UKGTL Season 8 Endurance - Round 1 - Estoril (GP), Portugal - Jun 25

[Alex vV]

http://simracing.blog.com/2009/06/26/july-25th-2009-srou-estoril-endurance/
If nothing else, I hope Legzy, Bill and Alex read it, if only for the final part:)

Nice read and spot on. Couldn't maintain your pace and saw you disappear in the distance...
The battle after the first pitstop was very good indeed! Had trouble cornering the 275 but could loosen all the power on the straight

As you stated I didn't notice your stealthy move behind PR's Jag until it was too late. Nice  

hmmm.. what car to pick for the next endurance round ....  

[BillThomas]

Thanks for those kind words Spadowski, I'd like to endorse all you said.  It was the most concentrated and thrilling on line race I've ever had.  Don't worry about the kisses, I know I take an odd line compared to the rest of y'all.  Also thanks to Legzy and Tony for their sportmanship it was brilliant. 

I've race the 1310 before including an enduro so I knew the 18 laps shown would be greater.  I'd practiced other cars but came to the conclusion that the 1310 was the car for a long drive.  It's performance on the windy bits was out of this world, the brakes are brilliant the turn in sharp and precise and the drive out of those long curves on rails. 

In sunny Burham we had a muggy day and from about 1700 to well after our race we had electrical storms not much rain but thunder and lightning - well it's Glastonbury ain't it.  Just before the end of practice we had an Almighty flash/bang and my computer just stopped dead.  I rebooted and check for electrical smell (was an electrical engineer so it's in the DNA) smelling none I joined the race again and luckily despite more thunder/lightning my compute behaved.

Initially I had a battle with Tony coming out of that final turn, sorry I gave you a gentle kiss but you were slower through there and I had to keep going as I had Legzy behind me and I had to keep ahead of him into T1.  After that I was usually  OK. I'd done consumption tests and decided I could do 20 laps before I pitted, which I made OK.

Came out and had some time in hand over Legzy so I concentrated on driving smoothly and after a while as Spadowski said he  Legzy and I had a battle to the end with me just getting 10th.

Thanks guy for fantastic nights racing.

Bill

[mr_oily]

Good to hear you chaps enjoyed yourselves, looking forward to checking out the replay this eve when I get back.

Wasn't the result I'd hoped for after somehow landing the Cobra on pole but despite dropping four spots, that was an absolute cracker! Bizarrely, not just due to the battling, although it was fun dicing with Madd in the opening stages, but mainly just due to the awesome track/ car combo and the double juice consumption our new Directors (& PR) have rustled up.

For the first time I actually thoroughly enjoyed just driving as hard as I could but concentrating on managing my tyres (ok concentrating on watching them disappear ) and carefully feeling the difference in weight distribution as the fuel was guzzled away. The handling was so different through the stints making it very tricky - but although I could tell by the pool of sweat that I'd done 80 mins, it absolutely flew! Really felt like driving on a knife edge for most of it and it had to be that way if the Cobra was ever to recover that extra stop.

Only git was that I'd stuck the brakes quite far to the rear to help me get the turn in I wanted for the twisty bits but I never really managed to pick a good reference point into turn 1 and with the bias where it was, that codding corner caused me grief time and time again...flying off the road fairly dramatically there three times in total!

Loving seeing two steps on the podium occupied by greenies once again, wicked stuff boys - you enjoy yourself on your hols Mr. Minton, no need to rush back bud Grats to Madd, well deserved but also to Jimbo - was really hoping to have bragging rights after this one but you well and truly destroyed me in the same car here, despite my attempt to block you by parking across the road at T1 - apologies, sort of freaked out there, it all happened so quickly! Literally came to a stop as you rounded the corner but I realise with hindsight that my words of warning on TS could have been more useful than just aaaaaaarrrgggh, waaaaaaatchouuuuuuuut, aaaaaaarrrghhhh, nooooooo!!!!

Fantastic track - we have to have this one again, just brilliant, well done guys.  

On to Mosport! It's a veritable sim feast we're having at the moment, delicious.

[pribeiro]

  It's a veritable sim feast we're having at the moment, delicious.

Indeed. 

[Wiltshire Tony]

I was going really well and had hardly put a foot wrong ....................until I ran out of fuel in the pit lane

A real shame because I was enjoying the drive so much

I could be wrong but........I thought you could pre-assign some keys that would enable your pit crew to push you down the pit lane. Might of been handy last night?

[Spadowski]

It was a truly epic race. Usually I'm in a class of my own. Occasionally get to fight, but I've NEVER had it so close as I did last night. And it was about 30 of the 40 laps! That was so much fun. When I take a break from packing today I will check the replay out.

Glad you liked my report. I don't always write them. When the race has gone badly (like Lakeside) I obviously don't particularly like to recap them, but Estoril had to be recapped.

Wish I could do the GTR2 and P&G races but there's something weird with the US release of GTR2. I get booted from all servers (both GTR2 and P&G) as a "possible cheat". Very frustrating:(

Looking forward to Adelaide! (Love that circuit. Have done 1000's of laps there. Mostly in Aussie V8's.)

[BillThomas]

Wish I could do the GTR2 and P&G races but there's something weird with the US release of GTR2. I get booted from all servers (both GTR2 and P&G) as a "possible cheat". Very frustrating:(

Of any interest:-

http://www.amazon.co.uk/GTR-2/dp/B000FII892/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1246179485&sr=1-4

Bill