UKGTL - Season 1-ish, Round 5, Imola - June 1st

[Zacari]

Solid race for me but completely unspectacular, quali'd in 3rd with PB and was just concentrating on keeping ahead of pribeiro to snatch 3rd in the standings, as well as Team Shark the team title.  As soon as Ruskus made it to the race I knew the team battle wasn't an issue! and kept a very conservative pace for 3rd in the race.
Go Sharks!

I'll check the Alfa sounds out, the standard engine noise has a mildly hypnotic effect on me after a while!  The track btw was exactly what I don't like about low-kerb tracks, where you can gain a bucket load of time by shaving off corners within the limits of the game.  I prefer Enna to Imola and I'm no fan of Enna!

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

Awful race. Hate the track in cars this slow. For the second race in a row had to stay clear on the first lap whilst cars came from silly distances behind under brakes (what happened to first lap caution ), then it was impossible to stay with the Alfas, they were just so quick off the corners with that extra gear.

Shark was obviously having a worse time than me 'cause I caught him after his n^th spin behind Tom Cooper, then I clipped the tyres in the Variante Bassa trying to get a good exit and bent the suspension. Then Shark was just messing around waiting for me, I was not in the mood and went off again, then for a third time and decided to stop messing about and retire.

A horrid end to a season which had been really picking up for me. :'(

[Madd-RIP]

I think they are on the RSC site, had a damn good battle with Dan Minton, a bit of tooing and foing with me faster in some parts of the lap and him in others, I made a lunge at second chicane and (fingers crossed)   hopefully gave him enough room but if I did tap you then I'm really sorry, I even tried to take a weird line to give you enough room, but I didn't feel a bump in ff wheel so I'm hoping I didn't.

But eeven though I like the track ish  I am just crap at it!!  

[JohnnyDee]

So many disconnects/retirements today!   That hurts.  ASSASSINO disconnected right in front of me but his ghost was in a good spot and I missed it easily.  Whew!!

I thought I might get a new PB time today but that was not to be.  Did manage a healthy 2:17.2 in qual, good enough for 6th on the grid behind my teammates.  Start went well but I dropped back and a couple times I thought the car(s) behind me would catch up.  Sometime around lap 7 I noticed a new red Alfa appear on the scene in amongst the cars behind me and when that one got the spot behind me I knew it was Ruskus coming up fast.  Lap 8 he comes flying past me and my sensors detected stray heavy particle emissions -- I suspect some kind of fusion reactor on board, so tech inspectors, beware!!    ASSASSINO put a wheel off soon after that and let me by and we had some good laps, but soon I developed a stupid leg cramp that eventually chopped a whopping 2 seconds off my laptime!  Apologies to my teammate for any confusion that caused.  The first time he got by he celebrated by checking the gravel levels in one the runoff areas, but just after getting past the second time he discon'd and I never saw another car after that, just cruising on home in 5th, my best finish here and quite unexpected.

Very nice race, but sorry for all the problems others had today!

     -=> J <=-

[Jeffrey]

I had to work from 8am to 9pm. I thought I wouldn't make the race, but driving at 160-170km/h homewards, I knew there might be a possibity (for any saints, there was nobody on the road).
Joined the race to see there was still 15 minutes of practice, so I thougth something went wrong and there was plenty of time. But the I had a trackreload and there was only 20 secs of qually .

So I started at the back. The warmup lap was full of gaps again . I had to push to win places, but little by little I was winning places. From some guys I even got a spot for free, eventhough it was for position, so thanks for that . After about 11 laps I was from last place, to 2nd, behind Peter (should look good in lapchart ). With only 8 laps to go, and knowing Peter's Imola pace, I knew it was impossible to overtake him.
Was a fun race for, but can we please stop discussing corner cutting everywhere, there is a thread for that.

[Minton]

Yeah you gave me a bump but just a racing incident mate, i could see you leaving the door open at the next corner but didnt feel right to take it as i thought it was a decent pass. Good race.

