It looked like I was set for 4th place but that turned out to be 3rd after H had an off at The Loop after he had a massive FPS drop. Bad luck there.
No, Sam, I didn't have any FPS drop, it was completely my fault for going off. When you asked about lag in post-race chat I thought you meant something else, that's why I said "yes".
Qualifying was really competitive and I narrowly took pole from Bob, but it amazes me that I'm still whole 2 tenths off a pb which I set 9 years ago when I first started driving online with a joystick. For some reason I can't control the car well at Watkins and despite trying all sorts of setup changes, it didn't help.
The start caught me out a bit when the flagman didn't wait too much to drop the green flag, but I managed to stay in front until The Loop where Bob made his move and we went around the corner side by side. This compromised our exit speed significantly and what happened next is partially due to that.
Bob's Lotus naturally gained an advantage down the straight leading to Big Bend and so I slotted behind, with the other cars following close by and having a battle of their own. I began to lift up a bit to account for any possible early braking from Bob, but he really overdid by braking some 50 meters earlier than normal, and as much as I tried to slow down and avoid tapping him, it didn't work out and so we collided, going off as a result.
It seemed other people were either involved or went off on their own as well, so it took some time to get a clear road and return in the race. Bob returned in front of me so we resumed the chase, but this time in 12th position or so.
Just as I thought, GPLRA shows that we both suffered engine problems as well as some minor suspension damage, and I couldn't use the full capacity of the revs. It felt like missing a single cylinder or something. Even so, I had the speed to keep up with those in front and reel them in, and in the next few laps I passed a few people with Bob doing the same in front.
Eventually he lost more speed and let me by, so I continued the chase on my own and caught up with some faster drivers who were harder to pass. Rick was one of them and I closed-in on him in the Esses, but then for some reason he swerved right and left on the exit of the fast right-hander leading onto the Front Straight. He must've also applied some brakes as well which was really unexpected, so I narrowly avoided him.
Rick stayed in front until The Loop and I was following behind when suddenly near the exit of the corner he again seemed to have swerved a bit and hit the brakes just when we were hard on acceleration. This resulted in a contact and Rick went off. I continued without losing too much time, but now had Sam some 6 seconds up ahead and he proved very hard to catch up.
I took the majority of the remaining laps to close up on him and at one point I thought it won't be possible, but in one of those laps he lost 1-2 seconds and now I had him well in sight. Our battle never happened though as he went off on his own and so now I was in 3rd, with Bartosz and Tom totally out of reach 20 seconds ahead.
Finally, with 3 laps to go, I went too fast into The Loop and almost made it through, but a little touch of the grass edge at the rear spun the car around and the haybale flipped it over onto the armco, and that was it. It's a shame because 3rd would've been really nice considering all the problems.
Grats to Bartosz, Tom and Sam for making up the podium!