May as well get a report in while I have the chance...
Was very pleased with the pace I found in the BT11, what it lacks in power it seemed to more than make up for in grip - an attribute neither myself nor Clive were accustomed too!
Got down to business in practice and quickly put John on pole!
Got
back out there and started work again, first I got what should have been 2nd thanks to a bit of drafting only to find Evil had done a stormer infront and relegated me to 3rd instead!
2 laps later I managed to chop another few tenths off that time without the help of a draft and got my final best lap and a P2 on the grid.
Got an everso slight jump on Evil off the line which put me on his outside approaching T1, not intending on doing anything silly and noteing JR leaving a sensble amount of space for me to slither about in I decided to stay wide and follow Evil in hanging just off and outside his rear wheel - trouble is I overestimated the cold grip of the Brab when not under power and slid gently up into the armco
As it was lap 1 I made no effort to get back down and just coasted along the barriers hoping it'd keep me out of the way - on reaching the chicane a quick cut across the grass kept me out of the pack's way and dropped me to 4th behind Goran who didn't seem keen on letting me past
After a lap or 2 I managed to make a solid pass on Goran and set about chasing Evil and JR down, for the first 4 laps or so they were close enough to slow each other so I made visible gains - then Clive broke away and started to hold me level/possibly pull slightly each lap as my setup wasn't quite up to temp yet!
I caught JR only to perform an un-forced pirouette in T1 while hanging off his gearbox - didn't hit anything and either recovered incredibly fast or was fortunate enough to have John mess the chicane up good and proper as I'd only lost about 100 yards to him by the end of the next straight.
A couple more laps and I caught him a second time - it wasn't going to be easy as John seemed to have the slight advantage on the run from the hairpin up until about the 4th ess after which I seemed able to carry more speed in the faster turns. Obviously our top speeds were identical without drafting getting involved.
Using my slight speed advantage off the final turn to it's full I got a run on John down the straight good enough that he couldn't really fight back without major risk at T1.
I managed to keep him far enough away in the esses to pull ahead abit in the final few corners before the S/F straight which ment he could only make up distance on me along the straight but not get close enough to threaten - a particarily brave (I'm not allowed to say Banzai! anymore
)attempt at T1 payed off and put me even further ahead, which gave me enough distance to effectively brake his draft by the end of the lap.
From there on it was just a mental slog as I worked to keep my lines as tidy and fast as possible with an increasingly skittish BT11 under me, even taking into account clive's slowing in the final section of the race I don;t think I could even have caught in the old style 50odd minute races - and all down to that T1 mistake at the start :'(
All in all possibly my first ever enjoyable race at Mexico so congrats to all!