn everything off, especially at once, but just do it. Within a few races it will become second nature and you will truly be glad you did it, and you will be proud of yourself. Assists slow you down. There is no way around it. You will never be the best you can be when you are still using assists. Don’t let them come between you and your best self.
This is what your assists screen should look like:
Suggested Line: OFF
Braking: ABS OFF
Steering: NORMAL or SIMULATION
Traction & Stability Control: OFF
Shifting: MANUAL W/CLUTCH
Damage, Fuel, & Tire Wear: COSMETIC
2. Use Rivals Mode.
Although racing against others is more fun for some people, rivals allows you to focus on the most important thing - YOUR driving. Rivals offers a more laid back and a stress-free place to learn. Pick a well rounded car, and pick a track. Do lap after lap, perfecting each turn using trial and error. You should know the track inside and out. You should never have to look at the minimap or “guess” which corner is coming next. You should be able to close your eyes and imagine the layout of the track. Run 50 laps if you have to. Eventually you will learn the little things, such as exactly when to brake, how to take each apex, or which gear is best for that corner. Pay particular attention to how fast you are running each lap, and look at the right for the various intervals of laptime. Knowing where you are gaining or losing time will help you perfect your driving line. Try taking certain corners wider, or tighter, and see if that affects your times. Strive for CLEAN LAPS (Those without an exclamation mark next to the time). Cutting corners or cheating in any way is only hurting your skill. Once you learn the track, load up the next one. Learn every track and variation. The most important thing while practicing your laps is to be mindful. This means that you are paying attention to your driving and not simply driving around the track in “auto pilot”. Try to squeeze every last second out of your lap. Realize that you went too fast on the last turn, and be aware that next time you come to that corner, you will have to brake earlier/harder. If you started turning too late last corner, be aware of it and know that next time you should turn in earlier, etc. The key here is repetition. With every lap you run, you learn, and you improve. Nobody became a pro by picking up the controller and just being good. They got to their skill by practicing. The more laps you run, the faster you will get. This never changes. A person who has done 1000 laps of the same track will still get better by doing another hundred or more. However, I have to reinstate that being mindful is just as important as time spent lapping. The problem with trying to get good at racing in career or online is the races are too short. 2-5 laps on any track is nowhere near enough to “get into” the track and really learn. Running 30 laps in a row is insanely good for your skill, and doesn’t hurt your credit count either. I should stress that you shouldnt run too many laps in a row without a small break. Going too long can cause your mind to slip into auto pilot, where you are not being mindful. The take home message here is to take short breaks. Stick to one track until you’ve mastered it, then move on to another variation of it, and so on.
3. Dont touch the Rewind Button.
Stop! Dont even breathe on it. Learning involves remembering your mistakes, and getting punished every time you make one. Every time you go off the track, your first instinct is to simply rewind. The problem is that next time you come to that corner you went off at, your mind somewhat forgets about your earlier mistake. It gets to the point where running off the track doesnt seem like such a big issue because you have your trusty rewind button there to save you. Imagine a tight rope walker with a safety net. Sure he will try not to fall off the wire, but in the back of his mind its not a big deal because he knows there is a safety net there. Remove the safety net and I would bet a million dollars that tight rope walker would pay extra attention and would have less of a chance of making a mistake due to an increase in focus. The same, albeit less life threatening, thing exists in Forza. When you run off the road, having to bring your car back on the track and losing your whole lap is frustrating, but it will teach you to pay attention. Developing a reliance on a safety net is one of the worst mistakes people make in this game. Do not be one of those people.
4. Brake earlier.
Knowing where to brake is very tricky. Many pros even make the mistake of braking too late and end up in the ditch once in a while. Braking can seem extremely hard when you are used to a braking line telling you when to slow down. When you first start braking without ABS or the line, you will overshoot corners constantly and this is normal (Remember, don’t touch that rewind), but will get better and better as you learn. Braking too early can also cost you time. But guess what? Braking too early is 1000 times better than braking too late. If you brake too early, all you have to do is let go of the brakes, coast another few meters, then brake again before turning. This will lose you fractions of a second, while braking too late and heading off into the trees will cost you many seconds, dirty your lap, and put you in a terrible racing line for the rest of the turn. When you are practicing your driving lines, braking too early allows you to still maintain the line you want.
