Supercharged Championship (3 race mini-series)

Bimodal_Rocket · November 27, 2023, 1:38pm

Some more shorts

I messed around making some additional short films. I’m curious how YouTube defines a short as some of mine show as shorts, some don’t.

The Emmy award nominated Chasing @nikspeeds with licensed music and artsy title!

Sadly, not a short because it’s too long.

Shorts

Drive with Dom

How long are YouTube Shorts?

YouTube Shorts are vertical videos that are 60 seconds or less in length. Shorts can be a 60-second continuous video or several 15-second videos combined. However, if your Short uses music from the YouTube catalog, your Short will be limited to 15-seconds only.

Pro tip: YouTube will automatically categorize any YouTube content that’s 60 seconds or less as a Short.

They show you how you are faring in terms of views per video in a convenient way. We can use this information to make intelligent decisions as content generators.

For example, we learn here that @AndreLafond is about twice as interesting as a manhole cover but 1/3 less interesting than someone weighing themselves on a scale.

Speaking of which… I’m closing on 100k!!!

nikspeeds · November 27, 2023, 9:02pm

Congrats!

I was up til 4am working on that bot/crawler btw , haven’t touched in a couple weeks but slowly getting motivated to get back to and hopefully have something nice for January.

I might try focusing a bit more heavily on just doing things specifically for supercharged instead of trying to account for everything.

For example, supercharged adds semantic meaning to their “activity type”, a custom field per venue that likely aligns with their POS terminal options, but not all places do (actually, most don’t…).

This means at other locations it may be impossible to, for example, derive which track you’re on, or which speed you’re running, based on the information available.

You can still probably get there running clustering algorithms, or maybe some simple heuristics, but I think that might be pushing it to far for something that might not get used.

Bimodal_Rocket · November 27, 2023, 9:19pm

I wish I had better knowledge of computer stuff. My son, Nick, speaks your language.

I would love to be able to pull up info like kart number so we can tell who we are racing for the drive with Dom narrated stuff. I use your club speed info page all the time.

nikspeeds · November 27, 2023, 10:16pm

You can go the “manual” / “brute force” route for that in the meantime. When you’re on your RacerHistory.aspx page, clicking under the Activity Type column will take you to HeatDetails.aspx of that race. From their, clicking on anyone’s name will show you their RacerHistory page along with their kart number if you line up the race, date, time.

Unfortunately, there’s no simple way to jump back to their race recap (that you see on the monitors) which includes this already

Anyway, I plan to include Kart Number in the outputs.

BTW if you have any ideas for visualizations you’d like to see, let me know! I don’t follow F1 or anything but I planned to look at some dashboards they have for inspiration. There’s not much data we have access to anyway, but it could be fun to play with. Particularly like driver progression through a league series, etc. I think we could probably come up with something for (although you might already be able to do that using the sheets Will sends out).

Oh yeah I can definitely generate standings on demand as the races go on, instead of waiting on Will to send out the sheet. However, the new Mulligan feature will throw a wrench in that, since I won’t know about the Mulligans in advance… Hmmm …

Bimodal_Rocket · November 27, 2023, 10:28pm

So, to warrens point, 360 footage that is zoomed out and full frame is indeed nauseating.

It appears that the shakiness is “worse” as you go further wide and proportionately gets worse and worse the further to the left/right edges.

I bet that the same footage presented 9x16 (thus cutting off edges) is not nausea inducing.

Will try.

I haven’t given thought to data visualization. Generally what I’m interested in is who/when/laptimes/what kart.

I do miss telemetry. I need to find a new way to get a timer. Maybe simply the stopwatch in a seperate window.

Bimodal_Rocket · November 28, 2023, 7:59pm

I too stayed up late, making a couple shorts just to crest 100k…

nikspeeds · November 29, 2023, 2:35am

Congrats!! You’re killing it with the 360 takes, they’re coming out great!

nikspeeds · November 29, 2023, 2:42am

Hey have you decided on what day you’re signing up for in January? I’m doing Tuesday again for sure, I’m not sure yet if I’m also going to do Wednesday again.

This time around, Wednesday overall had faster drivers, but everyone Tuesday was pretty close knit. A big group of us went out to eat together every night after each race (not only to Chik Fila, which only half counts since it’s in the same lot! haha).

Hoping to have the same in Jan, despite the cold!

Bimodal_Rocket · November 29, 2023, 1:53pm

Ok, so, better chance at podium, check!

I’ll ask Will to see if I can change to your day. Would be fun to continue the battles although you are getting faster than me consistently. Grr. I shall have to chase you and remedy this slightly from time to time.

