Back on the subject of erode,
I was able to check out a bit of today’s fun race on Unadilla smooth and was interested in how the erode played out.
The qualifier races were 8min +1 with the server erode apparently set on 4. The last qualifying race before UID grab was very full, at least 40 bikes. I thought the track rutted up very well at this setting. Unadilla smooth doesn’t really have much built in bumps/ruts, but by lap 2 there was already enough lines established to easily see. Throughout the race there were multiple ruts in almost every corner, and a variety of usable lines throughout the track. By the end of the short moto it was quite rough, with some lines getting a bit sketchy—it felt like a national should feel. Overall, for this race length and number of bikes, I thought it worked really well, especially considering the track was almost completely flat at the start.
For the first 20min +1 moto the server erode was set to 0.8. It took a few laps for any significant ruts/bumps to be established. Once those lines did show up, most riders would follow the established rut. By the end of the race there was basically one good line throughout the track and the overall roughness I would describe as what you’d see at the end of the first round of motos at your local weekend warrior track.
It was really interesting to me how well the qualifier roughed up, compared to the very tame results of the actual race. The qualifier worked well enough that now I’m back to questioning how necessary starter ruts actually are.
Of course, if they had kept the server erode at 4 for the 20min motos, it would probably be too extreme by the end. I probably would have set the erode to 1.6 for the 20min motos, keeping the same erode to race length ratio from the qualifiers. However, I do think the higher erode setting of the qualifier is what contributed to the nice multitude of lines at the start of the race. Theoretically, this is exactly what the erode limit settings should allow for. I haven’t looked at the tileinfo for this track, but it seems like something like this should work if the server erode is set to 1:
Code: Select all
erode_limit 0 4 4
erode_limit .5 .5 .5
erode_limit 1 0 0
The question is where exactly to put the middle and bottom limits.
Of course some people like the ultra tame erode settings because it’s easy to ride and fairly predictable once the main line gets established. But that’s not realistic. Real motocross on a national level is basically defined by the gnarliness of the ruts/bumps. I’ve only spectated at the pro nationals, but I remember racing the Spring Classic at Lake Whitney back in the day in the schoolboy class and the ruts were deep enough to rip your feet off the pegs on a normal, dry day. By the end of a long national moto, the lines should be chewed out bad enough that riders are searching the edges of the track for ways around the worst rough.