UKGTR Season 6 Upper Endurance - Spa - Oct 14

[mo]

Right that's me finished with the MC12, its far too inconsistant in power and grip. Tired of all the manhandling it through the corners only for it to spin every 5 or 6 laps. Its not enjoyable to race and takes far too much aggression to go quick. I did 3 or 4 complete 360s in the race for no apparent reason and it took off like a bullet on the Kemmel straight on 1 or 2 laps dumping me down into the chicane almost 30kmh quicker. Engine was revving like crazy, thought it was going to blow or something. There's definitely a bug there

Grats to CJ on a great qual lap! Apologies to Darren and Ruskus, I think I made what could be called aggresive passes on you both

[Simon Gymer]

The Viper is very much not suited to Spa. Although it's a great track, having to fight the fish tailing and lack of corner grip the whole race was somewhat tiresome.

Managed to hold it altogether through consistency until the last portion of the race where I seemed to lose it completely. I think it was just after I told me team mates over team speak that I'd moved up to 6th through consistent driving with no big mistakes.  What an idiot tempting fate like that. Almost instantly the devil struck and my Viper had turned into some sort of freakish camel demon, spitting, bucking, humping and most of all producing a lot of s**t. 

I had the most almighty fish tail moment whilst Paul Richards was 2 inches from my arse. I thought I'd saved it a number of times as I weaved hideously trying to keep it in a straight line, finally letting the armco straighten me out.  Paul had no chance and hit my rear. Sorry for that, the car was possesed. It just went down hill from there really and I just scraped over the line ahead of EdamSpeed for a totally undeserved 7th.

Apologies to Mark Jonzo who I probably scared the living daylights out of by driving over a banana skin Truetom had left from his ailing car and spinning not far in front of him.

Really struggling with the Viper and the Vette. It's too much like hard work. 

[picnic]

Replay available, provisional results are above.

[Jeffrey]

Interesting evening. It started with Simon asking what my quallypace was in P2, while I was doing quallypace  .

Was pleased with my quallylap in Q2, but the car was very unstable, so I changed ARB and it felt great, so I went out again in the last 10 minutes, but everytime I ran into traffic and lost my fast lap. But in hindsight, I might have gained 1, maaaaybe 2 places with a better time.
It was quite obvious CJ was gonna get pole. An alien with -20kg is easier than 1+1  .

Race started intense, with Zacari trying a pass at Les Combes. He didn't push it and I could stay infront. In lap 2 Silva spun at Eau Rouge, and all I could see was smoke, and it was sooo close when I past .
Had Zacai behind me right up onto his pitstop. And then Robert was behind me. At that stage I also had Mo around me, who had probably one of his worst races ever, as he was all over the place  . I see where that comes from, as I also find that MC12 a (...) to drive.
He spun at one point and he was spinning and spinning and spinning and I didn't know where to go, so I tried left, but his back came around and I got hit, causing aero damage. The outbraking you did was a bit hairy, but I knew with my heavy car I could get outbraked easily, so I was watching my mirrors closely everytime I braked.
Few laps later Robert outbraked me as well. I had no chance to defend.

Pitted in late and lost alot there, as I finished with 12L of fuel and had the damage to repair. Lost alot of places with the pits and came out in 4th IIRC, with Robert behind me again. He overtook me a few laps later and I was behind him for the rest of the 25 minutes. I was a bit quicker in the twistied and on the straight, but I lost alot on acceleration and braking. Could follow him around, but not overtake or try anything.

After a few races I'm not sure about the weightpenaltysystem. This race was already decided with CJ's weight, and my race was useless as I couldn't do anything. My weight caused me to brake very early and was afraid I was gonna rearend somebody or get rearended.
The weight is doing it's job in terms of closer racing, but for me the cars feel undrivable and no fun to drive.

Grats to CJ and MJ for the win.

[psuedo]

Love this track...pity I'm not any faster here

Qualified eventually after being 'pestered' by GT1 on three consecutive attempts...still over a second off my pb though.