Week 3 of the Mini-Champ
A most unusual set of races given the “normal” finishing orders. I came in around where I always do but we saw a new name up front!

Of note, Victor got podium in H2, edging me out for the first time, if I am not mistaken. Congratulations Victor. Well raced!

Marc had a series of broken karts and had a forgettable night, alas. Next league we will have a “drop” rule, which will make things interesting. Otherwise it was fairly normal, I got 3rd and 4th, coming behind Alex and Andres.

I got there early and did 3 public sessions, one with Brandon. The first session was bland but in the 2nd, I met two French brothers who approached me after our heat. They were hoping to see the footage. I sent it to them and suggested that they give the league a go to try speed 4, as they were good drivers.

My public heat with Brandon was a hoot and we made all sorts of cool passes, me chasing him through the traffic. Here’s my favorite, the “Sandwich” pass:

It looks like we have nothing on tap until league 2 starts in January. It had been a lot of fun participating in the series and super convenient, relatively. I strongly recommend this to anyone interested. There’s room for new and experienced racers and you will be slotted appropriately.

Come race us!

W3 H1

W3 H2

Les Freres (360 must be viewed on YouTube)

Tearing it up with Brandon (360 must be viewed on YouTube)

Shorts:

Panic at the Kartdrome (Tony’s dance)

Bimodal_Rocket · November 29, 2023, 8:21pm

On a YouTube note… I thought this was interesting. I’m not trying to grow big and monetize or anything, but it’s interesting how YouTube works.

I found the bit about sound interesting. How the sound effects create a hook and makes people stay engaged for slightly longer. It’s hard to change when you are getting pinged by stimuli. @nikspeeds

Bimodal_Rocket · November 30, 2023, 11:46am

The public sessions before the race can be a lot of fun.

It is interesting driving the kart when it’s overgripped relative to power. It is dreadfully dull when you get open track as there’s no drama at speed 3. However, it’s fun to play on traffic and it also allows you to work on the line.

You dont normally meet people in public sessions but I was approached by the two fellas I shared a heat with. They wanted to see footage since we had had a good session. I caught and passed them and then they played follow the leader of sorts.

Was two French guys, one of whom was here visiting his brother and came out for a night of fun. So we had a French moment and did French things. It was nice.

Here’s our fun. I made them a reverse cam version so they could see the whole thing… me closing, the pass, then them chasing me.

A drive with Olivier and Clement - Reverse cam footage

And here’s the normal footage:

Racing with the brothers was unusual in that it was just us 3 in a public heat and they were very competent drivers. Thats not usually the case.

These heats are typically crowded and pretty new/inexperinced. In some cases there are folks who are downright incompetent and in some cases, dangerous. We’ve had issues with folks driving the wrong way, stopping on track, etc. There’s a reason we struggle with insurance. The lunatics in the fat tails of the distribution curve.

Here’s a more normal public heat. I try to do a heat with my buddy Brandon, weekly. He’s 18 and is generally faster than me. He’s fun to chase through traffic. Here’s a great moment we had, doing a double pass on the same kart, simultaneously:

Full heat as we work our way past everyone:

Deanbert · November 30, 2023, 9:38pm

Several standard deviations from the mean then… It sounds like a challenge especially when you’re a couple of standard deviations the other way.

Bimodal_Rocket · November 30, 2023, 10:00pm

I bet the rental track owners have some great stories to tell. Jim Hall out in Oxnard told me about his worst concession session wreck. He had a kart somehow manage to hit curb, jump fence, hit car, flip, all at the same time. I may have embellished a bit but parked car was involved.

Given the lack of participation in karting across all men age 54approx, I may be an outlier in a good sense. Fortunately in rental karting I don’t have to deal with the fastest drivers around. Sadly I’m merely average in the big picture.

The thing with the folks on the incompetent end of the spectrum is the lack of, well, everything that allows you to navigate around them. Pure random driving.

Did i ever introduce you to team Pink croc lady? An example of this. Clicks for lol.

I can’t figure out if her kart was broken or if she was deliberately repeating the same failed turning technique.

Ok so, having rewatched this, I’m gonna say that while her driving was particularly poor, she did have magnificent straight line speed. Turning was the issue.

nikspeeds · December 1, 2023, 4:33am

btw, pro tip, they have $120 gift card for $100 sale going on now. You can buy gift cards and effectively pay $375 for the league . I picked up 4 cards the other day, might get some more to use next year in general.

yes very interesting.

