Zandvoort Grand Prix

Congrats to all on the podium. Conor seemed to totally dominate that one!

I didn't have a great qualifying... Had been managing the mid 1.29s offline, but then couldn't better 1.30s in quali. Had an alright start, almost gaining some places, but had to hold off and keep with the pack for the first lap. Then I managed to get past Ben on the second lap (sorry for the wheel to wheel, I thought I had a bit more space), and Maurice had an off shortly after that gaining me another place. Then, gaining on Borut I thought I could make a move through turn 3, my favourite passing place on this track, but was too far back. Wound up having to slam on the anchors as Borut braked in front of me, and then trying to stick behind, put my foot down to hard and sent myself off track.

Didn't cause any real damage at least, but from there I mostly failed to find the kind of consistency I was after. I at least didn't lose any more places from there, up 'til the pits, and gained some due to other's inconsistency.

I wound up pitting a few laps earlier than most everyone else, and somehow wound up with a stop'n'go (as if changing tyres doesn't take long e-bloody-nough), for speeding in the pit lane. First time I've really pitted in an online race though, so it didn't go as badly as it could have.

Any finish in the points was going to make me happy, so to pick up 4 is great. And good news that I didn't seem to have any Evo related problems with the race too!

Messed up at the exit of Kumho twice. Got onto the outside curb there, just swung the back around. Then we got to the pitstops... First pitstop ever for me in this sim. Forgot to confirm my pit settings and kept waiting for about 5 seconds until I figured out I had to confirm the settings... I'm such a noob :D

Came out of the pit in 6th position. I was happy to see someone pitting late, giving me 5th. Then I got closer to Christian, up to 3,5 seconds behind him. I was closing in at about 1 second a lap at some point when I decided to visit the inside curb at Scheivlak. Launched me into the gravel, increasing the gap to 8 seconds again.

Managed to race my way back to Christian's tail again when he came to a stop at the Vodafone corner. Regained 4th and got back to maximum attack mode for the final lap. Reduced the gap to 2,7 seconds but I just ran out of laps.

Threw it all away with my mistakes and a bad pitstop really. Enjoyed these a lot regardless. I'll be back for more next time.

Well done Conor, my teammate Allen and Ben.

Well, I did 3 pit stops, one planned, which was slow already, the next (disastrous) pit-stop after a bad mistake during which I had to learn the difference between the green and the grey fields of the pit-menu and (hoorray!!!) the 3rd stop, which was necessary because the damage hadn´t been fixed during the 2nd one, was rather fine.

Apart from all that the race was ok, lol.

I enjoy driving the F3000 and hope, that I won´t be so stupid again in the next races. :-)

Qualified 11th, the quickest I'd gone ever (well, call it the 1 hour practice to learn the track and the car beforehand!).

Decided to be last into the first corner as I wasn't confident with the car at all, but towards the end of the lap I decided to look down the inside of Jerry Sentell and completely missed my braking point. I slammed all on but we touched and as the corner was a 90 degree one we both went through the gravel - I stayed on the outside of the corner as I rejoined and let him by as I was clearly at fault (apologies for that Jerry). Wasn't sure it was a punt at the time hence didn't serve a drive through, thinking position back was OK in this instance. In replay I must admit it looks like a punt!

Claudio then overtook me to put me 12th, and decided from that point on to drive as consistently as I could. And it seemed to be paying off. Others had problems (including Claudio) with off's and I was P8 from around lap 5 right until my Pitstop with nobody in my rear view mirror.

And then it all fell apart. I had preset my pit option and the options screen came up fine, all relevant parts in green. Clicked return and the pit menu disappeared - my first pitstop in Evo, so assumed all was OK. I think it was around 48 seconds passed when I thought - I'd better set off here as nothing seemed to happen - I thought it must have pitted me. I drove round and just before the build up of the curves to the straight I spluttered to a halt out of fuel. In hindsight I didn't hit the ignition button to turn off the engine - but no warning was given (as it does in GTR2) to do this anyway - which maybe stopped the pit sequence?

Anyway, looks like P10 but also a DNF. Was going to stay by the side of the track until race end - hoping for a push so no DNF - but after 20 seconds or so the game automatically put me in the Pit garage and showed me as DNF Fuel.

Not the best start to my first Open Wheeler. Will take solace from the fact I was ahead of Claudio before my disastrous pitstop - and he finished 6th.