Well! Hristo is certainly putting his stamp on S23, isn’t he? Another admirable drive to P1. Grats, maestro!
A great run by Clive to score some very useful points with a P2 finish! Take a bow, Evil!
Al scoops the last podium slot with a workman-line run into P3. Well done!
And Robert John! What to go, bud! I’m seriously impressed with your drive after limited practice. A very handy P4 is a fine reward for your efforts.
I practiced the Brabham, BRM and Cooper for this round. The BT24 was quickest but a little skittish and I could no better than a 30.99 lap. The BRM was impossible! Over about eight laps trial, I could keep it on the road over the ‘yump’ only once and managed a dismal 34-odd timing. Best park my favourite car in favour of something that I could at least keep on the road. A call went out to the Coopers. I managed a 31.58 with the T81b and for the sake of all of a half second, it was the choice over the Brabham. (BTW, I’m seriously impressed with Rocket Ronnie’s ability to scratch out a 31.16 in qualifying aboard the P115; out of my league, bro!)
In qualifying, I was quite pleased to notch a 30.89 timing, eclipsing my Brabham PB. Looking good!
Off the start, I got a bit of a jump on Sky on my right in the Lotus and trailed Clive closely down into T1. I eased off early for fear off arse-smacking him and Sky pulled up on my right. But he was a little unsettled in the braking zone and stayed wide. I tucked in low to the kerb and sadly for Sky, it would seem from the server replay cap that he turned down rather abruptly and struck his LF corner to my RR. Off onto the grass verge and a spin. Bad luck, mate.
Immediately in front of me, Clive was menacing Al. A small slip from Al in the Terlaemenbocht complex was enough to let Clive gun the big Honda by in time to scoop P3 by the time they got to the Bolderbergbocht hairpin. I finished Lap1 in P4 with Al about one second ahead me and Arf ditto behind. Shaping up to be a good race!
The next several laps wound off with consistency. Hristo was breaking away up front; Clive was a solid P2; Al was firm in P3 with myself chasing and being chased by Arf. I find Zolder a bit busy and peer in the mirrors is only fleeting. I noted someone not far off Arf’s tail but couldn’t determine whom it was. Later, of course, I learned that it was RJ in the Cooper doing a ripper of a job!
Comes the start of Lap7 and I’m still running P4 about three seconds down on Al and only a second up on Arf. Roaring down into the Terlaemenbocht complex, everything’s under control when suddenly, on my office door, a vigorous and loud pounding.
‘This had better be an emergency!’
‘Dad! I hear thunder!’
‘How close?’
Silence.
‘How close?’
Silence.
Our area of Keswick had already experienced a fierce thunder storm around 1pm local time that day and another was on the horizon when I sat down to start Q at 4pm. I’d asked my 15-year old son, Logan, to alert me if we had lightning strikes in the near vicinity since it was unlikely that I’d hear any thunder associated with them with my headphones on and a V-12 Maser screaming away just over my shoulders.
I asked Logan to step in and report. Not that close as it so happened but the distraction I didn’t need. I noted from GPLRA that I lost a ton of time by going very slow into the Bolderbergbocht hairpin. From 9/10ths up on Arf starting the lap, the gap was now down to just 1/5th. I blasted down into T1 going fairly late on the brakes but I noted that Arf moved left for a pass attempt. I kept wide on the turn-in and stayed there as we swept thru the corner. I note from the replay cap that Arf kept his Cooper nicely down to the kerb on entry and pass thru but crept to the right as we started to exit the corner. Despite what seemed to be a solid two feet between us, GPL determined that was too close and punted me off. I could have used an extra six inches of clearance room there, Arf.
Recovering without a huge loss of time, I regained the track just in front of John Roberts who, it seemed, tried to sweep around me only to go tearing off into the catch fence and retirement. Bad luck, JR.
Getting back up to speed, I only made a few hundred metres more before the engine failed and that was it. Sigh...