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Hendy Nichols broke the Rainier-Thornton stranglehold to take his first win of the season, but he will need a good finish to the season to catch the top two now. He does have plenty of tokens however, which will certainly be useful on the flat out straights of Spa. This is Grand Prix Legends at its very best!

Race list	iGOR
Server	UKGPL_T7_2
IP address	62.149.202.168
Date	14-10-2012
Race time	Race starts at 21:30 UK time
Qualifying time	Between 30 and 60 minutes, starting no later than 21:00 UK time
Track	Spa
Mod	67
Damage model	INT
Race length	15 laps
Replay	Available here (ftp://ukgpl3.dyndns.org/replays/Archive/Season23/Grads_Privs/S23_Grads_Privs_R07_2012_10_14_Spa.rar)

Reserve drivers please note; you must leave the server with 35 minutes of qualifying left, for a total of 5 minutes, to allow full timers to join.

The red zone will be fully moderated for lap 1 only. For this event the red zone will be from the start line to the entry of Malmedy. Other moderation will be on reported incidents only.

The chassis token system is explained on the Privateers (https://www.simracing.org.uk/smf/index.php?action=LM2R&group=361&theme=6) standings page. Please ensure you choose a chassis that is within your budget, which can be seen by hovering the mouse over your points total in the standings.

Not likely to do well here :) I'm not usually one to say I don't like tracks...but I don't like spa  :angel:

I think "CRAP" is a tolerable amount of swearing for this forum.
Got my set ups mixed up & just before the flag went down realised I was only fueled for 6 laps. Thought I might be able to exit & rejoin form pit lane - but no luck. Thats' cost me 17 tokens! So ... Crap.
Best of luck to David, Dave & Fabio - hope you have better luck & collect get some good team points.

LOL. I managed to get through the Eau Rouge disaster of 2012 but then over-rotated at Les Combes (which I have NEVER done before - swiz). Recovered and then my over eagerness made me wobble all over the place into the path of poor old Nigel (I think). Reset - Down to Malmedy and somebody was stranded I got round but hit the hedge and collected... Nigel. Sorry mate. Reset and set off - pitted in front of Nigel as I slid into the pits and thought it might be nice not to rear end him. Hap a nice lap with him and pitted again. Enjoyed the next ten lonely laps when my engine gave up. Anyone spot the problem? D'oh - ONE Shift-R allowed.

Because they were both within yards of each other and I was concentrating so hard I forgot. Never mind. DQ but I feel morally clean ;)

Hope I didn't get in anyone's way.

Oh, and don't laugh but that was a PB!

Impossible to me to finish a race if the engine explode also at the start!Sorry to all that have found a stopped car in the middle of the start.
The second engine is exploded at lap 9,end of the race. >:(

You can say that again  ;D

Okay I think I "get" the track now. Small margins of error, but fortunately there's enough time to relax and not too many curves to learn. Had to resort to downloading a setup which was really weird at first (couldn't get under 319 with my usual settings). I was really expecting some fiery crashes, at least in practice I was really inconsistent.

First half of the race was some of the cleanest racing I've done. Towards the end I came into Les Combes too fast and lost my right wheels to the guardrail...having to reset with race fuel at that point was worrying but Gebhart was far enough behind that I was able to pit and stay in the race.

Grats to anyone who managed to actually finish the race, too :D

Tried the practise server and my connection was just plain awful , fully expecting a disco in the race I took the dreaded Beast of Bourne so as not to throw away points.

Struggled throughout practise and the race with rear tyre temps , dont know if this is a problem with the BRM or if its just me but the left rear quickly became yellow and stayed there almost the whole race , I softened the rear end before the race which I thought improved things and was hoping it would be fine on light fuel near the end but in fact the problem became worse , prolly due to the higher speeds and sliding more , the only way to control the temps was to back off early for the bends and short shift out of them but then i became a sitting duck  dropping from a worthy P4 (thanks mostly  to avoiding the square dance routine at the start ) lost it whilst trying to keep Phil at bay and before the tyre smoke had time to settle another 2 or 6 cars had gotten past , a few more thrills and spills and I saw the chequered being waved to signal the fact that everyone bar me had long gone home  ::)

Grats to Hendy (not bad for someone who hates Spa ) Andreas and Vos , commiserations to Team mate Mike who dissapeared from a good place finish on the final lap , and to all those who finished with all there bits attached .

Sorry Billy [and any affected pilots];  it didn't work out very well at all...

Surprised with qually,  but away from the grid it seemed a number of cars engaged cloaking devices!  So a very cautious pull away into the unknown.  Then some other stuff probably happened (I'll check replay over the next couple of days) & inherited a few positions.

On a lap or 2 & it turned particularly bad after stacking at the kink for some reason & my shifter falling off.  Thought I was out of harm's way,   but I must have ended up in a bad spot.  Subsequently the bottom bolt fell out of the shifter & took a few laps to get that back in & tightened.

I was then being reeled in somewhat & was just slow out there.   After eventually requiring a reset; things seemed a little quicker despite the full tanks.

Running last by that point but inadvertent shift to 1st gear & slow response put me out after parking it shiny side down.

Bah!  


Then took a peek over DaveR's shoulder as he was in the final stages. I think the extra weight onboard must have made his engine sick. It was looking rather close towards the end & well done that man for getting to the flag at a reduced pace.


Cheers all. Congrats all finishers!
Dave.

Is there an award for the most absent-minded team manager ?   

