After the imaginary difficulties of the flattest country in Europe we move on to the all too real sweeping undulations of the Garden of England. Brands Hatch, in Kent, was first proposed as a race venue by some cyclists who thought the bowl shape would suit racing very well. And so it does.

You all know the difficulties with the poor rear view in these cars so please be aware that the car in front maybe cannot see you and does not know you are there. Particularly on the first racing lap!

Race List = IGOR
Server = UKGPL_T7_2
IP address = 62.149.202.168
Race date = Sunday 29-05-2011
Time = 21:00 UK time (21:00 GMT)
Track = Brands Hatch http://dixierunners.speedgeezers.net/brands1967/ (HiRes version)
Race length = approx 50 minutes (31 laps)
Variant = GT mod
Damage Model = Intermediate (see rules below re resets)
Qualifying time = 35 minutes. Don't start until 30 mins left on clock to allow everyone to join.
Password: see above
Driver lists can be found on the championship standings page

There will be rolling starts for all races with full moderation of both the warm-up and first lap.

Guidelines for rolling starts...

The car on pole will lead off the grid and maintain a steady pace for the 1st lap around 175kph
All drivers should form up in single file behind him leaving 3-4 car lengths between each car.
There is NO OVERTAKING on the 1st lap until the exit of the last corner.
It is the reponsibility of the lead car to ensure that all drivers are with him as he approaches the final corner.
Racing and overtaking begin AFTER the exit of the last corner, so you may overtake between the exit of the last corner and the S/F line.

Any driver who loses his position on the rolling lap, by going off, blowing his engine or through contact with another car ( regardless of fault) must rejoin at the back of the field.
Incidents on the rolling lap ( Lap 1) will be fully modded and anyone found to have caused another competitor to lose position through bad driving will be penalised appropriately.
Also, please make sure that you know which car you should be following on the rolling lap, so that you do NOT get out of position.

The teams have been chosen and the cars are polished and ready to go.

TEAMS

RED TEAM          HRISTO ITCHOV,  Evilclive, Paul Badblood 
 Chap 2F / Mirage / Porsche
                                                                 
BLUE TEAM        SAMB, Fulvio, Happy Al 
Chap 2F/ Lola/ Mirage

GREEN TEAM     ZACHARIA BLITO, Phil Thornton, Axel Cookie
Chapp 2F/ Ferrari P4 / Mirage

ORANGE TEAM        NIGEL SMITH, Tim FMG,Dave RAndall 
Ferrari P4 / Chapp 2D / Ford GT MK2.

GREY TEAM     Captained by Tim Vosblod who is looking after the part time drivers who cannot be sure to attend every race.

The cars for the Grey team for this season will be
Chapperal 2D
Mirage
Ford GT40 MK1


All drivers must drive all 3 team cars at least 3 times. At the end of the 10 race championship any TEAM found to be in breach of this rule will have its BEST TEAM points result of the season cancelled. Each driver will drop his worst 2 results, in line with the other championships, this gets over the problem of missed races and 2 man teams looking for a sub at the last minute.

The events will be run on Intermediate damage and allow ONE Shift-R with a compulsory 10 second pit stop regardless of fault. (This means 10 seconds in your pitbox without moving). Any driver who fails to take a 10 second stop within 1 lap after a Shift-R, will be disqualified from the results. For this division the full moderation of lap one now applying across all divisions will include both the warm up lap and lap one proper.

Please check the Season 21 pages for details regarding rules and the GT Team Challenge pages in particular.

T7 server is ready set for 31 laps race listening on Igor on Console session.
Ciao

Well, that was another fantastic display of ineptitude from yours truly!
I was amazed to find myself qualifying 5th, with a truly competitive time ( if you ignore mr Itchov on pole) and was feeling pretty good about the race.. I was starting to get used to the 3-geared weirdness that is the Chaparral... well, as untill as far as Hawthorn on the first flying lap.. I arrived in the braking zone and.. nothing happened!!!!  I know the tyres were cold but I was stunned! I came to rest the other side of the grass bank and took my shift_r and 10-sec SNG. Thereafter I settled into a rythem, putting in some comfortable laps, passing Paul,Nigel and Geoff in quick order ( the bumper-cars session with Paul is worth a look on the replay - I was laughing my nuts off at our antics!)
So, there I was, miles behind Natan, a good wedge ahead of Geoff... and I think I must have fallen asleep at the wheel because I arrived in the braking zone at Hawthorn bend half on the grass!! Predictably the car didn't slow down and fore the second time inside half an hour I found myself on the wrong side of the embankment but thistime without a shift-r to take....


As an aside.. can we please get the servers started on time? I find these 9'o clock starts a little on the late side for such long events as it is without suffering extra delays whilst we get ourselves organized.

I take it that's tongue in cheek. Bunch of volunteers relying on your donations to keep our servers running. When we go corporate and everything runs like clockwork we'll become iRacing with their fee's

Even if it is not tongue in cheek I was there at 20:55 and there was myself and Geoff in the chat room. Drivers are asked to arrive by 20:50. The reason the server starts late is that you buggers don't turn up. 12 out of 15+ registered drivers by 21:10. We can start the server at 9 pm sharp but there were five drivers there at that point.  

Please note that Natan is not assigned to a team whilst I check the rules with the Moderator. There was a late request to add him to the Blue team but I do not know if that is permissible. He may not count yet. He can't be Grey because they had a full team.

Uhm, why blame it on drivers? It's not your responsibility to check who turns up and who doesn't, you just start the server and whoever makes it is up to each driver. Keep in mind that the majority come some 5-10 mins past the race (qualifying) start time, so it's not like they're going to miss the race. Personally I like to come a bit later myself and I wouldn't want anyone to wait with starting the server for me...

It's different when there are issues of course, but the reason you give is unreasonable. 

It is a balancing act - you don't have to put up with all the moaning when people turn up late and can't find the password.   As it is I had to wait until 15 minutes after I'd started the server for all drivers to join. We do do our best. As I am sure Tim will tell you, frankly it is only the salary that makes it all worth it....

Just to be clear boys. I have started the server (thanks Fulvio for setting it up), downloaded the replay, created the complete race report and edited it to remove Juha's second ghost entry (he joined with the wrong car initially), imported the race results, re-set the teams, checked the replay for somebody, started the practice server for Aintree, sent three PM's about the race with queries checked that that was OK and now I can go to bed. It's 12:45. 

My choice, happy to do it, but give us a break eh?