USA FB: Silverstone

First of all i want to apologise to Fernando again for that Quali thing (sorry mate)i just brake too late so that what happpened hope you still had enough time to do a good lap.
I made a good start in the race and then i had a contact in t1 with somebody i dont now who it was because visibility in those cars is very poor you cant see so much what is happening behind you but i was able to stay on track and was running third behind the leaders. Few laps later Tristan and David had a contact and that allowed me to take the lead but not for long. I was getting up to speed but it was still not enough to keep them behind both overtook me and i was running on the third place for a while
As the race progress i learn to drive the car and i was getting faster i was pushing David and i saw that Tristan was still not to far from us so there was a chance still to catch him. But then i made some mistakes and i new that only third is possible. Unfortunetly at the end i was out of fuel (lack of experience) and was unable to finish the race. Graeat drive Tristan and David you are the winners!!!

So how come side-swiping/ramming someone on Lap 1 isn't the same as a Punt or a Dive-Bomb?

It doesn't take too much driving intelligence to know that a car you are under 0.1sec ahead of is actually BESIDE you, so if you head in for the apex, where they already are, you are going to crash.
No different than hitting someone in the rear, or dive bombing into their inner side anyway. It is EXACTLY the same thing - unfair use of the road you don't even own because someone is already there.

More so when at initial turn-in the car was BEHIND me and only got to even be 0.1sec overlapped because they did go full-on into that turn heading for the apex - where I was.
So they would have SEEN the whole thing coming.

Or if they were not good enough to 'see', know, what was coming then they shouldn't be driving in that manner.

If they had run an outer line as they should they would have either stupidly run off track if they kept the speed up, or sensibly had to slow right down to make the turn safely. Heaven forbid doing either of those on Lap 1 and losing about 1 car length, and 0.2sec of the race. Versus causing a crash in Turn 1.

.
I think I have now been taken out close to 10 times in the two FBMW series, by people that don't know how to drive amongst other cars. "Let's just race at 100% even though I can't control my car well enough to be sure I don't hit that car I am racing with". And of course some/many that were genuine accidents due to their loss of control or whatever - not bad driving ideas and decisions (tho often they come from having made a bad decision or plan a bit earlier, which then created that sequence).
And about 1/4 or more of those incidents on lap 1.
Some times surviving and making good recoveries - which should never have been needed. And many to be too damaged to do much of use for the rest of the race, if able to even continue at all.

Add up the sequence and it all builds from that first incident:
1) Spun off and damaged - to be last
2) Unable to run full speed laps due to damage, thus much harder to catch cars.
3) Tougher to pass cars that are caught.
4) The whole time sequence drags out far longer than it ever would have been in a car that is fine.
5) Back markers spin out all over the track and I have nowhere to go then - but would never have been there if not for the Lap 1 incident and damage.
Probably would never see those back marker cars in the whole race normally.

So it is not just one little "setback", it is a totally race altering result. Even if it was a caused spin with no damages.

Drive-thru's are probably harsh enough in most cases, but the penalty possibilites don't seem to be reducing incidents too much really. In almost any class.
Possibly impossible to cure with so many less than capable drivers in a big field. (less than capable of co-existing, not necessarily driving skills).

Peter,
You need to move toward the back, my friend.

I can't say I enjoy having a snowball's chance in hell of winning a race, but I can say the racing was very clean, very sharp, very fast, and very gentlemanly.

All in all, a disapointing race for me. In qual i managed to get the perfect lap right at the end to snatch the pole. But i missed the track record, and now Scott has it :(

In the race, the start went well for me, but tristan managed to just sneak by. I followed him for the rest of lap 1 and in the last turn of lap 2 i though he had gone in too hot and wasn't going to be able to pull the car back to the inside. so i went for the gap. guess i was wrong and ended up spining him. I waited for him to go back by so we dropped to 2nd and 3rd behind Maciej. I just could not come to terms with Tristans braking points, they were so much earlier than mine. It just forced to be extra careful. because my car wasn't setup for this type of style, i just kept losing time to tristan. Final Maciej made a mistake allowing tristan to get by and giving me a shot at second. Me and Maciej battled for a few laps but our battle let Tristan get away. I managed to hold on to 2nd with Maciej breathing down my neck till he ran out of gas.

Mainly i'm disappointed because i just drove very poorly tonight. But i have been sick all week, so thats my excuse :P

Oh and sorry David (Fish) that my spinning down the track left you nowhere to go but into me! (Lap 1 Turn 1).

I guess that is another spin off that the Turn 1 side-swiping caused. Detriment to another car also.
Could have been a HUGE disaster there for a lot more cars if things unfolded even just a small amount different!

I actually would have made it back up there with you (following you through the field) if not for the big disaster of the back markers all over the track at Turn 1 eventually. But that was just bad luck - I ALMOST got past them alive, but the weeny gap to get through was too small and mobile still!! WHAM.

EDIT: Oh it was only ONE car spinning there, and others avoiding. So that was a shame Greg! You managed to drive out of the spin heading right, which was the way I headed to avoid an 'outwards' spinning car. DOH.
Must have been fate...

LOL Clay.

It is not really 'area specific' (where you are in the field of skills). Probably less true control of cars further back, but all that really matter is the intention to drive within that control, and 'correctly' when near/amongst others.
That is an attitude thing, not a skill thing.

It can take me AGES to pass even a back-marker who I am 2 seconds a lap or more faster than. Maybe a whole lap or more. If no good and safe sequence can be made to unfold.
And the further up the ladder you go, the harder it gets to do that. So you might never even get to pass a car that is actually maybe 4 spots down the grid slower than you, because of situation and safety.
But some people try anyway.... to 'make' it work. And often enough 'Ooops'.

Posted by David Banta: "But i missed the track record, and now Scott has it :("

Lol, dont sound too upset Dave! :P

I tell you what though, you and Tristan look very similar to me and Milan in the Euro series... you guys should skip work/school on a wednesday at some point and join us! Would be a great race ;-)

Peter said: Drive-thru's are probably harsh enough in most cases, but the penalty possibilities don't seem to be reducing incidents too much really. In almost any class.

Penalties will not reduce accidents and that is the reason we at R2P do not have laid out penalties for every instance of contact between cars. Racing is a high risk dance between many cars in a small space. The first laps of a race are the most dangerous ones and people are just simply going to make mistakes from time to time. Since R2P has adopted the "first lap punt rule", it has greatly reduced the instances of people trying to win the race in turn-1. It hasn't completely eliminated it of course, but it does have people thinking twice and that is all I wanted to accomplish by it.

The reason why R2P does not consider side-to-side contact as a "punt" (such as in your situation in turn-1 Peter) is because both drivers could have avoided the situation, not just one of them. With that said, lets not also forget that the responsibility lies on the car attempting the pass, not the other way around. You have to expect that guy to chop your nose off from time to time as he may not be as aware of his surroundings as others may be.

Good race, congrats to the top!

I was in second class all by myself! The top 5 pulled away, then two spun. Gradually DF caught and passed me, as I pulled away from the rest of the field. I spun once but was able to stay just ahead of the fray and pulled away again. I'm very happy with my quick setup creation skills and then running a solid 1-mistake race, luckily it wasn't a big one.

See you next time.
RA

anyone else notice i'm driving car #13 :), and have been all season, oh the stigma!!!!!!!!