UKGTL Season 19 60's & 70's American Heavy Iron - Road America - May 15

[EvilClive]

I confess that I do enjoy these monsters, but somehow I had just missed the fact that it was the day for racing American Iron 
Grats to all podiums and finishers, and thanks for some entertaining racing.

I used the same highly scientific process as Erling to select my cars........what have I got most of??  Well there was that monster that Geoff has been able to tame, I did about 3 laps and managed a 2:41 lap which was fraught with danger and near misses. So I got Arnold to roll another option off the transporter......
Race 1 and a Falcon Sprint ( whatever that is??) and..... a) surprised to be second on the grid    b) absolutely gobsmacked that Geoffers had pulled a 2:35 in that Tank masquerading as an Impala !!! 

I was sort of hoping that Geoffers would find that maintaining such a hot pace in that car, would destroy the tyres, so perhaps all that I would have to do is stay with him and wait??? Good plan, with one small flaw that became apparent around lap 5.    I had fuelled for an indicated 14 laps but a glance at the fuel after 5 laps driving like a lunatic to stay with Geoff gave me a shock!!! I had to try and do some quick mental arithmetic whilst wrestling my car around corners it did not want to negotiate. At this pace I was at least a lap short of the flag??!! I double checked the figures after another lap and ...yup, this ain't going to work  I had to let Geoff escape completely, although I doubt I could have passed him, because that Impala was awesome on the straights, even when I was in the slipstream!!
By this time I think that Geoffers had towed me so far and so fast that I had around 14 secs back to 3rd place. 6 laps to go and I can afford to lose 2+ secs a lap? But can I short shift and coast and still be quick enough. The fuel saving became more and more desperate and I began the last lap with an indicated 0.9 laps of fuel left. All corners were taken 1 gear higher and only 75% gas but I still had 5 secs lead. The engine began to cough as I went up the hill to the finish line and all went quiet about 50mtrs past the line...Phew!!!

Race 2 and the same careful choice of car....what have I got most of?? Plymouth Scuda sounds interesting. Thanks to Dominic for rebooting as it gave me few extra laps to screw a setup together and find a way to drive it. 
I tried some gentle encouragement on Erling to improve his starts, by pushing him off the grid  Fortunately I had the inside for the first 2 corners and was able to elbow Matt out of 3rd spot to try and chase the 2 AMC's up ahead.  But the lack of practice and a setup as good as the previous race hampered any attempt to stay with Erling and zero chance of seeing Geoffers for very long  .
This time I had added an extra 3 galls of fuel and discovered that I now had too much  But slowly Erling was easing away from me and Geoff was out of sight. Then there was a cloud of dust at the final turn??? surely not lapping cars already???
HUD changed as I crossed the line.. That was Geoff!!!. Erling now 1st, yours truly 2nd 
Ok I will settle for 2nd ...just keep it steady. Bad move, I tried to ease back and cruise but relaxed too much and lost focus. Small mistakes started creeping in and more sliding meant more tyre wear, and the spiral down started . TBH I was lucky to make 4th place and I have never been so relieved to see a chequered flag .

[Wiltshire Tony]

Result Race1

Thanks Kurt 

[Geoffers]

My choice for the first race was based on the fact that I would need to drive the Impala twice more & of the remaining tracks this one & Talladega looked like they would suit the car best. I wouldn't say I had tamed it Clive, it seems to be in control more than I am, just a case of where you let it be in control. It does seem to have good brakes so stopping it isn't an issue & letting it loose on the straights is pretty easy, the difficult parts are getting the damn thing to go around the corners & getting the power down out of the turns without it  heading off into the weeds.

Amazed myself with my 2.35 qually lap, had only just got into the 2.36s in testing. Got ahead on sheer horsepower at the start & it looked like it was going to be a close battle with Clive's Falcon which was all over me like a rash in the corners. After 4-5 laps I started to pull away at quite a rate, turns out Clive had not put enough fuel in to keep up that pace, so other than the fight to keep the unruly beast on the black stuff, it was a comfortable fun to the flag. On the subject of fuel, I kept getting differing consumption figures on XD every time I went out, so put in an extra 3 laps worth to be safe, which also had the benefit of some extra weight over the back axle to help with traction.

Race 2, I just picked the most powerful car for those 2 long straights. Erling was quite close in qually & over the first few laps kept me under pressure, but gradually eeked out a few seconds lead until  .......  I braked at the wrong marker board for the final turn & skated off into the gravel. No problem I thought, just spin it around, rejoin & set off after the leaders. Oh no, the Javelin has quite a high 1st gear so extracting myself from the gravel trap took the best part of half a minute, too many revs saw the car wanting to go around in circles & too few revs & the car would stall (4 times in my case  ). Eventually rejoined in 5th place, reeled in Rog & passed him when he had grassy moment, it was then a case of trying to catch Matt for 3rd, looked like a tall order but then 3rd looked more attainable when I came upon Clive recovering from an off. He went mowing too a couple of corners later letting me past & when I got a nice clean exit from the final turn on lap 11 was able draft past Matt over the S/F line for 2nd place.

Congrats to Clive & Erling on the podium in race 1 & Erling & Matt for 1st & 3rd in race 2. 

[Dominick]

First off, thanks all for waiting after I needed to reboot. 

I had wheel calibration issues again but it was entirely my own fault. I had those regularly in the past but found a permanent solution by lowering the force feed back strength to 70%. Never had an issue since. But as I discovered in race 1 I had forgotten to apply this to the seperate GTL install I have for the Heavy Iron series.  Damn shame because the battle with Matt and Coyote was great fun.
But it became undriveable and after losing it altogether I intended to jump out quickly to get it in order for race 2. However, "Computer says No". It took in fact two reboots before it would calibrate more or less accurately (three if you count the false positive I got on CPU temp with the first reboot). And then I made -in hindsight- the mistake of overcompensating by setting it to 50%. It took too many laps and a bunch of offs before I got used to it and by then everyone was at least 30 seconds ahead. One of those nigths....

Grats to both podiums. 
 

[Bob M.]

Not much for me to report.  R1 I took the Falcon, like the handling of the car and has pretty good straight away speed.  No one really around me just cruised the track,  gained 2 positions in the last 2 or 3 laps by cars going off and fuel problems.  These cars are gas guzzlers and I always add 25 to 30% more fuel than the game requirement says.  In R2 I stuck with a Ford also GT500.  Had a good time chasing Roger in his Cuda.  We were very equal in laps times I'm sure, but in different ways.  The Cuda got off the corners better than the 500 but then at the end of the straights I could reel him in.  Went on for quite a few laps and then I had a off, but still not too far back from him.  Then disaster struck, old PC crashed to desktop and I pulled left to scrub the wall.  After the blackness got back into GTL just in time to see Tony go by.  By the time I got the engine fired up and out of the weeds I was way behind plus suspension was messed up so just drove to the finish that way. All in all enjoyed the track one of my favorates and always enjoy the old muscle cars......

Bob M.