UKGPL Season 28 (2015) - Enna - Jan 18

[Cookie]

Did lots of laps testing, but in the race 2x engine blown... never before :'(

[francesco]

Did lots of laps testing, but in the race 2x engine blown... never before

For me is usual but this time only an incident (2 cars in incident,not seen in time)

[Ronniepeterson]

Thanks for the racing Doni and the late charging Arf. Not sure what happened to you Clive but if I was in any way at fault, sorry.

[Samb]

That was simply brilliant. Had a cracking battle all race with Raoni, Dean and Andreas. Unfortunately I ran out of talent late in the race and put a wheel on the grass, pitching me into a spin. Raoni simply had nowhere to go and gave me a whack which pitched me over the barriers, out of the race.

Glad I didn't take you with me Raoni. You made a great comeback drive in those last few laps and were a deserving winner. Congrats to all other finishers.

[Arf Arf Arf]

Your engine blew? I thought my crash box had hit your crash box, as we went past each other (with radically different lines). I had to swerve to avoid you, and then spent the rest of the race thinking I had knocked out the guy that had helped me so much in the last 2 weeks!!! I definitely contacted with someone (maybe Clive?) going thorugh Zagaria early in the race - apols if that was my fault, not sure...

After Cookie and I had finished duelling, I was surprised to see that I was gradually catching Ronnie and Doni - granted they were both driving BT7s (?) and I had the power of the BRM. Initially the gap was pretty static, but necessity is the mother of invention, and I started trying new lines, which mostly worked in my favour (I came out of Zaragia at about 148mph/237kph) on the last lap.. I am not sure how much they noticed me, they seemed to be having lots of fun on their own.. was glad to make it up to join in and then the power differential worked in my favour to steal P6 right at the end...

Good fun, and my first proper 60fps race. Seems to be a lot easier on the eyes, is that what others find?

Cheers..er, and well done to whoever podiumed..forgot to check..

[EvilClive]

No blame in your dept Ron, but plenty in mine I think.  

I failed to see another car coming up fast on my inside..Arf I think?? and I just closed the door on him with the expected result. So I quit.

Apologies to Arf3 hope you were able to continue.

[Turkey Machine]

I enjoyed the close pack racing for all of 6 laps, then on the 7th lap I spun.

There goes my draft, ah well, pootle round, see what I can do. Then can't avoid the blocked road at Zagwhatzit?! corner and ended up on my roll bar. Reset, go into pit, realise my box is first despite my braking, stop, go, pootle round some more doing 1:15s (only can dream of a 14 when in a draft). Spin at Zagtitsup, land on wheels, let the 4-pack go through, grab flag.

Oh, apologies for the tighter grid tonight, turns out someone forgot to check all was well with the grid before deploying. That'll teach 'im. Still, well done everyone on getting through successfully.

[bernie]

I was doing fine , inherited p4 after a slow start and others misfortune , then Maddog Moloney decided his BRM  could drift better with an extra wheel , so he decided to borrow one of mine , by the time I had called in at  the BRM pit to get my wheel back everyone had dissapeared into the sunset . ( must get a faster tyre fitter for next season ) 

[Iestyn Davies]

Axel - Rob had a similar blow when leading the F2s early at Spa.. maybe it's from leading a draft pack and setting such a hot pace in the early laps, as the engine warms up?

Good fun until I lost the draft, after sticking too close to Dean/Andreas as we lapped Fran. They checked up a bit and I got bumped into the barrier. The Cooper loses all momentum at 155mph - unless I geared it too highly? Still, it was nice to see 14.09 on Pribluda . Managed 15.2 on the last lap (with 4 gals left)... so slipstream must be worth about a second here? Or a bit more in the Cooper?

Still, can't complain with 2 points for Cooper at probably the worst track for it. Doni & Ronnie look close at the line!

A shame for Fran to be on our server - looks like he would have had a nice slipstream battle with Billy on the Ams (equal race finishing times/speed)

[BadBlood]

First outing for a while. Not very distinguished but good to see Martin on track - oh he's gone, there he is, oh he's gone. Agggghhhh bugger.

Gave up after that. Tired.

Looking forward to getting back to full health and half speed!

[bernie]

I think Martin is forever doomed to being a full time part timer 

[Billy Nobrakes]

Was shaping up to be an interesting race. Nice battle with Rog for 2nd place for the first few laps. Just got my nose back in front when I accidentally downshifted instead of upshifted & crocked the engine. The stop & go put me about 30 seconds down with no tow & no way back.
Strange beacuse this track probably has the fewest gears changes of any that i can think of.

[Walter Conn]

Congrats to Bastian and Dave C., and of course it was good to see Badblood and Martin on the grid too. 

The race was a lot of fun for me. I started in last place and finished third place, so not bad! I was as high as 2nd place with five laps to go. Dave C. started closing the gap at a fast clip. Then Bastian slows (which I thought) to make the race more interesting. At first it is a good thing because the slipstream was helping me escape Dave C.. However, I missed a downshift into fourth gear and went wide into the guardrail. Dave C. was able to sneak past. I was still in hot pursuit. The car seemed to be a little less predictable after that. I put it in the guardrail two more times, and I was out of contention.

I was able to benefit from others mistakes, and I was able to minimize my own mistakes. I surprised myself considering I had zero practice laps, and I was able to sort out the car in Qually. I should probably give some credit to the Lotus that I was driving.  

Thanks, WC

[dave curtis]

Been here before in other series,  but apparently not in 65s  (I found when looking for a setup for the qually session!)  And none for download at the usual location either!
However,  thanks for the helpful advice in pre-event chat - where it was suggested using a Monza setup & possibly lengthen a gear or two...    I didn't bother with adjusting gears however.

Was fairly happy with start position.   Was expecting to be last by many seconds.
Luckily for me,  I think I did most of my guardrail bumping the 1st few laps;  so had plenty of time to try making up the ground I'd lost.

Luckily, others were having their problems later on too.   I also probably managed to grab a tow for most of the event which must have helped.
Had some good (for me anyway!) running with Rog & towards the end with Walter & Bastian who was just too far ahead.
Prib had showed Bastian about 0.8 miles up the road at one point,  so was somewhat surprised when the 3 of us were on the same stretch of road.

The finishing gap is not really representative of his pace during the rest of the event.


I probably never got that 2nd from last corner right on any lap,   but at least managed to pretty much stay on the track most of the time.
Strangely, it seems that the corners are not quite so tight with the 65 cars

Congrats all;   most enjoyable.

Cheers,
Dave.

[dave curtis]

Another thing...  I forgot to comment on the 60FPS experience.

It had completely slipped from my mind during the race,  so clearly no issues!
(Although was fairly lonely running for much of the event).

Cheers,
Dave.