Thanks Tim.
To be quite honest I almost did not bother to start this race, but I figured it would be a good way to relax before an early crash allowed me to retire to my bed and get some serious sleep.
I spent quali fiddling with gear ratios on the race setup and was not concerned with a high grid place because I was so sure that I would not survive the race. Also, I did not want to be responsible for taking out some of the main title contenders when I fell asleep at the wheel
.
The start went well and I managed to sneak a pass on Clutch at T1 and set off in pursuit of the leaders but without any real conviction. Tim was soon coming through the crowd behind and I just pressed on as best I could but discovered that my tinkering with the gearing was not an overwhelming success on the main straight, but seemed to work well around the back of the circuit. ( more work required in that dept I think!!)
I slowly eased away from Tim and others threw themselves off the track until I was running in 2nd spot!!! Now I had a problem because I had not anticipated running this high and with a chance of some good points to end the season. Now I had to concentrate!! bu**er!!
Ronnie recovered from his excursion into the sand and slowly closed in. With every lap he took 50 mtrs out of my lead on the straight and with my gearing there was nothing I could do but defend the inside and hope to outbrake him into Tarzan. This worked for a few laps until I failed to pull enough of a gap around the curvy bits and he was firmly in my slipstream as we hit the straight allowing him to make the pass well before the braking zone.
The next 10 laps or so, I harried Ronnie hoping for a mistake but he maintained his composure and lap times. Although I was quicker around the twisty bits there is just nowhere to pass, and even the small mistakes that Ronnie made did not give me enough of an opening to get through. On the straights my gearing did not allow me to attack his faster car even with slipstream.
Around this time I started getting some frame stutter and almost rear ended Ronnie, so I backed off a little to leave some room for error and I was glad that I did because it happened several times and I thought on at least one of those that I was going to screen freeze!!
Time was quite a way back and I looked good for 3rd place at least and possibly 2nd if I could find a way around Ronnie. But as the race progressed lack of sleep and fatigue began to have an effect and small errors started creeping in until I got too heavy with the gas at Tarzan and managed a spin. Ronnie was gone!! but Tim was now only a few metres behind
The last few laps were a great battle with Tim as I defended against his BT7 and his late braking into Tarzan. I think we went side by side through Tarzan and the next left / right kink on one lap
. I seemed to have the edge around the twisty bits but Tim had the advantage of my slipstream and better gearing on the straight. He made the pass in the same way as Ronnie did as we started the last lap and unless I could get a really good slipstream on the straight I has lost 3rd place as well!!
Which was how it ended. Just pipped for a podium and suffering from sleep deprivation, but a great race and good fun.
Grats to Hristo for the win and to Ronnie and Tim for the podium.