Race started ok...although I got done first time through eu'rouge taking it far too easy ...then second time round pRibrero had an ooopsie and I looked like I was going to sail passed him and possibly Dave who had slowed to avoid, only to get a total drop in FPS and ending up without a clue as to where anyone was so just stayed off line and hit the brakes hoping it would clear...which it did but I was then 15/20 seconds behind.

Just spent the rest of the time lapping on my own.

Appologies to Brian Kerr, I had just let him through near the last hairpin and then missed my braking point and shunted him off track..totally my fault..and probably cost him chance of a place

Grats to winners and podiums.

[ginsters sponsored]

Congrats MJ .

A rather sore head left me a little undercooked tonight. Poor quali left me in trouble. Hadn't had much time for race setup so I just adjusted excellent quali setup accordingly (read badly). Forgot to change height setting and was bottoming out through Rouge which produced a brown pants moment every time. Also produced a couple of cut warnings so I rather cruised around after pitstop thinking Paul 968 was in front. Only realised it was Darren when we finished, no idea he had jumped me in pits .

Race was rather dull with  only one funny moment coming from Daves secret coded team messages . Shame you have have had enough of the M12 Mo, cause its was so much fun even watching lap me tonight. You remind me of one of those rodeo cowboys as you strangle the life outta of it

Thx all GT1 boys who were excellent. Apologies to Kerr for appearing to block you in quali and Claus for a couple of scary moments, but by jebus you were fast  

[Jeffrey]

Unofficial Lapchart

[Kerr]

During practice and qualifying sessions it was clear there was only going to be one winner here. Happy to qualify 2nd by the skin of my teeth over Mo in 3rd.

Had the run on CJ on first lap and was in his slipstream. I could have make a move to overtake but decided against it. No point trying to overtake and hold a driver so much faster behind for the next 80mins. It would have cost both of us time.

Mo chased me for countless laps afterwards. He matched me in every corner and every straight and I could not get away. I think he must have made a few mistakes and since my GTR-PD was not working I had no idea what was going on behind me.

Come pit stop window I was about 25secs ahead of third place. Then as soon as Simon's message of pit in appeared on my screen it started freezing at Eau Rouge. The whole straight it was freezing every couple of seconds I had to lift off and still ran off at next bend as no idea where I was. How frustrating.

My lack of practice showed badly at the end of the lap as I forgot where the entrance to the pits was and where the limiter was to be in place for. All in all a completely disastrous lap.

Came back out in 9th and watched me climb back up fully expecting to get my 2nd place back. Then wondered where Zacari had come from to get in second. As no GTR-PD I had no idea how he was running.

I put the foot down and my car was flying in second stint. Catching Zacari I closed the gap to under 5 seconds and catching more than quick enough. I was setting quicker laps consistently. Unfortunately I had a little incident which cost me loads of time and damaged the car to the tune of about 1.5secs per lap. Also by the time I straightened up and got out the tyres I was about 18 seconds behind and no chance of catching Zacari with damaged car.

As I said to driver I have no complaint as I know it was a mistake and he has always been great with me, making more than enough room if I'm ever passing him.

Just drove the car home afterwards but struggled especially on right hand bends. I was still quick enough to match 4th positions pace but gave myself a scare with an off on the last lap.

Was a fun race but a little disjointed. It will be better come sprint with no pit stops and everyone together.

That way Zacari can't pull another fast one! Good strategy there as you caught me well out!

