Here are the top* 20 all round fastest cars for X, S2, and S1 with position, car name/model, PR, first lap time, and second lap time. By "all round fastest," I mean the fastest cars when it comes to a more realistic scenario where there is a mix of both straights and corners and not just straight line speed.
Scroll to read methodology and more.
The full list of all 316 cars (sorry they are not displayed in table form. It is a copy of my working document)
X Class
https://preview.redd.it/474hr7uq82j61.png?width=1081&format=png&auto=webp&s=04d2b22155a4d6aecc1233fd5d1bb8812a0e0beb
S2 Class
https://preview.redd.it/o5h8d0ds82j61.png?width=1077&format=png&auto=webp&s=7b63b17ee707842d61dea948b3337cd901813dc3
S1 Class
(There were only 11 S1 cars to test)
Methodology
I tested 316 (88 X, 217 S2, and 11 S1) individual fully upgraded (including engine and drivetrain swaps) cars to determine which were the all round fastest on a course of 2.57 miles (4.14 km) in length with both long straights and a variety of corners in order to stress each car's turning and braking ability as well as to test their acceleration and top speed capabilities. Each car was driven for at least three runs to ensure that the car's maximum performance was being achieved. Each run consisted of two laps around the course. The first lap was used to decide placement and the second lap was used as a tiebreaker. This is because there is a lot less driver error within one lap compared to two laps, yet there still needs to be a way to tiebreak for two cars which get the same first lap time, and this is what I came up with. Not perfect but it works. The fastest of the first lap times and the fastest second lap times (independent from one another) from all three runs were recorded and used for placing.
The Course
https://preview.redd.it/dcw0pdcz82j61.jpg?width=3944&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=469afa47a95ad2405f13f5e67f7089174557bfe5
Conclusion
TLDR; the car analysis starts at the second to last paragraph
I figured I'd write about my experience doing this project and my thoughts on some of the cars. First off, this god damn project took way longer than I initially expected both because I didn't expect to test over 300 cars (I estimate that I have gone around that course about 2,000-3,000 after accounting for all the mess ups) and because about halfway through my first attempt, I restarted in order implement a new time measurement system using Geforce Experience's screen recording function rather than jankily using the stopwatch on my phone. As such, this project has been going on since July of 2019 and I just finished, so ya I really hope a lot of people at least look at this post. I didn't originally intend to post this online what else am I going to do with it? It probably wasn't worth it, but whatever.
I was inspired to start this because I wondered first which X car was the all round fastest car and how accurate that whole PR number and rating system really is. Another thing to consider is that the performance of a car can look misleading if its performance is unbalanced. For example, if a car is really fast, but it can't turn, its gonna suck and be slow around the course. I also was reminded by the Top Gear leaderboard, so here we are.
After testing all of these cars, I pretty sure I can say what makes a well rounded car. Of course it needs speed but more specifically acceleration. Moderate turning is acceptable, but even bad turning is doable. However, one thing that needs to be as good as it can be is breaking. Maybe I think this because I did all of this without a breaking line or rewinds (I get around to that later), but bad breaking performance can really limit how far a given car can be pushed and therefore how good its overall performance is.
Okay now its time to talk about what really f*cking annoyed me. Number one, the god damn traffic. I estimate about 67% of my failed runs were because of traffic. They can be really hard to not hit when you're pushing each car to the max. Even if I didn't hit a car, it could still slow me down because I would have to go around it which isn't efficient. I was forced to do this whole thing in free roam because the time trial races don't allow for X cars which was necessary. That was my perception anyway. Perhaps that's not true. If so, well shit whatever then. In addition to the traffic in free roam, other things that annoyed me was that I didn't have the racing line and no rewinds. I consider myself a good driver in this game, but I always use the breaking line and rewinds like most players. Imagine having to do a minimum of 1,896 perfect lapse with no aids and traffic in sometimes really difficult cars. I didn't have any rewinds because i externally timed record time, and the course doesn't really allow for setting a route.
Now a bit about the cars. My main focus was on the higher performance cars, so that's basically anything that is a "sports car" or the equivalent and up, but I also included some novel funny cars like the 2013 Cadillac XTS Limousine and 1963 Volkswagen bus (not in top 20), but there were some cars I just refuse to put the time into getting a usable result from like the Peel 50. I found that older cars tended to suck more than newer cars even after being upgraded. On average, they required more tuning to make usable. My general rule for tuning was that I edited the gearbox, camber/stance, roll bar stiffness, and nothing else because I didn't have time for that shit.
One car that I found particularly disappointing was the 2013 Ferrari Laferrari (1:16.93). It was the slowest X class car narrowly (not really) being slower than the 1932 Ford Custom "Double Down" (1:15.7), and it is slower than 71 S2 cars... so that's embarrassing for the Laferrari. On the opposite end of the spectrum, the 2012 Ferrari 599xx Evolution and the 2008 Koenigsegg CCGT at the number one and two spot respectively isn't really that surprising, but I gotta give a shout out to the 2005 TVR Sagaris Forza Edition for taking the number seven position which is still really good considering there are 88 X class cars in total. I think the car is underrated. This is already getting way too long, but I'll say that the 1968 Alfa Romeo 33 Stradale taking number one at S2 is kinda random, but its a good car nonetheless, and from my memory the 1939 Maserati 8CTF is a nice smooth ride at the number one spot at S1.
*The top cars which couldn't make it to the next class up.
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