As a driver, I was surprised by Cooper playing the yoyo in front of me and I hit him at the amazing speed of 38 mph. The amount of energy packed in my Ferrari was released in a fraction of a sec and flipped me over like a pancake. I don't mind presenting my excuses to Cooper with a 6-pack of the best Cream Ale (we're in a simulation, right ?  ;D) even though he should himself give a 6-pack of something to Molteni for the way he smashed the poor fellow tenths of a sec later. Split GrosJean award, I think.

As a Team Manager, I went to the replay to find a way to deny any responsability for the incident, I couldn't find any valid excuse and it's 15mn after the fact  that seeing Cooper doing his reset in the replay, I realized I was not in my usual French league, I was across the Channel in a league that keeps in mind the merits of the Habeas Corpus ( Pros aliens excluded of course). What was my driver doing at the bar when he should have been waching live Paul's Circus ?!

Now, if you want to sue me for lack of tokens, I must highlight the fact that I didn't even pass the starting line.

Don't worry, I'll be back .

Well that was a lot of lonely laps punctuated by a few dramas.

Quallied 10th - not unhappy with that, know the track but hadn't turned a wheel in a while. Those guys up top were fast.
Anyway seemed to be a hoohaa just after the start which I managed to avoid that bumped me up a few places. Then was following Phil for a few laps - just couldn't close - when he passed Cookie I think. Then his car appeared to break into two and both parts flew by either side of me. I'm presuming he had an impact but didn't see what happened.

After that I passed Cookie, I'm assuming he had to pit as he dropped back a bit then started reeling me in. By this time I was, amazingly, up to third - the two guys ahead were miles up the road so no chance to move up. I had sort of resigned myself to fourth as I knew Cookie was quicker but I was still racing. I knew he was back to the left and then BANG. Cookie was off the track but, amazingly again, I finished spinning the right way round with no damage. I haven't seen the replay but will apologise now if it was in any way my fault - if it was it wasn't intentional, I was trying to stay to the right.

Anyway after that more loneliness until Dave C started closing. It took a long time and I knew, if I didn't mess up, he wouldn't be able to catch me before the end. In true fashion I messed up the last corner two laps running which allowed him to close up to 75-100 yards. So last lap, 100 odd yards gap, and I just kept thinking 'don't mess up and third is yours'; sure enough I messed up and span. Luckilly Dave got past me, unluckilly he took a spin just down the road - I'm assuming it was following emergency manouvers to avoid my Lotus. Amazingly yet again, after my personal banking trip, I found myself again intact and facing the right way.

That was it really - a carefull dash to the finish with a comfy buffer. Sorry Dave, who knows it might have been a last minute battle.

Well that was better than I expected.  I'm low on tokens so I had to take the BRM; I knew I'd have no chance of a podium so it was a damage limitation exercise for me.  Got a good start but had to dart right very quickly as there was a bit of contact ahead of me.  Managed to get through L'Eau Rouge OK and settled in to try to drive consistently and hope to make up places due to other driver's mistakes.  I wasn't fast enough to get to the front on my own merit.

All was going to plan until lap 3 at Masta when I hit an Eagle trying to rejoin.  I didn't see any yellow flags and there was no way I could avoid it.  So I ended up having to do a shift-R and a S&G.  Masta is one of the worst places I can think of to have to re-join.  It is blind and very fast.  The safest thing to do is to engage chase view via the F10 button and reverse down the track and turn around on the grass.  Trying to do a 180 onto the racing line in the exit of Masta is asking for trouble.

After that I tried to make up as much ground as I could.  Had Geoff close behind me for a while and then I had a nice battle with Bernie for a couple of laps until he lost it at Malmedy and I got through.  On the last lap I managed to pass David Rainier nursing a sick Eagle back to the pits.  Unlucky David but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't smiling as I drove past you :o

Grats to Hendy on a fine drive on a circuit you don't like (I didn't take any notice of that ;), I know you are fast on any track, with the tokens you have you are going to be hard to beat).

The championship is finely poised with just 3 rounds left!

I got caught up in the melee at the start and then stranded myself on top of the hedge at Malmady. As a consequence the rest of the race was rather lonely if largely error free until the final lap when I was drawn irresistibly to the same hedge at Malamady but this time without the option of a ShiftR. Fortunately Bernie was behind me to claim 6th place for the Soggies.

Quick reminder to everyone, next round is at Dijon-Prenois, not Wigram.

Thanks for reminding me Ross, I'd totally missed it.  Downloading Dijon-Prenois 1981 VERSION 2 now  :)

Vos, I tried to avoid your Lotus crossing the track from left to right ...but I couldn't. So I made beautiful spins ...and burnt my engine.

Malmedy was a nightmare for me during the first and the last laps :
On the first lap, I spun and collided with 2 or 3 racers (Geoff and ?), I had to shift-R and to do a stop and go and restarted on the 10th position.
Sorry for Geoff and the other racer.
 
Then I made a good race and was back from 10th to 4th, chasing Vos on the last lap for the podium ...When Vos spun at Malmedy and the race was almost over for me.
Phil overtook my black smoking Eagle and I finished 5th.
       

Just a question : why is Adam Cooper already excluded as there was not yet any moderation  ???

Looks like he didn't have enough tokens for the Eagle  :-\

Another question (yes I know, I am too curious :) ) :
why is there no race on 28/10 ? usually there is a race every 2 weeks and next race is at Dijon on 04/11.

 

Per Paul's post here (https://www.simracing.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=10769.0) ;
The October break is to balance things up and get regular/even seasons. Thought you were on the modding team Dave ;)

Yes but I still have lot of things to read and to learn  ;D

Mod published.

Thanks for the moderation, Dave!