Well done CJ and MJ on class wins

[Mark J]

That was a fantastic race, loved it

Absolutely over the moon with my first? class win at Srouk (if there was one before it must have been a while back )
Was really up for this race, i was on a mission to drive the Porsche as well as i could and get a good result at my favourite real life race track and am ecstatic  

Had good qually battle with SBG, swapping times a couple of times to finally clinch GTC pole  
Knew my setup was good and just had to concentrate hard for 80 minutes  

Led the GTC race for an hour until i made my pitstop and despite building up a 16-20 second? gap over 2nd place, i was bricking it for my stop knowing how often it had cost me dearly in enduro. I was stopped for 45 seconds to take on fuel and new boots and re-emerged in 3rd ...thought Dave had pulled out on of his magic pitstop strategies and leapfrogged me, along with the shifting Paul968  
It galvanised me into action and i set about chasing the pair of them with a vengeance setting a series of my fastest race laps. DG then thankfully pitted a few laps later and Paul had a 14 second lead on me, but i was utterly determined to get my lead back.
I started taking big chunks of time out and eventually closed on him with about 10 minutes or so to go, expecting a battle royale to get past, but knowing if i timed it right i could draft him out of eau rouge and get an easier pass. I lined myself up to do it one lap but dropped back too far to get a clear run through eau but only caught him at the end of the straight...D'oh...try again
I decided to stay really close to Paul on the following lap and then repeat my manouvre at the end of the lap, but his Morgan started to get a bit squirrelly with his mirrors full of my porsche and when a couple of lapping GT cars joined the fray he unfortunately ran wide at the exit of stavelot, and i blitzed through down the inside, not needing to be asked twice, unlucky mate  
There was no way on this earth i was gonna make an error after that and i just kept it steady with 2 laps remaining...though Simon did his best to distract me with a dramatic smoke spewing spin at Stavelot  , hehe.

Absolutely over the moon to get the win at my fave track
Congrats to Claus for another dominant drive and thanks to all the GT boys who lapped cleanly

[EdamSpeed]

Mostly quiet race for me. Kept a consistent (more or less) gap between Simon in front (who I couldn't catch when he was being consistent), and Pudie/Gazza behind me. Got a few sniffs, but never really any room to put my nose in, and thanks for giving me the room Simon, when I did, but I had already backed out of the pass - too early Last corner was fun -with us side by side, and your leaden right foot nearly deciding it for you But you just kept it in front.

Sorry to Ian and Dave G, who seemed to be in front of me when I was having wobbly moments. Apologies if  I came across as a bit of a bully - I was trying to be patient and not press the issue, but sometimes it seemed to make things worse! Not your fault guys

Few scary moments when Mo and Luis left the server - there was a brief lag, right where I was turning into Blanchiment - very nearly lost it at that point, and sorry also I think to Darren, who I tried to pass after Eau Rouge, but timed it a bit wrong, ended up going wide at the top, and very very nearly wiped myself out on the tyres. Hope I didn't frighten you too much!

Oh, and well done MJ - who put a rocket up your a**e tonight?

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

Nightmare of a race for me. Having totally missed my braking point for La Source and lost about 20 seconds reversing out of the gravel trap, I was still on for a good 4th place at least. Mediums held up well and I was able to delay stopping for softs until there were less than 30 minutes to go, which meant I could push hard all the way through the final stint.

My pit crew however had other ideas, and I found myself unable to select things properly off the board. Grabbed my keyboard and managed to pick the right things (softs and a small aero repair where Jure gave me an accidental tap on the bum very early on), but the button I'd mapped to "SELECT" failed to have any effect, nor did the Enter key.

Wasted a minute until eventually I pressed every button and every key on my keyboard (hence the two weird chat messages) and finally the crew went to work. That put me half a lap down on Ginsters and with no chance for 4th place. Had a reasonable scrap with PRibeiro who looked to have a car problem of some sort until he spun off.

Lappers were very well behaved with one exception - I had to make a few people wait longer than I'd like - there are a few corners where I just could not run safely off line.

I'll miss the next round so that could well see me off the championship podium at the end of the season.

[DynoDaz]

Apologies to Darren and Ruskus, I think I made what could be called aggresive passes on you both

That's ok Mo, no harm done. 

and sorry also I think to Darren, who I tried to pass after Eau Rouge, but timed it a bit wrong, ended up going wide at the top, and very very nearly wiped myself out on the tyres. Hope I didn't frighten you too much!

That's ok Edam, again no harm done.

