Grats to Daz and the podium, plus of course all finishers
I guess that I have only myself to blame.... "Race at Brno" it said on the race post, so I was picturing that long snaking circuit through villages and countryside with long fast sections. Well, I know that track don't I
, so no need to do any pre race practice, it will probably suit a faster car maybe the Sierra? if I can control the tyre wear.
Needless to say I was more than a little surprised by what I found when I joined the server lol.
I was grateful that my wife had taken control of the TV remote and announced that she was watching "her" programme. That sent me to my PC at around 7:30 and gave me plenty of time to discover my error.
Half a lap on a strange circuit with the Cosworth made the decision easy...Toyota for an easy drive !!!
Most of practice and qually was spent a) learning the track and b) tweaking setup and gear ratios, rather than worrying about outright lap times. It was clear that the Toyota was never going to bother the faster classes, but when Erling entered the server in a Toyota I knew that I had a fight on my hands.
Once the race started and the noisy hooligans had cleared off into the distance Erling and I got down to many laps of close racing. It was more intense than I had planned as I was planning zero pit stops and wanted to save some rubber for the later laps......but Erling appeared intent on pushing the pace
We swapped positions a couple of times and it was comforting to note that, when Erling was ahead, the slipstream eased my fuel consumption a little. So I planned to shadow him until that last few laps and hope to steal the class win in brilliant fashion on bald tyres.
However around lap 12 Erling threw a very large spanner into that plan when he swerved into the pits and took his slipstream with him!!!! I had assumed that he would also be avoiding the dreaded pitstop??
For the next 3-4 laps I was worried that I had made a major tactical boob, and that Erling with his nice new rubber and greater pace would simply swallow me up in the later laps. My tyres ( especially the front left) were at 40% or below thanks to the fast pace in the early laps and I wondered if I could make them stretch to the finish. But I found that with a softer foot on the gas pedal and some short shifting I was able to sacrifice only a second or two per lap to the hunting Coyote.
With around a 60 sec lead over Erling after his stop and only 12 laps to go I could afford to give away 4 secs a lap. Provided that I kept just a thin band of rubber on that front left rim I might just hang on for the class win. With about 4 laps to go right hand corners were becoming more and more difficult so I resorted to hanging the tail out in Rally fashion to get the nose around and pointing the right way.
TBH I was so grateful that I had been lapped and only needed to get my tyres to 24 laps to finish the race, although I still had ( just ) enough fuel for a very careful 25th lap if I had needed it.