USA e30: Brands Hatch

From Ryan's screenshot on Lap 12...

How's my drifting? Dial 1-800-2Laps-To-Go-Spin-Around and loose 3 places for a finish near you! :P

Congrats to the Top 3... :)

Congrats to the top.

Fun race tonight. In close action with OG,MK,LA all race.I came out ahead thankfully and then up to 8th thanks to a few offs on lap 15. I had alot of fun sliding my car around and fighting it but it was no way to be fast.

RA

overall good race. had a couple mistakes that put me back, so i decided to take it easy and at the end i gained a couple positions. Overall quiet race for me though

esteban did some cool stunts in his car

I hate that I missed this event. I have a love/hate relationship with Brands. It is scary, quick and a real handful. A lot like my home track Lime Rock (only more so). A PCA event held me up so I couldn't join you guys. It sounds like there was plenty of drifting fun.

Too bad you couldn't make it Mike, it was a good tight field. NO 33's but race pace was good.

Qual was not so good for me, I made a fuel calculation mistake which left me stranded 1/2 way out so I only got 3 laps in, but was happy with 2nd. Based on the Euro race results I was just hoping to be in the top 5.

I had elected to make use of 1st gear so it was pretty tall and I knew my start was gonna suffer. Steve got a great jump and lead the way into T1 and carefully slotted into 2nd.

I didn't know what Steve's race pace was gonna be like, but I know patients pays off at this place. Steve bobbled on exit from that funky uphill right kink with the 10 foot curb and I was able to use my momentum to get under him. He setup himself up for a crossover pass so I held the inside line to the next corner. I knew another cross over attempt was coming, but I had to do the best I could on exit. Fortunately we didn't end up going side by side into T1 -- 1/2 lap til I felt the pass was actually complete - nice job Steve :)

After that, I had to remember to NOT over drive this track -- that's hard to do with Steve a foot behind me. I'm not sure what happened but a few laps later I had a small gap (about 4 seconds), was able to extend that to about 6 seconds. Then I started to hit traffic and lost a few seconds making sure I got thru safely.

It was pretty late in the race at this point, but the gap had dropped to 3 seconds and I had thought that Esteban got around Steve and was closing the gap. Turns out it was Kevin. 3 laps left and 3 second gap, I could afford a second a lap. Car still felt good, tires were ok, so I had to keep reminding myself NOT to overdrive just in case. Then a lap later the gap had gone back up to 5+ seconds...now it was time to relax and bring it home safe.

Intense race, really enjoyed it.

Crazy race. Let's skip qual because I didn't post a lap. I was gunning for a high 33 or low 34 but never got the chance to make a single lap in.

So I start dead last again. I think I made up 10 spots by T1. I was pretty aggressive in the first few laps trying to get spots from guys battling and getting bad runs on exit. Then I hit Tom O'Gorman. Great driving Tom. We were side by side for 3/4's of a lap. That was fun Tom. I made it up to 2nd and saw I was taking off close to a second per laps so I kept pushing till my concentration went to crap and I settled for 2nd. Congrats to Rob and Steve. C ya next time.

First off, well done to Rob and Kevin; the consistently quickest cars in the field finished up front where they belonged. Even if one of 'em had to take the long way 'round... ;-)

Hadn't done much prep beforehand, so even though I'd only seen 35's offline I figured 34's would probably be the pace. The E30's are very forgiving and Brands is a known (and loved!) quantity, so for me it was pretty much down to what I had rather than doing a lot of laps and tweaking. Turned out I was OK, but not great; just not super sharp on the day. Still almost got into the 34's in Q and gridded in 3rd - was not unhappy with that.

In the race, I got as good a launch as I'll ever get and slotted between Rob and Esteban into the lead through T1. Laughed in surprise at having the lead down Hailwood Hill, but then remembered I had two faster guys on my tail! Tried to drive the 1st lap conservatively on the cold tires, but still got it wobbly at Dingle Dell and Rob got by. Tried to latch on in hopes of learning something and did finally nick into the 34's in the process, but then got a bit too close entering Hill and had to choke up hard to keep from tagging him from behind. That killed my exit and opened a gap, after which I fell back into Esteban's sights. I got sideways up the hill out of Surtees and that sunk me as Esteban had a good exit and went by going down the other side.

Was actually relieved a bit, since it gave me another fast car to follow and I'd been worried about mucking up their fight since they'd been close in Q and well clear of me. Felt OK in 3rd and was tracking Esteban when he lost it in Dingle Dell and spun. That's a real thread-the-needle corner and easy to miss!

That put me back to 2nd but I wasn't going to be able to sustain Rob's pace, so I just decided to drive steady and not make any big errors. Told myself not to watch the positions or time gaps and didn't, but I think I lulled a bit into cruise mode. Came upon some lapped traffic about 4 laps from the end and suddenly noticed I'd gotten caught from behind! Figured like Rob did that it was Esteban, but it was Kevin who'd caught me sleeping. We had a close run out of Clark through to Druids, including going 3-wide with the lapped car through T1, but he was by and away after that. Exciting, but nothing compared to the dice he and Tom O had - that was great!

Tried to get focused and back on pace for the remainder, but while I could do it for a lap at a time I just wasn't consistently quick enough to close up so I ended up where I'd started, in 3rd. As good as I really could've hoped for, so not a bad outcome - barring Esteban's troubles I really warranted 4th at best.

Nice to be at a proper racecourse again instead of that awful Kart track Oschers! ;-)

That's the hardest I've ever worked for 10th spot, I was sweatin' like a dog before it was over.

I haven't been very fast at all in these cars, best I could muster was a 1:37 during practice. Q'd in 13th I think, a little below potential after getting hung up in traffic. I bogged seriously on the green and lost a couple of spots, then was apparently way too conservative through most of lap one and lost some more. Seemed like the field ahead of me stayed pretty clean through the first couple of laps, I don't recall picking up many spots by attrition until later. I settled in behind Larry and Bob and tried to start picking my pace up.

The real fun began a little later when Ryan got into the mix. I think Ryan and I were a touch faster than Larry, but not by enough to make an authoritative pass anywhere, so we stayed in a tight bunch for many laps. I went through Dingle Dell Corner purely on memory with my sight lines completely obscured by Ryan's car a foot in front of me for like 3 straight laps- it was a real pucker-factor moment every time, and immensely satisfying to pull off with a couple of classy drivers I could trust. I guess eventually Larry's tires cooked and he started slowing noticeably in the corners. Ryan got caught up exiting Hill and got 2 wheels in the grass, then I got inside of Larry in Surtees and was off to the drags down the straight. Ryan was back on my bumper before long as we gained on Omar, and another multi-lap battle ensued. Again, we were faster but it's very difficult to pass here. Eventually Omar did a little extra rotation at Druids as seen in the screenshot- this is shortly after I left a little paint on Omar's rear bumper during straight line braking; don't think I caused the rotation but I definitely made us go wide, and Ryan tucked in neatly to pass us both. Sorry for the love tap in any case OG!

I was used up at that point, fortunately had enough breathing room to stay ahead of Scott in the last 2 corners and hang on to 10th.

Not a problem at all Michael... I had lots of fun, this kind of racing is what I enjoy the most... I had a battle for a few laps with my teammate Ryan and I trust him even when were side-by-side...I really fought hard on these little cars, but 1 mistake is all it takes... :)

Looking forward to next race. ;)

I had alot of fun in this one. It`s nice to be able to mix it up a little and not just ride around by myself. I tried my best to run hard but be clean and fair and I think I pulled it off this time.