Congrats Tim and Sam! Tim's too good at Clermont. I likely need a car advantage if I ever want to beat him here. I could have made it tougher for him with a BT26. It was virtually impossible to keep the MS80 close enough to get much from a tow. I tried.
That was great work on the start guys! Everybody made it through T1 unscathed. Very nice! Tim didn't get a good start but I had no desire to pass since I couldn't actually match or better his pace. I'd have been tempted to pass if I felt I was faster. You can't get much closer together, than Piero, Bob, and I were through T1. Nice job Bob to stay off my gearbox after my slow entry in T1.
Nice recovery Piero for 5th after having to let the field pass you early in the race.
My apologies for messing you up Doni by helping Clive get by you. Clive was easily able open the door for me to lap him. I caught you in place where it was harder to make it apparent when you were ready to let me lap. With no chance to beat Tim on speed I wasn't in hurry to lap. I'm glad I didn't cause you much grief Clive, although more than I would have hoped. Considering you guys lap times Clive was probably happy I helped him pass. You beat Clive in the end so I guess my lapping didn't hurt you overall Doni.
In the race, i was unfortunately between Tim and Greg when Tim spun.
No problem Bastian. I thought you did a good job.
If Tim hadn't made two errors, I wouldn't have been close. I tried as hard as I could to stay close the first few laps. I was pleased to stay as close as I did for as long as I did. Once I fell back 4 seconds I started to back off a bit since I couldn't even use the tow to try to keep up. Then Tim spins and I'm on his tail again. So much for the thought of relaxing. It's time to see if I can use the tow again. A lap later I miss my braking point and spin. Luckily it was a slow section and I recovered with little damage. I struggle for a lap after the spin and then I'm back to a good, comfortable, and consistent pace. Tim spins again a little while later. I'm back pushing again. I manage to stay somewhat close the last two laps. I needed a third mistake on Tim's part but he wasn't that generous. He definitely made it more exciting by "waiting" for me.
I'm not sure if I got a tow on my fast lap or not. I seemed to be stuck at 58.5 in the Matra and figured the only way I'd do a 57 was to get lucky with an extraordinary lap. I'm pretty sure I got some tow on lap 3. I was very surprised to see 58.77 that lap. The MS80 feels real good on the last two laps of fuel. It's not so nice heavy on fuel.
It helped me tremendously that Sam and Bob weren't better prepared and Clive took a slow car. I worried Bob or Sam might catch me when I spun. A lap later I realized I was far enough ahead I was going to have to screw up real bad for them to catch me.
I got rid of the video tearing but I'm still getting some stutters. I was only able to look at the fps counter once and see 57 fps coinciding with a stutter. I noticed it before qualifying so I reduced the AA to 4X EQ and the AF to 8 levels. That was worse. That must have made my video card go into 2D mode. I had to exit the server and raise them back to 8X EQ AA and 16 levels AF. It's hard to find the exact settings to get this new cpu to work perfectly. Things are much better now but it will be real nice when I finally get it flawless. I've now found a program that will keep my card in 3D mode so I should be able to lower the graphic settings a little to keep a steady 60fps.
The was a pretty impressive job overall for the field. 11 out of 15 finished on this difficult circuit with a difficult mod. There was a lot of good driving by many drivers. I'm glad to be part of it.
Thanks guys. It's great to run a good race again.