Firstly a big thank you to Tony for interrupting his hols to sort the server.
I wasn't expecting much from this race, absolutely detest the Hella Licht chicane, always my downfall at this circuit. Testing had not gone well, could not get the brake balance & pressure right, car would either plough straight on or would swap ends. Consequently I could not string more than 2-3 laps together without losing control.
Despite a new PB in qually I was well over a second slower than Erling so a win seemed out of the question & my plan was just to take it easy & hopefully get to the end. Got a great start & had a big lead going into the chicane but at the exit Erling was right on my tail
. First few laps were quite stressful trying to be fast enough to hold the lead but not attacking the track too much & risking a big error. It was almost a relief when I nearly lost it exiting Texaco & Erling went past & started to pull away, I could relax & drive at my own pace.
However a few laps later Erling was in the barriers at the Bosch Curve & I was back in front with around a 5s lead, this wasn't in the plan, I've got to drive hard again! The gap started to come down but only slowly, Erling would take 0.5s out of my lead through the chicane but I was able to get most of that back around the rest of the lap. With around 5 laps left the gap was just over 2s then I caught Bob at Bosch & nearly lost it under braking & clipped the barrier on the inside as I went past, fortunately the car straightened itself out & I continued on with the gap now under 2s but with Bob between me & Erling. Then the gap jumped to over 4s, guess Erling & Bob had had a 'moment'. Over the remaining laps the gap went up dramatically & I came home 7s ahead.
Still don't know how I managed 28 laps with only a couple of small errors, I really was expecting to last no more than half a dozen laps.
Congrats to Erling & Clive
& well done to Bob & Rog for making it to the finish.