Indianapolis Grand Prix

Congratulations to the Podium!... Apologies to Allen...I had no tires and in my in-lap I had to brake earlier than what I had been doing and Allen found my gearbox, no big damage, but I was having trouble turn in in, because that was in-lap, my tires were cooked and I couldn't turn, once you were on my side, I lift off and we tangled up...My fault... Sorry...

I hope everyone enjoyed the "AP" fix...

Couldn't get a clean lap in qual. Started 10th. Almost didnt make my 1st pitstop becasue I ran out of fuel and barely made my pitbox. Lost about 30 seconds there and many spots never to be recovered. Was fun, just not the results I worked hard for. Grats Emilio and the rest of the podium.

great race. running with full fuel for a 1-stop strategy i knew i'd be slow but with pole position i was hoping to hold people up and ensure a race victory. everything went according to plan for the first stint and i think i had a few cars queued up behind me for a while. steve brunell attacked me for some time with no success because even though he'd catch me in the twisties, i'd run away on the straight. my wings were set to 12 so i was hitting about 200 by the time i had to brake for turn 1. eventually steve got by me but i kept up and as everyone started to pit i felt very confident i had won the race, but to make sure i didn't run out of fuel i was short shifting for the last 10 laps of that stint...not worried at all it would come back to bite me. still though, i pulled into the pits with just 1 liter in the tank so i guess it was necessary.

came out in 2nd place i think and just drove. emilio was quite a ways back so i didn't even push for a while until he got within about 10 seconds and was hovering there. that's when i started to push a bit but i couldn't widen the gap. he kept getting faster and i kept getting slower but i figured he'd only catch me at the end and i could defend. by the time he caught me with two laps to go in the race, my front tires were shredded and he just drove around me on the outside of the left-hand sweeper and walked away. there was nothing i could do.

i think a two-stopper would have been better but i went with the one-stop just to sort of try something different and enjoy the perks of high straight-line speed which makes lapping slower cars a breeze. i'm glad to have this track behind me as i never liked it. congrats to emilio for a great effort and decisive win.

That was a hard race.

In practice before the race i managed almost 3 laps on boost 2 , come qualifying engine blows on the last corner on my 1st boost 2 lap when i was 2 1/2 secs up on my time. Qualified 12th.

Ran wing 19/19 and while i was alot quicker in the infield section i lost out big time down the straight. Had a good battle with barret all race and only just got passed him while he exited the pitlane after 2nd stop.

congrats to Emilio and rest of podium.

MY FIRST OFFICIAL WIN!!!

Had some wins in independent chapters but finally an official one, I'm pretty happy, specially because it was a pretty dramatic race from the start.

In qualy all started horribly... first timed lap... was vary fast going for a 1:10.0 or so and blew engine some 300 meters from the finish line!!! so time went to hell and had to start 8th from the grid (was the end of qualy as I had to press ESC). As I read Brian had the same problem... in spite of not blowing on similar conditions when practicing... I am really puzzled on this. Maybe the engine wear is on the limit and plain old randomness of it played wrong on us. Maybe I used more throttle as I was pretty extreme driving on that lap... damaged more than usual an already on the limit engine.

Well I was pretty decided to fight for a podium as a minimum as I knew I had a good race pace in my practice sessions. So started to quickly move up with some fun passes on the oval section (crazy stuff with 3 cars wide included).

Then got to my first pitstop in 3rd place... and one lap later Steve was apparently a bit slower in the stop so I passed them just before T1 as he was coming out of pits... great news for me now in 2nd... lap 22... and on to chase Barbour... who was 26 secs away on 1 stop strategy.

I started to quickly close in until his stop on lap 30... I was about 20 secs behind so I passed them after his stop, gaining a lead of 6 secs. I had an small gap after that so I was doomed to lose my spot again... as it happend on lap 40 with my second pitstop... entered with some 15 secs advantage but exited some 10 secs behind. So, its 10 secs to recover, 20 laps to do the job.. an strategy war was in place.

Well then came a BIG SURPRISE... before my last pitstop I was about 0.6 secs faster per lap, relative to John Barbour, the leader. But now... I was having a lot of trouble shaving a couple of tenths every lap... with luck!!! so with just 6 laps to go.... he was about 6.5 secs ahead... I thought I had little chance but kept fighting thinking he might have to save fuel at the end.

Well... it was not fuel his problem... but with 4 laps to go... I started to gain about 1.5 secs per lap... even more... he was having tyre problems!!!... I didn't know at the time (I guessed on fuel)... anyway with 3 laps to go I almost passed him on the oval section but him being on low wing... was impossible... so on lap 59 I did manage to pass him before the back straight... in mid turn... as he was having very little grip.

Then on last lap I just was very easy on the the driving... as John was 3 secs behind and not pushing any more.

Finally crossed the finish line... with a nice spanish scream: VAMOS!!! (come on!).

Grats!!! Emilio!

Congratulations Emilio, and the podium - and all that finished!

I didn't think I was even going to get into the the race so day by day as no entries left I let another fay go by wiothout any practicing for it. By the night before I had given up getting in anyway.
Then when I went to bed I decided I would get up and see the entry list then. (4-50am).
So when I checked, I was in! Yikes. 20mins to practice.

I don't know anything about the Champcars so I don't know if I was missing out on boost (not on?), or whatever, as everyone was miles faster than I could get near! I just ran the default setup and from about 10-10 wing to 15-15 area (I think) and it made no difference overall - just faster infield or oval.
So I had no hope of getting anywhere in that short time. Though my race car had done some 1:13's and I thought it might be enough for at least a top 10. I was set for a two stop strategy.

Too bad that after about 10 laps I drove straight into the pit wall end for some unknown reason! So that was that.
The only good part of that (good?) was that I had signed up for an F1 88 race that was starting 45mins into the Champcar race, so I got to go there and run that! And won. So at least I forgot all about the Champcar disaster! (till now)

If I run these again I better do some serious practice to work out whatever I am missing about these cars!

Wooops Peter forgot to ask you if you were going to run... would have send you my setup. Next time we could share setup info. Hope you can join us next race.

Grats guys, i couldn't make it!!!
seeya on the next one

We ran this track one season in the F1 series, and I remembered thinking it turns out a lot more fun to drive than it looks on the surface. I signed up, and wasn't disappointed.

Had some great moments, particularly in the first stint before pitstops mixed up things. Running third found myself stacking up on Steve, who was pressuring John for the lead, and before long I was fending off a challenge from Ryan. We went side-by-side through Turn 1, through Turn 2, through Turn 3, before Ryan got the angle exiting Turn 4. Awesome stuff.

I repassed Ryan a lap or two later and put on some distance, chasing down Steve and John still battling some six seconds ahead. Caught up to them, but since I wasn't going to make any ground through those two and was within my pit window, decided to zip in for my first stop.

After my second and final pit stop I quickly found myself solidly in third and starting to wonder about John's and Emilio's pit strategy ... especially Emilio's, since I never saw him on the track and somehow he was ahead of me. I see now he leapfrogged me during the first round of stops, and that was that. Nice job.

For my setup I used Sandman's (Fuji, which he described as his base setup for any road course). I did play with gearing a little bit, but never got better than 182-183 mph down the straight ... In the end I think I used the gearing unchanged. Knowing what I know after the race I do wish I played with wing settings, but the car felt good at max wings and I had fun.

Good run guys.