I’ve noticed the bit about average view duration too. If I have a video that’s super short, and watched multiple times, where the view duration is >100% (because most are rewatching) then it’s recommended like crazy.

But that’s what makes for good videos … aside from fully public races, I think overall I’ve enjoyed the League Practices the most where it’s the higher speed and still a mix of skill levels.

I keep forgetting but meaning to ask Will if we can have practices always just first come first serve the hour leading up to league races. They say that they have the guys running the karts out there to test them and warm them up, but they obviously don’t have 20 people doing that. Seems like a good opportunity for the track, as well as for us all to start with warmer karts, etc. leading up to the race (since the first ones out always get screwed).

Bimodal_Rocket · December 1, 2023, 12:54pm

@nikspeeds Ooooh you are very clever! I was napping on that and bought the next league already but will follow you lead and grab $500 of gift cards for practices and next league.

Btw I posted a review on Google for Melissa. What’s funny is I also posted some pics and I got messages from Google about views and followers. It was fun. I’m contemplating fleshing out my SC and OKC Google reviews with more images, I think I could actually get hits in really big numbers. Why not?

The shorts are absolutely killing it

I was growing steadily and slowly prior to SC. With SC league, shorts, and enduro footage…

I more or less did a 5x. And it’s just building steam.

I think all this time I’ve been preaching to the wrong choir. The recreational karting facilities that are opening in urban centers are proving to be hugely successful. People are finding their way into karting without the existing karting infrastructure having a damn thing to do with it. Here’s where I come in…

I think that by participating in this and doing what I do vlog/videos etc… I’m trying to show the bridge between Supercharged type stuff (electric indoor fantasy) and the mainstream traditional sprint racing we all love. Since I participate in both and report on both, those who I supercharge race with who follow my vids may also see my enduro vids and make the jump to trying that. “Hey if Dom can do it so can I”. Also, I spend a fair amount of time talking with league participants, answering questions about what other opportunities there are for racing.

It occurs to me that TKC (Alec and Matteo’s series) could grow MASSIVELY if I can figure out a way to direct folks towards that better than telling them one at a time. It’s perfect next step… it’s still rentals but it’s position racing. It’s also fun and goes to lots of different (good) facilities in the tri state area.

Speaking of which…

Since we are done with mini championship and have a month till league 2… I suggest the TKC winter mini series. The first date is Dec 10 and it’s a 3 hr enduro.

I’d love to see some of the folks who did the league try position racing for the first time. Will be nuts and good fun.

I’ve got scum lined up. Do you want to go? I have a guy that’s also LFG. You could create a team of 2 or 3. I can get you a second.

The Suoerchargers need a discord like my old discord that Ethan started for the NJMP regulars. This turned into our chat room, where we’d also arrange races and teams and stuff. Also I would post cats. Should we start such a discord we will need a #pets channel.

Bimodal_Rocket · December 1, 2023, 1:14pm

Also shame on me for not posting this sooner:

Note to Will: trophies are meh. We could do better, smaller ones. How about cut lucite with sc logo?

Speaking of which, did I miss the final spreadsheet?

League 1 results:

Supercharged Edison Wednesday League (Y1S1 Final Results).xlsx (128.9 KB)

Bimodal_Rocket · December 1, 2023, 3:50pm

Some more shorts from final mini-champ heats:

I can’t remember the movie but the short title references a movie in which Peter Falk and Alan Arkin are trying to evade fire by running in circles, ineffectively.

Ah, rental racing!

Bimodal_Rocket · December 5, 2023, 1:49pm

A post was split to a new topic: REBEL scum RACES extremezone 3hours

Bimodal_Rocket · December 3, 2023, 2:29am

I’m starting to see the value in my Epidemic subscription. Now that I am using a nice editing suite, adding audio and mixing it is much more interesting and pleasant.

With shorts I believe you can use the YouTube music library, which has all the usual major and minor recording artists.

I have been enjoying the YouTube thumbnail mini-game. I am making my site as pretty as I can just because it’s fun.

Bimodal_Rocket · December 4, 2023, 12:57pm

LEAGUE 1 2024 starts Jan 16-17

@nikspeeds

Getting dangerously close to having to make decisions about whether I follow the money bricked road. (Which doesn’t pay much apparently).

I was sort of the assumption that I’d never monetize since i thought that would guarantee ads before video. It turns out ads are unavoidable unless you are a subscriber like I am. I might as well monetize eventually.

The shorts are driving views:

Which has generated a flurry of new subs:

I think I got more new subs in 1 month than in my first 5 years.