UKGTR Season 7 Lower Endurance (GT2/3) - Interlagos - Feb 17

[Kerr]

I quite liked that, although I wish I went with the 911RSR.

Qualified 2nd although a mile off Freq's time. Your too fast in that beemer.

Race got under way and just approaching the grid on parade lap Freq's car dissappeared from my screen. It reappeared and I think I might have nudged him?

Down the main straight I could not drive behind him. His car kept jumping back and forward. This caused me to lose loads of time around the first section of the track.

Come the straight PR had a big run on me so I stayed on the inside line for next bend to defend my position.

I looked in my mirror after corner to see PR spinning. I hope and don't think there was contact?

I was happily sitting in second for most of the first stint. However I noticed towards the end that Zacari had been making good progress into my lead.

I made my stop hoping to get out ahead of Zacari as I know he is always good at pit stops. I made a really poor exit from the pits nearly crashing and lost all my speed.

Came out the pits only to see Zacari right behind me, but he had too much speed and passed.

I gave chase for a few laps but made too many stupid mistakes of trying to get the power down early to get a run on him.

Then went through a phase with Mark McLean gifting each other 3rd place. We handed it to each other a few times but luckily I got it the last time.

Well done to Freq on another win, and team shark junior on yet another dominate display

[Kerr]

That was better than I expected, although the weight definately affected the car by quite a lot, I did 32.7's offline and once online, couldn't get below 33.7's! 

Apparently I was lagging at the start? Did anyone else see my car dissapear on the warm up lap as apparently I dissapeared from Brian's screen.....no problems on my end but I did wonder why I had such a big lead after just one corner....

Bit embarrassed by qualifying - sorry TT, I'll try harder next time 

Shame the race wasn't wet - that would've been great! Grats to Zacari on a great drive up the grid and Picnic for holding up a flag for the seniors! Did TSJ get another 1-2-3?   

See you next Sunday

I just could not safely follow you.

I watched from afar for a number of laps afterwards and all looked well.

One thing I did notice was that your name kept dropping down the position chart throughout the race too. When I'm nearing a disco my name starts doing this but thats the first I've noticed someone else do it as often

[stnasky]

Great race overall, near the end i made a few to many mistakes trying to catch up with Zacari.  I was with him for the whole first half of the race with thee odd place change but i felt he always had the upper hand and so i settled to just tail him.  Then at about the halfway mark Zacari pitted and i decided to stay out for one more lap and then made my stop, but as the pitcrew was finishing off the last pair of tyres i could hear that 360 of his scream past and i knew i was screwed.  He had at least a 10 sec gap . so i guess staying out for one extra lap with worn tires ended that little battle.   

As i tried to narrow the gap i found myself trying abit to hard and made a couple of mistakes.  Then Brian in the m3 got past as a result, and i was kicking myself .  Then Backo caught me up and passed aswell,  i was indeed going backwards but when the race was over i noticed Backo was 9th

Gotta say thanks to the guys who made lapping easy, i know you guys had your own race, so cheers for that.

Congrats to Freq and good drive Zacari and Brian.

[Reign Man]

Overall I enjoyed the race. Just need to get used to the long races again. I could put in good laps but I just didn't have the consistancy. Looking forward to the next one. 

Apologies to paul, I think it was you I collected while I was spinning.

[psuedo]

think my report is going to be made up mostly of apollogies

first one to Reign man.....I had managed to get just ahead of a RVS car in front (sorry cant remember if it was madd or Dan) aproaching turn 1,  got the car slowed enough then went and turned in a bit too early and had to make a quick adjustment which sent me sliding wide....all credit to the RVS though, he avoided me pretty sharply. Unfortunately though, in trying to catch the slide I over did it and started fishtailing....right into the side of RM....sorry mate.

Second sorry is to Reign Man....(again  )...two or three laps later RM had got passed me but I went and slid straight into him under braking for T1 again....sorry again...hopefully still mate.

and next, Dave.....I was on fresh rubber with about 6 laps to go and was catching dave at  an alarming rate....when he started sliding a little wide I made a run up the inside and was desperately trying to stay narrow to give him room but the Viper wasn't playing and I drifted too wide and balked him quite badly it looked like in my mirrors. Sorry Dave.

Other than that...it was fun, but hard work. Seeing the rate my tyres were going off...due mainly to me forgetting to adjust the pressures on my race setup for the temperature ...I decided quite early to try a 2 stop strategy....didn't really work...but It was worth a try....

Good race though, enjoyable track...roll on tuesday.

Grats to winners and podiums.

[Kerr]

Having watched replay of the start looking from my car,  Freq's car moves a foot or two suddenly just before the start.

Watching for the cars behind it looks like it was me who jumped. Hopefully it was nothing bad for those behind.

I doubt it could be as PR managed to follow within inches. Having watched replay I'm glad to see I had nothing to do with his accident either

[ginsters sponsored]

Everything happened in the first half hour and then it was an unfortunately quite run home after.

Odd start when I thought I saw Dan put on pit limiter only to see him pull away again. Rather than catch up,I thought it safer to keep station but all behind me a lost a bit, sorry chaps. First few laps were great fun, I was catching Dan but old Madd was all over me. Really nice to have complete confidence in him, perhaps we see too much of each other , and subsequent hard but always fair tangle was ace. Thanks for waiting and your pass on me was very nice. Unluckily the RVS chaps fell away and that was end of fun really.

