F-Zero Central Staff Ghost - Long Pipe Course Guide

Long Pipe
Although I used a custom machine in the video, I only did it to make the staff ghost to be not too difficult to beat. Fat Shark is by far the best machine for this course. Here is a good run with Fat Shark done by Yoshifan28: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8bl_d3CKBk

When using Fat Shark in this course, the more you minimize strafing with L and R and replace stick steering with quick turning, the faster you will go. Becoming as proficient with quick turning as the players with a 2’06 or lower time in this course doesn’t happen overnight.

If you are still trying to get the hang of using quick turning, you may find that a heavy custom machine would net you a faster time. Cosmic Star-G4 with the Giant Planet body is another good custom machine for the course.

The Triple Z custom booster may be better since it has a longer boost duration. Thinking about it now (about 1.5 years later), I’m not sure why I didn’t use it.

Lap 1
The first part before the obstacles is fairly straightforward. But you can get some extra speed by going for the edges of the boost plates, which can save a significant amount of time if you get enough of them.

After the second boost plate, while I turn left to get to the third boost plate, you can also turn to the right as well, which is actually my preference, but it would need a quick turn to not lose too much speed if you are using Fat Shark.

If you are using Fat Shark and utilizing MT, MTing after the first boost plate is slower than not MTing. If you hit a boost plate in the middle and your speed tops out at 1500 (1495 to be exact) or below, then it is always better to NOT MT.

For edge boost plates, if you speed tops out at around 1540 or below, you do not MT at all.

If you are using a custom machine or Black Bull, the MT points after a boost plate are most likely slightly higher than those figures, but it hasn’t been thoroughly tested

There’s more to this whole thing but it isn’t too vital to know since it doesn’t make too much of a difference.

To simplify:
Fat Shark MT Point after hitting middle of boost plate: ~1500
Fat Shark MT Point after hitting edge of boost plate: ~1540

To properly line up for the boost plates where the spinning obstacles begins, use the markings on the track itself. If you align the machine where the appropriate yellow arrows are placed and go straight, that will set you up nicely for the two boost plates.

You may be unfortunate with the obstacle blocking a direct path to the boost plate. With quick reflexes you can avoid it, generally with strafing.

Before the section with the consecutive bumps, you want to try to approach the first bump going as straight as possible which helps with avoiding too much speedloss from the bumps. MT through it until your speed drops down to under 1200.

When you approach the “tricky” part where the pipe dips down then back up, try to copy what I did. After hitting the boost plate before the dip, move to the left a little. Then right before the pipe dips down, strafe to the right for a moment. That should make you go through that part without losing too much speed.

Afterwards on the last turn, while it is easier to take the path I did, the path taken in Fat Shark run that I linked is the shorter path, but it is somewhat tricky to do without hitting the obstacles.

Take care to not crash into the final obstacle. If you want you can attempt a shift boost off the edge of the half pipe, but it’s somewhat tricky to do at a consistent basis.

Lap 2
The boost strategies I recommend will differ between Fat Shark and custom machines. With both machines you would boost twice, timing it so the second boost ends right when you hit the first boost plate. The differences starts between the second and third boost plates, I would recommend to NOT boost if you are using Fat Shark while I would boost if you are using pretty much any other machine.

Then after the last boost plate before the mini drop/jump until before the bumpy section, the Fat Shark WR start only calls for one boost and to MT between the upcoming boost plates. While I think with customs you should boost twice to keep your speed up during this section. At this point, as my video demonstrates, you only have less than one full boost left, while Fat Shark has 2 full boosts left.

Then during the bumpy section with Fat Shark, after the first few bumps, you can boost once.. It’s faster to boost but you risk losing control, losing too much speed and maybe miss the boost plate right after the bumps. Alternatively you can choose to not boost during the bump section and save it until after the last boost plate. That will leave you with one extra boost to use in lap 3.

End of Lap 2 and Lap 3
After the last boost plate, with both Fat Shark and customs, boost. But while Fat Shark should boost through the refiller, I would recommend not boosting while going over the refiller if you’re using most other machines to regain more energy. That would let you use the same boost strategy I performed on lap 2 on lap 3.

If you’re using Fat Shark and you boosted during the bumpy section on lap 2, then you will have one less boost to use on lap 3. For lap 3, you would NOT boost during the bumpy section, and instead save that last boost for after the final boost plate. If you are able to MTRS well, that extra speed will make the railslide very fast.

If you did not boost during the bumpy section on lap 2, you can either use that extra boost during the bumpy section again, or you can use it before the final boost plate, making sure you try to time it so the boost ends right when you hit the boost plate as best as you can.

In the video I performed a boost right before the bumpy section on lap 3. I only did that because I lost a lot of speed hitting the obstacle. Had I not made that mistake, I would have saved that last sliver of boost for the very end, using it right after the last boost plate.

Long Pipe can be somewhat tricky to navigate to hit all of the boost plates, and to do it well requires excellent machine control. Even if you are not yet great at it yet, you can still set a good time with proper boosting (and avoiding those darn obstacles).