I must admit after not completing the first two races of the season through collisions with GT1 guys, I was praying as I saw you rapidly approach my back bumper.   Fantastic reactions mate to avoid both me and the wall.

Well done MJ. Congrats on your first win.

After my disastrous start to the season I'm happy to take 3rd in class. 

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

Well, that's a bug I've not heard of in the Logitech Profiler before - I had a bunch of shifted commands set up on the POV controls for the DFP, but I'd removed them and the Shift button for the G25. Unfortunately, the Profiler for some reason decided to retain the shifted controls instead of the ones I set up - I don't understand why because when I first changed the mappings I reset all the control mappings in GTR2 to check that they were correct. Grr, grr and thrice grr.

[Zacari]

Great race for me, a real life issue turned out to be bloomin' great strategy

I had never run the Lister at Spa in GTR2 so I had no setup before quali, and 8th reflected that somewhat.  The start of the race was good, had a nice battle with Robert for a few laps- damn you could brake late in that Lambo!  After that, and TT spinning, I was behind Jeff who was in 4th.

Around 1/3 distance I had my 'issue', which was my wireless headphone batteries running out after thinking of the options I decided I had to pit for new batteries and thankfully with 55 mins left I could make it if I took on a full tank of fuel.  The stop went well (I was weaving all over the place on pit entry trying to find the batteries in my draw ) and I was back out a lap down, just behind CJ.

The next few laps were just hotlapping, with lots of free track and very few cars to lap.  I suddenly realised I was going over 2 sec a lap faster than Jeff who was on old tyres, so I thought I might be in with a shout of jumping him when he pitted.  I did, and also managed to jump everyone other than CJ who was miiiiles faster than anyone I was, however, suffering from a very hot car (oil @ 105 degrees, anyone?) so I was a little fearful of making the finish in one piece.

When all the stops were done I was about 10 seconds infront of Brian, but not having any major issues other than doing 3/4 revvs down the main straight to keep the engine in one piece.  The gap seemed ok, then in consecutive laps I lost alot to traffic which I was cursing about, over 3 seconds in one lap, though I guess that traffic cost Brian alot more in the end anyway, so we never got to see how any battle would've turned out.  I could've stressed the engine and been going faster, but it could've gone boom too

Once the gap went to about 15 seconds I totally backed off down the straight to keep the engine below 100, so I was running low 2:16's not high 2:13's, with no danger it was the sensible thing to do, and it lasted until the finish for a very unexpected 2nd

Grats to CJ and MJ for class wins, and thanks to the GTC guys who were great another good TSJ result too

[Truetom]

Grats to CJ and MJ for winning. When I grow up I'll have a "J" in my name, too. 
Qualified 5th, with 0,5 sec off pb, couldn't get that back, probably I was too chickensh.. in the Eau.    Race started good, Ruskus was all over Paul Richards and that gave me some gap behind. Was close to Luis Branco when he spun but not as close to get entangled. Mo was faster so I settled my pace and tried to be steady, not too fast. That payed off when mo went out and I was running 3rd. When I lapped DG on s/f straight I must have got a slightly different line through the Eau Rouge and I spinned.    Lost 4,5 places in a blink.    After pitting I was running 7th I think, behind mo again. Great sight that MC12, mo, but I guess driving that car on the very limit is a time-limited project - I had the same troubles in S5, the car just isn't competitive in GT1 class.    Anyway, after mo made a small mistake I came by and was after Robert and Ruskus. Was faster and was waiting for mistake either of them would make.

driving over a banana skin Truetom had left from his ailing car and spinning not far in front of him.

Had the same feeling, Simon, don't know what happened, but the car just slide wide and went off into the wall. I don't think I took a different line, speed was usual.    Probably just a downward step in rubber grip. Anyway, on top of the Eau Rouge the car went straight into the wall, broke off the splitter, suspension damage, right front tyre out. Wanted to get back to the pits but after I almost took out Shark and another car I decided I was a dangerous obstacle on the road and quit. So promising... 

TT