USA F3: Brianza

Finished that one way better than I was, just due to not making any big errors.

I'd been thinking of passing on the race since the series was wrapped already, but figured I'd try to put some points up for the team. Not a very good outing on my part really; showed up with no prep and a setup from Laguna. Had way too much downforce so I took some wing off after practice, but really didn't know what was what and it showed. Was well off competitive pace and just looking to see what I might luck into. 2nd as it turned out; go figure.

Don't know what was going on with everyone tonight, but at times it looked like people were just going off in all directions, like there was oil on the track or something.

Started when Mark P. looped it at the start blocking Barrett, which gave me 2 spots straight off. Got another one when I outbraked myself into T1 and got away with it. Ended up getting by Toni, but was really lucky not to have made a real mess there - not pretty. Toni was a lot quicker and looking impatient to get back by right away. He stuck his nose inside at 1st Lesmo, but he was too far back and when he backed off, he got into me and spun since his rears were unloaded. He should've just been a bit more patient, as I was expecting him to get back by out of the 2nd Lesmo and wouldn't have contested it.

That put me in 4th, then 3rd when David went off up ahead, apparently on his own. That slowed Rob up, who I got by into the T1 chicane for 2nd. I figured he'd come back by too, but then saw him spin off the 1st Lesmo behind me. Didn't appear to be close enough for any contact, so I guess it was just a spin. While looking in my mirrors I saw Nick J do the same thing right after Rob and was wondering what the heck I missed - seemed a normal enough corner! ;-)

After that it was just watch the gap behind and run it out in 2nd, since Esteban was on another planet and clearing off. I'm wondering if guys were just running too little wing, especially on the rear, and losing it in the corners. I was at 10F/20R and getting killed on the straights, but not crashing in the corners!

These cars just don't feel right to me. If I could get the car to drive like an F1, but just with less HP then I would be happy. But, it feels too loose even with lots of wing and wobbles around in the straights even. Another big difference between the F3 and the F1 is that the F3 needs braking help from downshifting...something that I only realized during the last 10 minutes of practice, but when I carried the technique through the race it gave me a false impression that I could take every corner faster and thus lost it and spun several times.

Sadly...If I had just kept my cool I would have had a 5th place finish, but I had a lot of fun.

Damn, Steve, 10/20 on the wings? I was running 1/7. No wonder in practice i was able to (occasionally) keep pace with Esteban in sector 1, only to get killed (by more than 2 seconds) in sector 2! Never occured to me to test higher wings 'cause the car felt great thru there.

'grats to you on the season championship and to Esteban for another outstanding run.

Great result for me tonight, although it didn't start that well. Dodged a big one on the grid. Avoided a major pileup in T1 by jumping on my brakes and letting Nick J get away with dive bombing me from the outside and then slamming the door on me (guess he just had to have one more position from the back of the grid by T1 -- i can see from the replay that i could have been much more in his way approaching this turn -- i'll try to remember this next time i have one of the "fast guys" behind me on the grid). Survived a tap from behind in the second Lesmo which ultimately cost me two more spots at the end of the back straight.

I tell you, after surviving lap 1 i was congratulating myself on still having pretty good reflexes.

Anyway, it was only one lap later that i was chasing Kevin for P3! It was quite inspiring, and kept me tightly focused, as he was driving well. Then i made my one large mistake on lap 9, getting too deep into the second chicane, locking up, and having to coast thru, losing a couple seconds there and another one during the rest of the lap as i adjusted my brake bias and made sure things were OK again.

My pit crew decided to harass me at this time with false pit in requests as well. But eventually we go that sorted out when i just left them standing there waiting as i blew by them on the front straight.

So i resumed the chase that now seemed futile, but was able to gain a little here and there. Then, too my surprise, found Kevin sideways, apparently having suffered some throttle oversteer coming out of the first chicane, and i inherited P3.

From there it was just one of those DON'T SCREW IT UP LIKE YOU'VE DONE SO MANY OTHER TIMES things.

Had some great racing and was happy to have had the opportunity to run this last F3 race at R2P.

Barrett I was thinking the same thing when i was ahead of you. :) But my nerves got the best of me and i lost it coming out of the first chicane. You put in some good laps and i couldn't cut down the gap between us. Congrats to the podium.

That was a strange race. David M. was a good distance in front of me in 2nd place and I was in 3rd. Got to the last turn before main straight he disappears then re-appears sliding sideways in front of me all locked up (that was some bizarre and huge lag)?? Can't believe I didn't hit him, but lost a ton of momentum which gave Steve the opportunity to take me on the front straight.

After that it was just a stupid mistake that put me into the tire wall a few turns later. Too bad I had a good race car, just pushing too hard too soon.

After my pit stop for damage repairs, I spent the rest of the race driving around with a wheel at 45 degress off center and a car that was ALL over the place, repairs doesn't appear to include and fixes to toe/camber damage.

Hoping I could pick up a few spots but only spot was my teammates DNF, dooh!

Oh well, next time.

Congrats to podium.

@ Barrett - actually I think it was 11/20. Like I said, I was pretty much totally unprepared, and just started with a Laguna set and started dropping wing. Didn't have enough time to get far with that so I just ended up running that much. As you'd expect, it helped in the corners and sucked down the straights. For example, when I caught Rob after he got slowed up behind David's off, I tried to draft by him on the S/F straight but was losing ground in his draft! The saving grace was more grip under braking which is how I got by.

Had even more than that on when I won Indy; these cars present a really interesting aero setup challenge; I tend to go for more downforce as it saves the tires and helps prevent PIE. (pilot-induced-error!) Kind of ashamed at it though as if I had my way no real-world racecar would be allowed more than about 10-20% of it's weight in downforce. Ruins racing imho. Just watch some motogp and think of what F1 could be without boatloads of aero grip...

Enough of that rant - @Rob, that off of David's definitely looked lag-induced. In my local replay you were never close enough to contact him either before or after his lag, but I'm thinking at his end it probably felt like a big dropkick. One of the oddities of online racing unfortunately - sometimes you get totally unpredictable and unavoidable glitches like that.