CART: Portland

Grats To Eduardo and John for rounding out the podium

Qualy...missed the pole by 0.006 , Nice job Jon

Race,going into the race I knew what I had to do, not make any mistakes and run solid laps as my three stopper was borderline of working, I rolled the dice and it worked. This had to be the most stressful race to date for myself.The first stint was intense while I chased Jon up until he had a PC issue, then the most intense section of the race was in the middle stages with Eduardo, we ran nose to tail for 9 laps all the while I knew if I didn't get by him shortly the end result would strongly favor him, so applying the pressure I managed to get around him and build the lead I needed to keep me in front, then I needed a shower.

Thank you to all the other cars that allowed smooth passing, well done!!!

Cheers,
Cya in Surfers Paradise

Congrats to the podium!

I was quite happy with my qualifying time because I didn't have time to practice a lot for the race so I favored the race setup instead of the qual setup.

Then, for the race, I told my brother who did qualify just behind me, that I would be cautious on the start. Guess what? I screwed up on the last turn before the start/finish line and didn't register a single lap!!!I had almost no damage but the engine had staled and I was not able to restart it...

Too bad, but with the little time I had put on the preparation for this one, it's no surprise to me...

Let's get ready for the next one!

Great race

Grats to Jeff and Eduardo for finishing ahead in 1st and 2nd, with me trailing behind in 3rd.

The beginning did not look so good as i completely screwed up in qually by getting on the throttle too much before the first qually laps and threw my self into the pit wall, repairs were 2 minutes and by the time i got out, there was very little time left, landing me in 11th for the race start.

The Race on the other hand went great considering my start near the back, i climbed up into 3rd with passes and several wrecks ahead, I chased Eduardo around for a while but eventually he began to pull away.

In the end I got my podium with the 3rd place finish.

Good job everybody, see yall at Surfers Paradise in two weeks, that track is going to be very unforgiving vs Portland here.

This just keep on getting better!
i'm getting addicted to this championship, amazing cars to drive, excellent drivers on both speed and respect, different strategies and many of my favorite circuits.

Portland was the first track i drove seriously on indycar racing 2, spent a whole month only driving there back when i was 12 years old... so it brings me good memories!
Had lots of fun as always here, knew i didn't had a good car setup since i focused this time on the F1 (where i had an amazing second lap connection lost), so i planned to start heavier and just try taking the car to the finish line with no major expectations.

Made a great qualify, it was on the limit of what my car could give.
In race i had trouble for the first 5-6 laps on finding the entrance of the last chicane, the fast one, so i lost 3 spots in a walk on grass, and made the next few laps very slow there to avoid others mistakes.
My biggest problem was the brakes, couldn't get them to work well here, sometimes it was blocking too much the front tires and with increasing tire wear the rear became very loose on braking zones, which allowed Jeff to overtake me in T1 on the middle of the race, in that moment i was thinking, he is 1 second faster than me per lap but it seems that maybe he is on a 3 stop strategy so i have to hold him and maybe i'll have a victory chance, did my best but when the mistake came Jeff didn't lose his opportunity.

Can't wait to drive in Surfer's Paradise, for sure a top5 track in my list and in Laguna Seca which is probably my favorite.

Congrats to Jeff for the victory, Jon for the podium, to all drivers that managed to finish the race and to all the respectful lapped cars who behaved greatly.

Cya

I can't say this is my favorite track, with all the bumps :) My main aim was to finish, which I did, although way off the leaders, courtesy of a few spins and 2 long stops (82 and 124 sec) for repairs.

Surfers should be fun, the walls are close, but at least it is not as bumpy :)

Congrats to the podium.

Soon realised this was going to be about how far I could make the tires last, and was settling in to a 4th place finish.

Going down the back curve I looked at the dials and drove straight into the wall! Not sure if that was tiredness or just a plain bad move.

Well done to Jeff on the win, bumpy track but enjoyable and look forward to the next race.

Unlucky again JW, hope to see you on track again but maybe not.

In free practice earlier in the afternoon I had hit two laps under 55.9 so I was confident going in to this race that I would competing for the win.

On my final flying lap I came up behind John Z who was clearly struggling on cold tyres. He uninentionally held me up and I hit a 56.3, no biggie, still got the pole.

Come the race and it became clear quite quickly that Jeff was on a lighter fuel load than my two stopping car. He made a couple of half-attempts into the first turn but on both ocassions it would appear he got caught out by the bumps and would slide past the turn in allowing me room to pull a small gap.

On lap 8 I had picked up a 1-2 second lead and looked into settling down into a rhythm. All I needed to do was stay consistent and hold up Jeff to wreck his strategy. The racing gods were not interested in my plight and handed me the shortest of graphics stutters. Long enough though for me to miss the turn in for the fast left-right sweeper before the final turn. I had been taking this turn at a much higher rate of knots than anyone else and so it was always likely that if I were to have an accident it would be here.

I aimed to take the escape road onto the drag strip behind the tyre wall but the car was carrying more speed than it would normally be doing in this situation (because of the gfx stutter causing me to miss the braking point as well) and I slid into the wall at about 80kph. It killed the engine stone dead and my race was over.

Guys, I've had a blast racing in this series with you guys. But I'm not prepared to put in the time and effort required to be competitive to have silly little mistakes and bad luck like this end my race. In every race this season I have been blighted by bad luck. All things being equal; and had I managed to finish where my relative pace has indicated; I would be leading the championship. I'm sure you can all understand my sheer frustration.

CCWSS has been my sole sim-racing focus this season and my pace has been proof of this. However, something out there is causing me to have accidents and bad luck. Be it fate, a higher-power, kharma or co-incidence: there is something out there determined not to allow me to do well in sim-racing at the moment.

I am currently studying towards an Application Developer qualification and this course is taking up more and more of my time. Also, the band I play in is receiving more and more recognition and with a possible appearance on national radio in the offing, it's going to require more time in the new year. Particularly so considering we are in the throes of organising a UK and possible European mini-tour.

I think it's time I came to accept, that for whatever reason, sim-racing is going to have to take a back seat for the fore-seeable future. At least until I have finished my course. I will be keeping an eye on proceedings in this chapter and I will debate making an appearance at the oval races next season.

I would like to thank Jeff for organising and running what is, a brilliant chapter. You're doing a great job and I intend to rejoin dualing with you when I have a bit more time to devote to it. Hopefully then I will also have time to find some luck.

Finally, a hearty well done to Sylvain who is race-by-race improving his performance.

Thanks guys,

JW

Jon,

I just read your post and I'm quite sad to see that you have to take a back seat for many good reasons (studying and music!) But I realy hope it is temporary and that we will see you again on a track! I hope it's not only out of frustration that you leave though, because this bad luck has to stop at a point or another...

Finally, I really did apreciate the time that you gave me back in springtime and wanted to thank you again!

See you soon Jon, hopefully!

Thank You for the kind words Jon, there is strong competition for you when you return, Good Luck.

Season 4 schedule will be released after the Surfers Paradise race, one of the changes in store is an earlier starting slot.

Fantastic news Jeff.

This is my favourite mod so I'll join in if the races will start earlier :)