Dunno where to start.
Managed a decent enough 1:50.8 or something in qualifying early on, but knew from offline testing there was more in it. Hadn't done below 1:50 in testing, but I knew I it was possible. Somehow I managed one of those banzai laps and I dipped below 1:50 to take 2nd on the grid with only a couple of minutes left. I think that has to be one of my best qualifying performances all season and it made my race tbh. Jimmie in the Spyker was too quick in qually and I knew I wouldn't beat his time, so all I wanted was to get ahead of Lazlow to give me a chance in the championship battle.
Going into the race Lazlow was leading by 2 points and I knew if Lazlow was in the place behind me I would have to win to take the title, because I missed one round due to family activities so level points would see him crowned due to 1 more race attended. Jimmie being in first wasn't ideal therefore, but I was hopeful he would take longer in the pits or make some mistakes like at Magny Cours.
Race got under way and the first few laps were very quiet for a change with the cars spaced nicely out in GTC. However I couldn't really see where I was going very well because each track segment would flash on and off from the car headlights behind. It was so distracting that I just couldn't see where some of the braking points were so I was braking conservatively and not lapping very quick.
Jimmie led for a few laps but then made an error which let me through into the lead and eventually Lazlow too. Battled then commenced between the two championship rivals. As the temperature of the track dropped lower and lower my medium tyres were just dire and I was struggling 2 seconds off the pace I could have been doing. Lazlow was sitting right on my tail as I was clearly holding him up, but he couldn't get close enough to make a passing attempt and I was really unsure what to do at the pit stops. Leave mediums on or switch to soft tyres.
Well I decided to switch to softs as I really wasn't comfortable driving an car on what felt like rain and so I left it 1 or 2 laps later than I would have done to stop for tyres and fuel. After the pits I hammered the car trying to make sure Lazlow didn't jump me in the pits. Unfortunately some of the lappees and GT1s decided otherwise and the lap before Lazlow pitted I lost 4 seconds in one lap so all my hard work had gone to waste. Lazlow came out of the pits 3 seconds ahead and I was very annoyed at losing the lead because of other cars.
So, the red mist came out and I was driving like a demon possessed to catch Lazlow. I think within 3 laps I was right on his tail and with the extra grunt of the Morgan I made minced meat of his puny BMW.
After that it was plain sailing as Lazlow couldn't keep up with my soft tyre shod Morgan and he eventually had to pit twice again afterwards.
Have to say Imola was a really really hard circuit to drive the Morgan at. It's so stiff that it doesn't really make friends with curbs, but at Imola you have to use a lot of curb, so I was really pleased at the result. My offline testing showed I could do 1:50.0 in the BMW Z4 without too much bother, so I really was worried that it could go quite a lot quicker than the Morgan.
Congratulations to Lazlow on a great season, sorry for pipping you at the post. Yet to see the final standings but I'm pretty sure Team Oldie will have just had enough to retain their lead in the GTC team championship, so congratulations on that, a job well done. Hopefully Prof has managed to keep 3rd in the drivers, but I think that one is going to be very tight as I'm not sure on the points everyone got. Either way a great season for Prof, so well done.
In GT1 I hold my hat off to Busi who has done what I've done to Lazlow and pipped the previous leader (FreQ) at the last, so well done on the championship win Busi and hard luck FreQ, but a great season in the challenging Viper.
P.S. Joss you can't quit, you can only be fired at Team Shark, so you're not going anywhere!