[Madd-RIP]

It didn't give you a penalty did it? I hope not its just not my way, reminded me of the battle in the last race!!

[Jeffrey]

New Alfa sounds

The new sounds are amazing, that's one reason I stick with the Alfa.

I posted a hotlap replay of my reasonable time of 2:14.xxx in this forum. Might be usefull to check where we get the time from.

[Minton]

The new sounds are amazing, that's one reason I stick with the Alfa.

I posted a hotlap replay of my reasonable time of 2:14.xxx in this forum. Might be usefull to check where we get the time from.

Thanks .

[Madd-RIP]

I sort of manage to keep to the lines but I just cannot find those times, but then I am human!

[[ZiP]Tyf]

Oops, made a mistake during the formation lap, I saw Dave weaving about and thought ok, I'll try that as well, hehe. Spun off as a result , grrr. Thinking it was allowed to retake ur place if it didn't cause problems and braking of rules I tried to get back into 18th! spot . Obviously some other peeps knew this is not allowed and Ruskus flashed his lights multiple times, but some1 else just tried to semi-ram me off the track 3 corners long and was right up #17's rear bumper!? And it almost caused a crash?! That is just silly imo. If every1 starts to be judge and jury on track we might as well dismiss the moderators!? Bloody hell...

And another thing... If some1 muscles his way past you (through a chicane...) and you get a 'Cut track warning' because u get bumped off, that's not really nice, is it? :'( Especially not if u make 1 mistake yourself later on and have to drive very careful for the last part of the race, else u'll get a stopngo with the 3rd cut track warning... So tx for that...

T

[Pero_Grozni]

Excelent race for me, but very boooooooring.
Qualy went well and I even got into the 2:13's and I acctually thought that that laps was no good. Than just waited till the qually ended and went to race.
It was acctually hard to keep concentrated for such a long time as I didnt have to have a good pace. The crusing made me sleepy and I almost did some stupid mistakes so I upped the pace a bit to keep concentrated. I wanted to really go for it on the last lap, but the laptime went in the first corner allready as I braked very late and almost visited the kitty litter.
Anyhow - I do like the track a lot and if some remmember I was allready quick in the GTC76 race we had here. The key to the times is the first section and some of the corners. It is not all in the chicane - it is in the combinations of corners. You have too keep a good entry in some corners taking the first corner slower than possible to than have a good run into the second corner of the combination and to get the optimum exit speed. That makes this track very selective on the pace - it has more technical sections than many other tracks. About cutting - the game is strict enough with giving cut tracks for running wide. On the other side - check some Monza WTCC pictures for cutting. Have a look in the No-Grip gallery (http://www.no-grip.net) and you will see exactly what I mean.

And here you will find my setup which I used for the qually and the race. I just changed the fuel - that was all. 

[Zacari]

The formation lap pace at the front was exceptionally steady and nice & slow at the end of the lap.  There were a heck of a lot of people in my mirrors weaving like mad though which isnt allowed in the rules, and is probably the reason for gaps everywhere at the back.  I suggest anyone aggrieved by it should report any specific incidents of it to the mod for the race and get it sorted that way, it's totally unnecessary!

[Jeffrey]

Obviously some other peeps knew this is not allowed and Ruskus flashed his lights multiple times...

I didn't flash because I thought it wasn't allowed. Like I care of there are 20 cars, or 21 cars infront of me. I flashed because I had to laugh . Not laughing at ya, but with ya ("lachte je niet uit, maar lachte met je mee" Dutch explanation). I was allowed to overtake you because of that mistake, but I stayed behind you, all because I didn;t care about winning a position like that.

I've got bumped as well giving me a warning. I was on the racing line going for the famous chicane, I steered in but somebody thought that there was an overtaking oppertunity . Tried to keep my wheels on the kerb, avoiding a warning, but no luck with that. So I just watched myself not getting another warning and risking a S/G later on. No biggie about this all, close racing.

[Minton]

Ive figured out how Ruskus and Peter do it! Theyve got Mcphearson struts with a lowered tca to sycronise front to rear roll centres.