The main thing that separates a good driver from a top 100 driver is where they brake. Braking later and into the beginning of a turn sucks. You should be doing practically ALL of your braking in a straight line leading up to the corner. Braking into the turn rather than before it loses you time. No debating that. Watch real life racing, from GT3 to Lemans or F1, they all brake before they begin turning. Your goal should be to brake as late as you can without having to still brake and turn at the same time. A good rule of thumb is to brake half a second before you feel you need to. If you end up braking too early and have to let go of the brakes and coast a bit before the turn - thats fine, but next time you come to that corner brake a little bit later until you find that sweet spot. When you brake properly, the rest of the turn sort of falls into place and you are able to power hard out through the turn and launch yourself ahead of the late-braking idiots.
FACT: The fastest way through a turn is to be as wide as you can on the outside leading up to the turn, brake in a straight line, turn in, hit the inside curb a little with your inside tire, then apply throttle gently as early as you can without going off of the track on the exit.
As you can see, the red line demonstrates the racer being “greedy” and applying the throttle too hard and turning in too early, resulting in a slower corner. The yellow line is almost perfect, but the green is by far the fastest. Note where the green line begins turning, and how it eases on the gas on the way out. If you look at the green line after it begins turning, on the way out it seems almost straight. This means the driver is able to hit the gas earlier and harder without spinning the tires. Its also important to note that the braking was done before the turn in point.
5. Think Ahead.
Obviously you should be concentrating and being mindful of your current corner, but always be aware of what is coming. Be mindful of which turn is coming up after the one you are on and prepare for it. This is the time you should be remembering things like “Okay next is corner X, where I spun out last time from going too fast, so this time I will go a bit slower”, or"Okay, last time I went too slow around the next corner, so I know I can push my car a bit harder". Coming out of a corner that is followed by another right after requires you to put yourself at a good position/line to take that next corner. You want the end of the first corner to link up with the beginning of the next nicely. Running good laps and avoiding mistakes in racing is a lot like chess. You’re mind needs to be one step ahead of the current situation.
6. Have the right Car.
Slapping random speed parts and just winging a tune is the worst thing you can do to your car. Every good race car takes these things into account first and foremost:
- Tires
- Weight
- Down force
- THEN Power
Upgrade your car in that order, and you will see improvements ten fold. Your actual tune setup can make the difference between top 50 and top 10,000 times. Therefore simply guessing a tune out is terrible and if you really feel that you don’t know how to tune (which is absolutely understandable) then simply look up tunes. Start off with the tunes by the gamertag “Tuned by Worm”. These are great base tunes that will point you in the right direction. Take a look at the leaderboards for each track and class and write down as many of those names as you can, then try to find them and “follow” them. When you buy a new car, any tuners you have followed will show up in the “recommended” tunes section when you go to load a setup. Remember that even the fastest tunes aren’t for everyone. Some just won’t fit your driving style. A general rule of thumb I use when upgrading a car is that once you put on race tires, make it as light as possible, and add all of the handling upgrades, it should be close to the limit of the class. If you have to add too many speed upgrades to the car to get it up to the max PI of the class then you should consider aiming for a class lower. As an example, if I am upgrading an B class car rated B450, putting tires and a lighter chassis on it, brakes, sway bars, etc. only brings it to A525, and I have no other upgrades except engine upgrades left to bring it all the way up to A600, then chances are the car would do better in B class. Of course there are a few exceptions to this if the chassis of the car is extremely fit for racing. But generally I don’t try to “stretch” a car up too many class letters from it’s stock rating.
FACT: Many parts in the game are just inherently worse or don’t provide the same bang for your buck. These parts should only be used if you have one or two leftover PI points:
Flywheel: Only use if your car spins it’s tires ridiculously when downshifting.
Clutch: Doesnt help enough, especially when using Manual with Clutch (Which you should be!!!)
Camshaft: Only offers power at the end of the rev range, costs way too many PI points for what it offers.
Oil/Cooling: Adds weight but not enough power to compensate except in rare circumstances.
I should mention that there are certain parts that are the opposite of the above. There are parts that give you a ton of performance for a minimal PI penalty. The Centrifugal Supercharger is a perfect example of this. Sometimes bolting on a race transmission won’t penalize you and even sometimes give you more PI to work with. What I am trying to say here is experiment with different parts combinations and see which yields the fastest lap times on various tracks.
If you really do want to give a shot at tuning cars yourself, check out TG Wormburner’s guide which should give you an awesome rundown of the basics. The thread can be located here:
Finally, to conclude this section, I have to stress the importance of picking the right car for the right track. You don’t necessarily need to have a specific car with specific upgrades and a specific tune setup for each and every single track and variation gasps for breath (Although you can if you have the time and patience). Start off with a few cars and tunes/upgrades for fast or slow tracks. Have a grippy car for shorter tracks and less straights and a more powerful car for long tracks with long straights. Some cars that place in the top ten on Catalunya might do terribly on Road America or vice-versa.
