Euro FH: Silverstone

Qualifying:
I was on a way to some mid to high 20ies on the first run, but I have cut a bit of road in the last chicane, hence I slowed down considerably. If I weren't such an honest guy pole would've been mine there. :P

On second run I was even slightly faster, but took it very cautiously through last chicane, had to make sure I'm in top 3. P2 in the end.

Race:
Got of to a great start, and overtook Roman for the lead. Tried to open up as much gap as possible until (and if) Craig overtakes Roman. That happened somewhere in lap 5, I think, and from then on I expected Craig to come charging fast. That didn't happen fortunately and I opened up a gap bit by bit. By lap 20 it was nice and hefty 10 seconds. That was enough for me.

There was some more time to be found in race pace, but I did drove very near the limit every lap, going for that extra time would've been way too risky.

Extremely glad to have won it, against very fast guys! Grats podium guys, and Craig no tequila next time before the race and you won't loose concentration. :P

P.S. OK OK, I practiced some 20 laps before the race, not 5.

wow,what a race. I still have cramps in my hands after holding on to the steering wheel :-)

Qualify was good with 5th postion with a new PB laptime.

Got off to a good start and got into 4th position. I had Allen right up my tailpipe for a while, but then I managed to slowly pull away.

I then had one of those 'blonde moments' where I loose concentration and all of a sudden Allen was right behind me again. We had a good fight going on for several laps, but in the end he flew by me and I was back in 5th again.

I managed to hang on and try to pressure him a bit,hoping he would make a mistake so I could get by. His Renault was much slower in the corners but a lot faster down the straights. Whenever I was close to him coming into and out of the corners he would just pull away again :-(

In the meantime Peter was closing in very fast behind me. This was not looking to good. If I couldn't pass Allen I would be down in 6th position.

For once I was lucky :-) Just as Peter was breathing down my neck Allen lost it and went on the grass. 4th postion was mine once again . However I knew it would be almost impossible to keep Peter behind me as he was clearly faster than me.

I tried putting up a fight for my position,but he was just to fast and on the next lap he got by me down the straight and I was in 5th again.
I was not going to give up that easily :-) For the next couple of laps I managed to hang onto his slipstream and tried putting a bit of pressure on him. Tactic worked in the end, he spun coming out of a corner and I regained my 4th position :-)

As always a pleasure racing with you guys. Good clean racing all the way. Looking forward to the next one :-)

Grats to everyone who finished the race.

Hmmmmmmmmmm,
first I apologize for my poor formation lap, forgot to put my mobile telephone off. Threw it on the floor, but its working :P
I had no practise here and after coming home I tried to learn the track an hour before the race, used my setup from WG.
Qualy surprised me, in fact I dont know if it was a clean lap or some cutting in last chicane, I was drifting all over the place there. There was no lap in Q and R I had the car under control like it should be lol
After start I couldnt find a comfortable and SAVE speed and Enis and Craig went ahead. Too many mistakes. I was driving like a woman and didnt want to risk 3rd pos and DNF to gain the 2nd pos.
At the end I gained the 2nd cause Craig had bad luck.
Sorry bro

Yes it was a good battle Christian! And good driving and pressure paid off!! hehe

I was too slack to unplug my Router and paid for it. After practicing online fine the day before (alone), the car was then skatier with everyone on the server. It took me a lot of laps to even run anywhere near surviving more than two laps without sliding off or spinning, and thus X amount slower than practised.
And even then I had the TIME to unplug the router and rejoin, but for some reason I still would not make the effort!! I think I was in denial about it and trying to prove it can all run fine with it in... which it never does.

I didn't practice starts and when I smoked up the rears I short shifted to 2nd and the car bogged right down!! DOH A few cars shot by befoe Turn 1 then.
I wasn't worried really as I knew I was notably faster than those and would get positions back soon enough.

Unfortunately I then came across a Renault that had run off the right side of the last main straight section and he rejoined JUST in time ahead of me (Lap 1 still). And that huge Renault power shot him to FASTER than me, from that slow start, before I could even get quite to him!!
And that meant I was going to have to chase a 'slower' car through the last esses area. Which I was very fast at.

I slowed earlier to allow for the Renault leeway and it all seemed fine, but as I neared the first right apex I was then gaining on him rapidly!! Even at my fair bit slower pace. Sp I had to brake mid corner (in the somewhat more dangerous skatier car) and thus lost the rear end and spun off to be left back in LAST position by over 10 or 15 seconds by the time I resumed!! DOH again!!

24 laps to get back to 5th where I had started... still seemed possible.

A number of cars ran off so I got easy passes on them. A few I had to catch and pass. Then from 7th I had Alex and Christian about 9secs ahead and I could see they were fighting neck and neck up there. Hopefully to slow them down and assist me catching them!!

But they were lapping the same times as me almost. I could only gain 0.1 to 0.4 per lap, or even 0 for some. So that was not going to be bridged by the race end from there.

As more laps went by they were slowing. I assumed either from a bit of tire wear, or not adjusting to the lesser weight of less fuel. So I was gaining 0.5s or more then.

Maybe about Lap 17 area I began to gain 1sec or more per lap!! So I was bearing down on them fast, and was worried about the coming three car battle it would mean!
But as I got right near them Alex ran off track and was left behind by 10 secs, and made that part easier!

I felt I was enough faster than Christian, so I expected to get past within a lap from there, or two at worst. Lap 19 now? And that all went well and I got past.
The big problem was that I couldn't break free of him enough so he then got nice free tows down all straights and that kept it impossible to get far enough ahead to drop him out of the slipstream!
I was already running on a razor's edge in my tricky to drive car, and I knew I could not afford to push any further or I would very likely crash! So I pushed a MICRON more, to as far as I dared, and even some really good areas and laps could not break him off my tail!! Sheesh!

Finally on Lap 22(?) I pushed 2 Microns too hard on a corner exit and the rear slid out. I was going to lose the position due to that loss of corner exit speed, but the car felt OK that I had it all under control to drive out of the slide. But then it just broke free and spun out!! DOH no.3.!!

So then 10secs behind and no way to bridge that in time, unless Christian also errored. But he never did.
Thus he deserved that position for a well fought battle of pressure!!!
It was great driving done by him too (and myself) so that made it the best section of the race!

But at least I made it back to 5th as hoped!!! Phew.

LOL for the posted pics and story Christian!!

I could see the crowd all leap up out of their seats and hear the loud deafening 'oohs' and roaring and cheering!! (even with the helmet on and engine screaming and tires screeching out in pain!!)
[Maybe they weren't actually IN seats... it was more of a 'sea of rising people' that I saw as I spun past them!]

I bet they were hoping to see some big car demolishing crash. hehe

Wasnt able to extract as much from these quali tyres compared to other tracks, so hoped it would be enough for top 3. Was suprised to see Sandbagger Duati in 2nd especially after he made such an effort to let us all know how little practice he had... mmmmm where have I heard that before? *grins* Good quali times by both Enis and Roman.. well done :)

Settled in the first few laps and made a pass on Roman on lap 4.. planned on chasing down Enis but he was running at a good pace. He was stretching the gap every lap but I wasnt comfortable pushing any harder than I was.
3 laps form the end I dropped it at Abbey due to a moments loss of concentration and was lucky to not end my race right there and then. Managed to salvage 3rd at the end as was happy with the result.

Congrats on Enis and Roman for 1 and 2 and of course well done to all the finishers :)