iRacing Setups – The Top 9 Sites Listed in Google

Once in a while, I perform a Google search for iRacing setups, just to see where this site is listed. At the time of this writing, the site is listed at number 10. That gets the site on the first page in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages), but is a little disappointing since the iRacing setups on the site are frequently updated, and the state of some of the sites closer to the top is abysmal. Here are some examples:

1. Listed at number 1 in a Google search for iRacing setups is racesetups.com. It’s a nice domain name, but it’s not quite so pretty when you look under the hood. When I used the site’s search function to search for Late Model setups (Chevrolet Monte Carlo SS), I found out that the setups on this site are so old that they are completely useless. The newest Late Model setup available on the site was uploaded on September 21, 2013! That’s before the New Tire Model version 5 was introduced on the Late Model. We all know that the setups prior to February of 2014 are utterly useless.A search for Street Stock setups was even worse, with the latest setup posted on July 29, 2013. Again, this is prior to the iRacing New Tire Model for the Street Stock cars. All of these setups are a waste of time and space.Then I searched for Super Late Model setups. I was surprised to find that there actually is a category for Super Late Models on this site, considering the fact that the site is so woefully outdated in other areas. I was also surprised to find three setups in this category, one for Mosport Raceway, and two for Infineon Raceway. At this point, I’m thinking this might be a joke. Do these cars ever run these tracks? No, they don’t. Maybe in some hosted session at some point in time, but these actually look fake to me. What about tracks that the cars actually run? What’s going on over there?

   Obviously, racesetups.com is useless, yet it is still listed number 1 in Google and Yahoo for the search term ‘iRacing setups.’ It just goes to show you that the search engines aren’t always that accurate in their rankings.

2. The number 2 site listed in Google for ‘iRacing setups’ is bustawrench.com. It’s appropriate that it’s number 2 I guess, since all I get when I click is this:

   Error establishing a database connection

   So that’s that. I guess this site is down. Nice.

3. The number 3 result is for the forum at racedepartment.com. I found this site to be pretty well-organized, but that’s not hard to do when you have no setups to organize. The Late Model category has zero setups. The Street Stock category has one setup, posted on March 26, 2013. The author says it’s still a work in progress. This is a joke, right? There is no Super Late Model category, showing that the site is not maintained or properly updated. Another poor site that is ranked high by the rocket scientists and their ‘intelligent algorithm’ at Google.
4. The number 4 result is for the site iracersresource.com. I can’t help but like the design of this site, and there are a couple of other things that I like about it. However, as a setup sharing site, it lacks content almost as badly as the other sites above. The site boasts 248 iRacing setups. Unfortunately, the vast majority of them are badly outdated.

   In the Late Model category, there are quite a few setups listed. All of them are garbage. The newest setup there is for 2013 season 2. This setup is a year old, and was made well before the New Tire Model version 5 was introduced on the iRacing Late Model. The rest of the setups are even older. It doesn’t get any better. The Street Stock category doesn’t have very many setups, and the latest one is for the infield road course at Charlotte. If that’s not enough to make it completely useless, it was built for the previous tire model, in 2013 season 2. The Super Late Model category really shows how well a site is maintained. The fact that there is no Super Late Model category at all is good evidence that this site is not maintained at all.

5. The number 5 result is for an official iRacing site that lists ‘community sites.’ There is a ton of useless information on this site. Many of the links are broken, so it obviously isn’t maintained. Kevin Bobbitt is listed as the contact for this site, and I’ve emailed him twice to get listed there, but I’ve received no response. There are no setups shared on this site, but if you have the time and the patience to dig through the useless information and the broken links, maybe you could find something.

As you go further down the list, number 6 is a car setup guide in pdf format that is hosted by iRacing. Number 7 is a gtplanet post that doesn’t have any setups. Number 8 is another forum posts that has nothing to do with downloading setups. Number 9 is another forum post from 2009 that is irrelevant due to its age and its content.

In summary, there are no worthwhile iRacing setups to be found in the top nine Google search engine results for the search term ‘iRacing setups.’ This site, osracing.net, sits at number ten, and is the only site in the top ten that has current iRacing setups and is maintained and updated frequently.