Congrats to our Paul for an excellent 2nd with that ballast and all GT2 boys who were all very kind. I noticed that if you run wide that corner flips you in pracci Shark, is that what happened? Shame as you would have been fun to fight after your longer pit :'(

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

and next, Dave.....I was on fresh rubber with about 6 laps to go and was catching dave at  an alarming rate....when he started sliding a little wide I made a run up the inside and was desperately trying to stay narrow to give him room but the Viper wasn't playing and I drifted too wide and balked him quite badly it looked like in my mirrors. Sorry Dave.

No problem - I had pitted 5 minutes ahead of schedule in an attempt to get track position after spending time trying to right Shark's car (I did warn you about that curb Shark! ) and by the time you caught me I had tyres heading towards wear 30 and was starting to struggle to even stay on the track. Quite relieved not to finish last and I wonder whether with hindsight I might've tried a two stop strategy with the first for fuel and tyres and the second for tyres only.

[Zacari]

Well that was a mighty hard race!  Though possibly not as hard as 78 laps of Monaco in a '79 F1 car hope it was good JR!

I'd only done 5-6 practice laps to re-learn the track (not raced here since GP4), so my setup was more than a little random.  In quali I was nowhere near the front- ended up 8th though everyone other than Joss were pretty close.  I was relying on a fast pitstop again so I went with meds F+R and 100L for the start.

The start was pretty quick, seemed like I was on the limiter for only a couple of seconds!  The following few laps were very close, trying to keep the tyres cool and work out how fast everyone else was.

Infact the whole of the first 20 or so laps were a blur, being shadowed by Mark very closely!  I think we traded places at one point when passing Paul, he ran wide on the exit of the last corner at the bottom of the hill, I had to lift and Mark got by on the inside of both of us!  I managed to follow him into T1 and a lap later, passing Dave I think in T3, I managed to do the same thing to Mark as he did to me, and that's how it stayed until the pitstops.  The only other thing I remember is narrowly missing a GT2 coming out of T4 rejoining from the outside, but it probably felt closer than it was!

After 35 mins I felt like I had to pit, even though I knew I would be 'releasing' Mark and he'd be faster.  I also knew my stop would gain 10-15 sec on the other GT2s so I was hopeful of passing Brian and getting close to Joss in the lead.  All was well until the last corner of my out lap, when I stupidly trail-broke as if my tyres were hot and promptly spun.  What made it worse was when attempting to rejoin it just spun again really slowly which felt really wrong.  Anyway, my advantage had gone and as I entered the Senna S I could see Brian was exiting the pits.  As I came onto the back straight I was just close enough to get passed into T4, it really couldn't have been much closer!

After that it was just a constant push until the flag, tyres were well and truly rubbish by the end!  That and I got a low fuel warning on the last lap   Grats to Joss for the win and Brian/Mark for the close racing and big thanks to the Viper drivers for helping me passed on the straights

Having watched replay of the start looking from my car,  Freq's car moves a foot or two suddenly just before the start.

Watching for the cars behind it looks like it was me who jumped. Hopefully it was nothing bad for those behind.

That is exactly what it looked like for me at Silverstone, I hope you don't get given a warning for it like I got

[Simon Gymer]

(I did warn you about that curb Shark! )

I have no idea which corner or curb, if indeed it was a curb. Not seen the replay. That's not the point, I was simply driving a normal race and it spoilt my fun which is a real let down considering I only race for fun. I don't think I'll be racing this track again or any other 3rd party track in GTR 2 as I've had enough of problems from dodgy amatuer tracks giving extra discos, crashes, car flipping antics, cars stuck in the track, being placed off the track at the start and so on. I really do have better things to do with my time. 

For all those people that constantly badger people to include more 3rd party stuff, this is why we shouldn't cause at the end of the day it's made by amatuers to a sub-standard level.

See you in Dubai.

[Kerr]

Think you were just unlucky Simon. I've never rolled my car on that kerb, but a few times I've ran over it the car was violently thrown off the track.      Other than that I felt this is one of the better add on tracks. However even without the heat, it had the same issue as most. Really high tyre temperatures.

[Paul968]

As SBG says, all the action was in the first half. I couldn't get near the top of the grid but was happy with my race pace and hoped to hang on to the vipers till the stops when I would jump ahead. The plan went to pot though when after a few laps Reign man and Pseudo tangled ahead of me. A gap on the inside opened up, I drove though it and it promply closed as Reign Man suddenly veered to the inside. By the time I got the car turned round the guys at the front were long gone, so I plodded after them. The Pseudo Vipers caught me up and Pseudo had a nibble but then ran wide at T4, after which the 2 of them tangled and dropped back. I thought I'd have to fight hard to get past Dave, but he somehow contrived to throw the car off the road in front of me before the last corner - what happened Dave? From then on it was very quiet. I somehow ended up 2nd after the pitstops (just for tyres), SBG was 15 seconds ahead and Madd was 10 seconds back. I eased away from Madd and closed slightly on SBG but never anywhere near enough so I eased off and settled for 2nd.

Congrats to SBG for another win and to Freq for running away with GT2. Thanks to the GT2s who were in the main very polite when lapping (apart from one late lunge at T1 which luckily I saw coming). The twisty infield section must have been frustrating for the lappers as it was very hard to let people by there.

[Dave 'Gizmo' Gymer]

I thought I'd have to fight hard to get past Dave, but he somehow contrived to throw the car off the road in front of me before the last corner - what happened Dave?

Probably when I went off to try and right Shark's car!

TBH the Viper's tyre temperatures were completely out of control and I only had two choices; cook 'em and go off or slow down and watch as every other car zoomed past me. Methinks the VCC needs some sort of even hard rear compound.

[Paul968]

We all had that problem Dave. I was runng 230F+ on the rear right most of the race last night.

[Jeffrey]

Many add-on tracks have the overheating tyre problem, which is best solved by changing the .gdb file.