Congrats to Johnny for another win, and commiserations to Rob, I really thought you had this championship wrapped up and it was a little unfortunate that you spent most of the season in the BT7.
I’m happy with my race but a little disappointed with my result. I started quail and went looking for a tow straight away. I never got a really good tow but I did managed to get a OK one for my lap, went ever I got a tow I tried to give a tow back. I was really hoping for a lap in the 36’s for my quail time, but never managed to get a good lap in. I was looking good on my last lap, but Giovani was a little late on his brakes and we had a coming together.
I got a great start to the race and was in the lead for a while. There were a group of 4 of us, me, Rob, Johnny and Vos. We were all about the same pace and all dicing, swapping positions etc. I was taking it easy, waiting for everything to come up to temp, and trying not to do anything silly. But at the same time I needed to remain with the group to keep the tow, I didn’t want to fall behind because re-catching up would have been difficult. It was great fun while it lasted, but Rob made a small mistake and I hit his spinning car. I needed to do a Shift & R and took my stop and go straight away.
After my quick pit stop I was just behind Giovani and I was in his tow. Because of the tow I caught him quickly, but he was wrapping really badly, I didn’t want to get too close. We both caught up with Girard and I managed to get past and put Girard between me and Giovani, that gave me a little gap so I was able to break the tow. Next up the road was Dave and Rog, I started to push to catch them, but it wasn’t going well, my pit board kept increasing the gap, from 6 seconds, to 7 and then 8. Nothing I could do apart from keep driving as fast as I could. I don’t know if anything happened between Rog and Dave because suddenly they were both right in front of me. I pulled into their tow and managed to get past Dave and was baring down on my teammate Rog. Rog was very kind and pulled over to let me past, unfortunately he pulled over to the side I was trying to overtake and I had to dip a wheel onto the grass
it certainly kept me awake. Thank you again Rog for pulling over for me, and I’m sorry it cost you a place to Dave. Ran out of laps after that, Johnny was cruising also, so I doubt I would have been able to catch him under normal conditions.
I normally make a real mess of Monza, so I’m glad that I didn’t make any mistakes. At the same time I’m pretty sure that I could have won this race, and I’m really disappointed that I didn’t get pole. I’m pretty happy with my recovery drive and the season as a whole. I’ve been much more consistent this season and have challenged in a number of races. I’m really looking forward to next season, and will have to decide if I should move up to inters, or go for a championship challenge in Novices.