Grats to Berger and Geoffers who were in a different league altogether, and how they were extracting those laptimes from these cars is a total mystery to me.
Still, to finish on the podium was very encouraging for me, considering where I started from in the GT40 a few days ago. First attempts were in the 2:35 region and with a car that felt like it was programmed to kill me. Another couple of sessions and some tweaking of setups was slowly developing a more stable car that gave me the confidence to push a little harder and get quicker.
My offline PB before the race was mid 2:28 'ish and I felt that was about as fast as I would get. Erling was almost a second a lap faster in qually and although I was an race fuel I could not be sure that Erling was in pure qually mode.
My start was poor and I lost 2 places before T1 and had to get my elbows out to stop anyone else muscling their way past. I knew from practice runs that my tyres would be slippery for the first lap or two so I concentrated on staying with the leaders. Then one of the cars ahead lost the rear end at T3 and exactly how I avoided contact I still don't know...but I was now up to 4th and tailing Erling with Red just ahead. Berger and Geoffers were checking out ahead, and I had no illusions of challenging that duo.
Erling appeared to be a) held up by Red or b) being very clever and protecting his tyres early in the race. Whatever, it was giving me the chance to close the 3 second gap and catch the battle for 3rd place. Once I got there I could see that Red's car was getting a little squirmy ( now I know that he was having vision issues, I hope that it is just a fever and nothing more serious ). More of interest to me, was that Erling also appeared to have problems getting his car turned in at some corners...was he already struggling with front tyres?? Suddenly there was a huge gap inside Erling and I just stuck my GT40 into the space and stole the position
Red was definitely having problems now that I was able to observe it up close and Erling was obviously a little miffed about my opportunist pass as he was sitting on my tailpipes. Erling returned the pass when I was forced to back off when Red wobbled mid corner and I was back in 5th again. When Red spun and Erling swept past I fully expected to watch him pull away and in my hurry to stay with him I missed a braking point and ran wide. I thought that was the end of my challenge, but slowly I reeled him in again and the closer I got the more I could see him fighting the rear end of his car.
Once I caught him I was happy to sit and wait for a few laps and watch where I had an advantage. There were a couple of places where I was taking a few tenths out of his time and I was just planning how to make that work for me when his car screwed off the track. It may have been very rude, but I did not need to be asked twice and I jumped into 3rd place and set about escaping from him.
Arnold's work on the setup ( more by luck than judgement I suspect) had produced a car where I could mash the accelerator out of most corners and the rear would still stick behind the front wheels. Also the changes to the diff and roll bars allowed me a controlled, stable entry to most corners, the result was that my tyres were lasting extremely well. I now needed to maintain clean laps and steal those tenths on the parts where I was quickest, without giving away anything around the rest of the lap.
It all worked perfectly and although I never approached the pace of the leading 2 cars I was able to sneak away from Erling for a comfortable podium spot.
Quite gratified to see that my tyres were all evenly worn and still showing a hint of green at the end, with a whole second knocked off my previous PB too.
Maybe these cars aren't so bad after all? and I might consider joining the next round .................... if Arnold can work his magic on the setup again.