Nippon: Donington

First off, sorry I was late.

Next, there was some HORRENDOUS driving in the back, some people are getting reported for dangerous and unfair driving (weaving, side-swiping, punting)

you guys need to smarten up

Agree with Jack. Whereas my drop to the back of the pack was because of a self spin, one guy decided to go really slow and turn into me out of coppice, and I witnessed some ridiculous driving at the start.

My result is pending review following contact somewhere midway through the race in sector 3. I'll let Tim decide on that.

The race: good start of the line, crap line through T1 as a result of braking slightly too late. Let two cars by in the process. Going down the hill and through the right hander, the leader got on the grass near the bridge and spun, taking 2nd with him and narrowly missed me. The result was me back in first place and pulling away a little. While trying to open up a gap, I saw Tristan pull himself up through the standings and eventually into 2nd, just like I had expected. Gap remained consistant around 1-1,5 secs up until I hit the first slow backmarker (Liam was actually the first one, but he didnt affect my race as he had adequate pace). Going through the chicane I got caught behind Pinheiro which allowed Tristan to close right up. 3 wide with the Pinheiro left, me middle and Tristan right going into the penultimate corner and thats where I started to noob up hard.
First I proceed to brush Tristan, then I lock the rears under braking, meaning a spin. Try to get going, realize I cant before the pack behind get to the scene, I panic, hit the clutch for some odd reason and coast right into Eduardos line, leaving him nowhere to go. Apparently that forced his retirement. Very sorry about that Eduardo, absolutely no excuse for that, total brainfade.
Eventually got going again in pursuit of Tristan, but the gap remained exactly the same for the rest of the race.

What started out so well ended up so poor. Sry again Eduardo, not my finest moment.

And Tristan; some day...some day... ;)

As per usual please PM Tim with any incidents you wish to have reviewed.

This did seem to have a higher than normal DNF rate for this series, and indeed will be dealt with if dangerous driving is being performed.

My final position was more due to those DNF's than my own speed, having to pit for damage mid way and not having set fuel to zero, I ran the last half with 90litres of fuel!!

I did better in quals than I was expecting. There were some quick times flying around in practice. Happy with 3rd.

Race -

Got off to an average start, Eduardo was off like a rocket and I was in 4th. By the end of lap 1 I was in 3rd and then a few laps later found myself in 2nd with Tristan right behind. After a couple more laps I lost the back end in possibly the slowest spin of my life. I couldnt get going due to traffic and ended up setting off again in 10th.

Anyway, drove round and as people spun I took their positions (thank you very much :D ) and eventually caught up to the back of Barney who put up a good fight then made a small mistake that gave me enough of a run to get past.

There was some strange behaviour in the race today, people need to be more careful when re-entering after a spin - especially in these cars as they dont accelerate that well from a stand still.

Any incidents PM me and I will investigate.

Congrats to the podium

A fun event.

Q:
Hit traffic on both of my flyer laps. It was difficult for me to get a rhythm down, too, as I still had some coffee jitters from a couple of hours earlier. 10th was acceptable as I knew I had good race pace.

R:
A very exciting and tumultuous start meant I was up to 5th by lap 2 thanks to tip-toeing around everybody and leaving lots of room for people on the insides of corners.

Now I was behind Eduardo Prado. I set off in pursuit, and after a few laps had a run out of the sector 3 chicane into the penultimate hairpin. I pushed a little wide and Eduardo fought back into the final corner. I braked cautiously and hugged the inside curb, denying Eduardo a good run onto the pit straight.

Next was Tim Brook. I was P4 now, some 5 or 6 laps in, and Tim had good, consistent pace. I followed for five laps or so and watched carefully where he had not-so-good exits, planning for a move to make. I inched right up to his gearbox and put on some pressure after P2 spun off and granted us both another position. I sat right behind Tim for a lap until he went into the final corner maybe 2mph too quickly, very slowly spinning out of the way.

Phew. Cool. Now off after Jan. I put the boost from 4 to 2 and gradually got the gap down to about 1.5 seconds. Put it to boost 3 and watched Jan for a few laps, like I did Tim. By coincidence, the point in the race when Jan hit bad traffic and I closed in was also the same point where I put the boost to 1 and decided to have a go at Jan. I was not expecting the lap traffic to hold him up so much. But they did, and I was on the gas straight away exiting the chicane, moving all the way to the edge of the road on the right as Jan defended his position from me. We were equal in braking, and Jan surely could have fought back for the whole race, but as he mentioned above, t'was not to be. Next time, Jan. :-)

Thanks guys for an exciting race. ... Maybe work on the whole "wheels on pavement" thing a little.

Hi there, guys.
This was my first race at a foreign server, and a very difficult one. I've been racing online for 18 months now, but never at this level of difficulty (clutch assistance allowed, only) so my aim was just to finish the race in one piece.
In a ridiculous start, my car spinned and I was already at the last position; then I went out of the track and had a hard time to get back to the field, just to be overlapped by every car on track! I decided to race in my pace and not to be on the way of anybody, so I had to pull out off the track a few times to let everybody pass.
Anyway, I managed to complete 10 laps, and my best time was 8s away from the winner. Hope to perform better next time.
Daniele

When i started I didn't have any experience of online racing, but I can imagine it's a whole lot harder to come from somewhere where there were many aids allowed. Well done Daniele.

Thanks for the support Liam!
I race at a league where there are more aids allowed, but it isn't as easy as it seems to be hehe. The most difficult thing for me is to race without traction control which I'm not used to. But it's a good practice though, learning to control the car makes me a better driver ;)

Another few shots:

Jan in front exiting T1.

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Excitement further into lap 1.

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Chasing Eduardo with Dominik and Kieron right behind.

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Locking the inside rear a bit while slipping past Eduardo...

...Eduardo fights back out of the corner. (Honda prevailed :D)

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Jan's unfortunate spin.