Endurance Championship Division 1 - Season 1, Round 6, Spa - Sep 25th

[Rich_A]

Doh!

Race was going fine, until I stuck it into the wall after my pitstop.  All this was after I threw it in the wall at Eau Rouge lap 1, and amazingly got away with it.

Didn't do any practice so didn't expect anything out of it.  Not enjoying racing as much as I did - just burnt out I think

Lol, I now that feelin. I got a bad shoulder atm, bit like Montoya but I battle on.

I was following a Saleen for a long time at first stint, good driving. Trying to find a weakness but different weakness every lap lol - good strategy. Perhaps best place was in final hairpin but I made sort of bad move by blocking you in against a lapping nGT car.. I shouldn't have done that sorry, not like me!

Jon_M won by a mile, 2m11 for race pace ouch - well done

[Rich_A]

Oh the hell with this!!!! 

I just sucked and sucked, first part was OK, but after a spin I just shot backwards.  Got boxed in with Jamera as Rich was passing me at the same time, tried to slow down enough, but punted Jamera off  :'(

Struggled round with a massively oversteering Saleen until I got to a piststop window, car was better after that but spun off when Jon lapped me, then spun massively at the top of Eau Rouge limped back to the pits with 2 punctures, then quit as I was last GT and had no chance of improving that.

I'm totally hacked off with that race and with the Saleen, and with GT cars in general.  I might try a different car again, but maybe not, I just can't get on terms in the GT's and I'm falling out with them big-time  :'(

Yes GT cars are all or nothing. Pedals are very important to be totally connected with car and to have total control of FFB in wheel... FFB in wheel and pedal precision are very closely connected, with very precise pedals you become more connected directly to FFB. Those MOMO Racing pedals are aweful.

[fozzmeister]

NGT races are tending to be very lonely recently. Again I was in the middle of two other cars, both something like a second a lap quicker/slower than me, if not more. All I could do was lap and lap and lap. Seemed that Locutus was having lots of little moments though so I occasionally kept seeing him about 5 secs up the road. And when he pitted I was 1:30+ seconds infront of him, but by the time I came out of my pit stop, I was surprise 5 seconds behind him. About 3 laps from the end he must have made another mistake and was 3-4 seconds infront of me, and I started pushing to try and keep up, was hemorrhaging about 0.5 seconds a lap but kept pushing and then at the bus stop, on the last lap, Locutos hit Jamera (who appeared to be stationary) and I just out dragged him to La Source as he was recovering for a [TheCraftyButchers] 2nd place!

Wanted to have a beer to celebrate, but found my beer fridge only had lemonade in :-(

Fozzmeister

PS. Come back PaulW, I need some good competition and you always seem to be pretty close to my level

[Jamera]

Over shot my braking point, which meant I had to brake very heavily and lost all momentum through bus stop (was lucky to get through it at all), sorry to , oh bugger what was his name, 360 driver anyway

[[ZiP]Tyf]

Good race for me, noticed there weren't a lot of people around, so thought I'd join in with a GT car for a change!

I was a bit of pace during qualifying, but then again I qualified with my race setup, since I'm not really used to GT cars.
First couple of laps people just kep on dropping, so I was surprised to drive in 5th, hehe! Then I think Mark came from behind and was way quicker so I let him past easily . At tyres worn message I thought, wow I'm in 4th let's pit .

Dropped back to 8th or so and noticed I was gaining on #7 which I thought at that time was Matjaz. Couple of laps and some heavy pushing by me later, it turned out I was right! LOL! He was driving an N-GT car, haha! Well done m8, awesome times !
Other people pitted or dropped or wotever and I was in 5th position at the end, about 15 secs or so behind #4. Gave it a decent try but it was in vain . Managed to finish a GT race, lol, and was only 7 secs behind #4, who turned out to be another Penguin! LOL!
And seeing JonM (congrats m8!) won, I'm not even scoring any Penguin team points! Grrr!

Good stuff overall (only 1 incident for me ) and on to the Div 2 race!

T

[locutos ukgtr]

Yeah Fozz, was a good race, tyres died 3 laps from end of 1st stint, back end just kept stepping out, had to drop pace by some 4 secs a lap which put you back in. 2nd stint was much better, but 3 or 4 laps from end came to lap Jamera, was a nightmare finally culminating in what appeared to be a stationary jamera exiting the bus-stop, I'd glanced in my mirror cuz I knew fozz was coming and I looked back theres this car stopped right in the race line. Then to really anoy me, race clock said 6 mins to go, so I thought well no prob, I can get fozz anywhere really, cross the line and race is done...lol oh well, least I finished. Good race guys, GT cars were very good at lapping as well might I add, well done fellas.

[picnic]

Replay and provisional results available

[PaulW]

PS. Come back PaulW, I need some good competition and you always seem to be pretty close to my level

2:21 at Spa so I would have been pretty competitive if I didn't tart things up. Love the endurance races but they're just too long for my back unfortunately.
I did wonder whether the sprints might be extended slightly for the next season now that we've all got the experience to maybe 40/45 mins? Still a sprint but just with a bit more meat to it.

[silver53]

Hi has anyone any idea why the g3 porsch caused a missmatch and spit me out last eve. I do not think the car has been played with. Wish I had chosen the BMW but ended up with the G2 bi turbo and pulled out at start.gerald

[mo]

I used the black G3 Porsche at Doni without problems

[JonM_uk]

Had a good qualli and race  1st in both. I had been playing a little bit of rfactor and this seemed to totally cock my GTR ability up, I just couldn't put a good lap together, it took us an hour or so offline to get back into the groove. Thought I'd do the race on meds which was very good to start with but after about 8 laps on each stint times dropped about 3-4 secs a lap and I was lucky to finish after spinning and hitting the barrier, thought i'd have some damage but didn't   Apart from that the race was a bit lonely and found my concentration wandering at times, probably should've had a mars bar like shark said  A good day for ze penguins though, 15 points ahead of those nasty sharks now 

[Simon Gymer]

Well done Jon on your win, I'm sure us Sharks can swim back into contention though. Really peeved to not have been able to make it as Spa is always enjoyable.

Was the weather dry?

[JonM_uk]

Yep, dry as a bone 
Was greatful for that as I've never gone round in the rain 
Now just gotta practice with those pesky Z3M's for div2 race, can never keep them going in a striaght line. Well except when i'm entering a bend

[greg130]

Now just gotta practice with those pesky Z3M's for div2 race, can never keep them going in a striaght line. Well except when i'm entering a bend

I know the feeling Jon, tricky little cars to handle especially when braking

[[ZiP]Tyf]

My advice: brake pressure at 35% and it will handle nicely under braking! 

 

 

 

T