Intro to PPRC

Now THAT was a race! My first double at R2P too :-)

Thank you Rogier for giving me the best race I've had here in a looonngg time :)

Congrats to the rest of the podiums and everyone else, everyone seemed real clean, tight track but lapping was easy, thank you. Couldn't get a clean lap in qual to save my life, but hey it's the race that matters.

Damn, this is gonna be a barn burner of a series! I don't know which car I want to commit to, I like 'em both! Damn you Tim for putting my 2 fav's both on track at the same time :/

That was a fun race. The Panoz are a real challenge to drive. My tires were shot by the end... next time I run with harder tires. Other challenge was dealing with the Porsches - the midpack cars weren't that much faster so it was tough but fun.

Good race everyone.

After the Formula BMW race at Oran Park, I was a bit skeptical about racing today, but I'm glad I did. I finished 17th overall, but the race was pretty enjoyable for the most part. In the first few laps I was doing ok, running with Steve, who had his hands full with the guy in front of him. That gave me a chance to stay close, until I made a mistake on the high speed chicane before the last turn, launching my car in the air and losing my splitter. Off to the pits and ended up 20th after all was done. Crawled my way up to 17th and I was catching Inkman pretty fast, but everytime I got closer I was being lapped, losing time there. What was a bit frustrating was that after Tim lapped me, he was going slower than me!!! Why Tim? WHY??? Oh well, it was fun anyway!!!

Congrats to the winners!!!

Sorry Zach, I was going to let you go back by too... once I got past you that was it on the tires. All of a sudden I could barely hang on to it.

Clean racing.
I got a good start and led for a couple of laps. Then Rogier had a good run on me into the first braking zone, and took the lead.

P2 was pretty comfy but I got a bit sideways coming out of the Momo corner, slid down the grade on the left, and brushed the wall. I resumed in 5th with a little cosmetic damage.

Tim had an incident, moving me up to 4th, and I was able to put some pressure on Barry as we started lapping people. But he (and the lappers) drove very well, so I could get right behind him but never had an opportunity to pass.

Around lap 20 I had a couple of minor bobbles and realized that the tires were going off. So I backed it off a notch and tried to be smooth. Then I noticed that my fuel estimates were a little off, and I was probably going to run out of fuel. So I backed off even more, and started short-shifting.

After a few laps the fuel numbers started looking better, and I was able to push the last three laps, but it was too late and Barry made no mistake, so I finished P4.

Salute to the podium, the lappers, and anyone who drove a Panoz. :)

Congrats to Tommy on his double-win day - one with each car in this series.

Awesome!

First time it has ever happened to me. I had a screen freeze. A big one.

Couldn't get a clear lap in qualifying, so I just gave up and started last. Lap six, I was up to twentieth when, entering the front straight, it froze. For a looong time! I just held the wheel straight. When it unfroze, I was right at the kink before the first turn. I just hit the brakes and spun it out. Didn't hit anything and only lost two spots. I survived that lap and, concerned about where the leaders were now (not far behind me), I glanced at the map at just the wrong time and overshot turn two. Into the tires and ruined suspension. Race over before it even got going good.

Coming up to the bridge on lap one, some cars made contact if front of us. At least one went off and parts were flying. Bill Kaiser slowed a little more than I did, and I got into him. It seemed like a little tap, but it was enough to spin him. Very sorry for that, Bill.

Excellent race, best race so far! I qualified near the back of the pack, and I was trying HARD.

I got a great start, passing 3-4 people on the start, but I did not get too greedy and kept my nose clean.

I need to apologize to Baz, watching the replay it looked like the corner was his and pulled into him. I am sorry, and I hope I did not ruin your race.

I made only a few mistakes, I finished higher than
I qualified and I was doing good laps form the start to finish. I can't wait to do this again!

Man, I want to do harm to whoever coded the physics for those Panoz cars... Only seems fair after what they did to me! Hadn't tried the GTS before, just figured it would be a slower version of the GT2. Uhh, nope! My mom's old Mercury Marquis had better grip, and it wallowed less too. ;-)

Jumped into Q late and didn't have any setup, so I basically went out on the default. Bad idea! Think I went off 4 times in 5 laps. Holy cow; started clicking setup buttons in hopes of getting it to stop trying to swap ends and went back out in warmup to see. Wasn't out long enough to tell, so I kept clicking stuff and hit the grid, fingers crossed and praying.

Got a decent start and somehow went from 18th to 9th on the first lap, with only one freebie from a car going off up front. Unbelievable! I was thinking the scoring must be off at first, but it was right. Figured maybe the track was just low grip all around and the Porsches were struggling too.

Stayed with it and made it up to 6th by about lap 5 or 6, and was struggling to keep Patrick behind until I caught a break in traffic and got some room. Got close to Tim when he had some trouble and tried to stay close, but I was over the limit and backed off to try to keep the tires under it - I'd gone soft/med-soft and the rears were glowing red all the way through. Got so that I was afraid to hit the gas, brake or turn the wheel - was eggshell walking a loooong time.

Finally outbraked myself into T1 on lap 21 after about a half dozen near misses there, and slipped back to 8th. Nicked the wall but no damage, so I got back on and tried to get back up to Patrick but it wasn't gonna happen. Cheers to everyone for clean driving, and mostly to Patrick for not running over me a dozen times when I was all over the place in front of him early. He probably should've just put me out of my misery!

Think I'll take the German car next time... ;-)

Ugh, I need to work on making less mistakes. These are killing me. The GTS is a car that suffers no fools.