Examples of Grippy tracks:
Catalunya
Bernese Alps
Laguna Seca
Prague
Yas Marina
Examples of “Fast” tracks:
Road America
Bathurst
Lemans (not Bugatti)
Indianapolis Grand Prix (Loop obviously and the inner track)
Spa
Then there are some tracks that offer sections for both types of cars such as:
Bugatti
Road Atlanta
Sebring
Silverstone
7. Race…smart.
Once you have learned every track and variation thoroughly with multiple types of cars, you can begin to race others. Whether its online or in career, use your skills and the things you learned in rivals when facing other cars. Dont get caught up in people being near you or throwing you off your lines. Stay concentrated on yourself and keeping your composure. You might notice that with other drivers on the road your laps just arent as fast as they were in rivals. This is because part of your brain is paying attention to what the other cars are doing. While you should be aware of the cars around you, its most important to stay focused like you were in rivals. Another one of the biggest mistakes you can make what will kill your progress and your race position is giving in to pressure. In rivals, you were racing against yourself, and the atmosphere of that mode is much more at ease. Here, you have a strong desire to beat those around you and come in first. This leads your subconscious to make mistakes. Your subconscious will tell you to brake later, or “try harder”, etc. But don’t do it. Brake where you braked in rivals mode. Keep focused and stick to your habits you’ve been learning. I’ve seen people who can run 100 laps while hotlapping and never run off the track and always average amazing lap times consistently. But as soon as they enter a race they suck because they dont drive with the same level of focus or “cool-headedness”. Don’t stare at the bumper of the car ahead of you, pay attention to the track and the road ahead of you. Use proper race etiquette. Everyone makes mistakes and sometimes you’ll smack into someone genuinely by accident. Do the right thing and wait for him until he gets back in the race. If you are the victim of a crash and end up off the track, don’t become the offender by ignorantly returning to the road and causing another crash. Look both ways and check your blind-spot (literally - use the stick) before getting back into the race. If someone you know is faster than you or beats you to your line, give it to them and let them pass cleanly. When people see that you are a respectful driver, you will become a respected driver. Race smart, and don’t be that guy.
Some Extra Tips:
When switching to clutch, swap your hand brake and clutch. Clutch should be on the A button so it is easier to hit, and have your handbrake on the left bumper. Just mash the A+B Button to upshift and A+X To downshift. Dont let off the throttle when upshifting. I know this is unrealistic but just letting the engine bounce off of the limiter has always been faster in Forza. If you can’t stand the sound of doing that, you can let off the throttle for a millisecond when upshifting, but this is a bit slower.
Use vibration. It tells you when you are at the threshold of braking or accelerating and lets you know when you are overdoing it.
Fix the deadzones on the controller. This is located in Forza Profile, under controller settings (Hit X for Advanced settings) Change the values in the 90’s to 100 and the lower values to 0. Doing this improved my lap times because it allows you to have precise control of steering, gas and braking.
Dont hate certain tracks. I have my favourites and my least favourites. The tracks that I hated were usually the tracks I was worst at or didn’t race often. People like the tracks they know and are good at. Step outside your comfort zone and run dozens of laps on that track you hate. As you spend more time in it and become more familiar with it, you will develop a fondness for it. I promise. Own and embrace the track.
Find good racers. One of the best pieces of advice I can give is to build your friends list with people who enjoy clean racing and who want to improve their abilities like you. Get a lobby together full of people who aren’t going to ram you off the road. Having a good group of buddies will expose you to the greatest aspects that Forza has to offer. Having more fun with the game will only ignite your passion for it which will improve your dedication.
In summation, I just would like to say that the way most people play the game is not fit for reaching their potential as a driver. Many of the features in the game are amazing for people who just want to play a few times a week and just want to drive cars. But if you are someone who wants to become the next racing legend or just improve, you’re going to need to take the right steps. Fewer laps, shorter races, rewind, and assists are a concoction for poor drivers. Do the opposite. Spend long periods of time running laps, avoid the rewind, and turn off assists and you will become a much better driver in a very short amount of time. Just trust the knowledge I am putting forth, and practice practice practice.
I hope this helps! Feel free to ask questions and be sure to follow me on Xbox Live. I can provide you with in game tips, lessons, or just a lobby for you to race clean in 