Apologies to Fabian for the contact, entering parabolica for the 1st time I braked pretty early with the heavy car , all seemed o.k. Until the everyone more or less came to a standstill ....... I nudged Fab into the gravel and tried to hang around while Fab recovered ........ He seemed to be stuck, so, I got back to speed again.
He did re-join, but, I guess it wasn't much fun on his own ........ Sorry Fab :-(.
It was a hard race trying to be perfect for 38 laps , I had no chance of gaining a tow after my early mistake , but, eventually i caught Uwe H and I used a recovering eagle to make an easy pass ....... Could not stay with the eagle for more than half a lap , so, hard work again to catch Ferdinand. Nearly every lap I exited lesmo 1 to see him enter lesmo 2 and every time I put a fast lap in it made no difference , time after time after time. It was about lap 30 when the gap started to reduce and finally I could use a tow and pass him, I just held the position into curve grande to then finish in a decent position.
I dropped into the server and saw a lot of Brabhams and some other slower cars ..... 2 Brm's etc , there was another Lotus and Mario in the Eagle. I had expected more fast cars, but, it was way too late to change my choice. Mario seemed to be struggling for qual pace or maybe he just ran race fuel to get some practice, so, after doing a few races here in the past I had a good set up which put me on the pole by a fair margin.
After Harry and lasse told me the pace lap speed .... Which I was embarrassed to ask for, we got underway :-).
I led for a couple of laps until Mario powered past me on the s/f ........... (Definitely wasn't going to under estimate Mario) , but, after a few more laps I could tell his grip levels were fading as the heat in the tyres built up ........ so, I took my chances and made a run for it hoping to break the tow. I just about made it before my tyres were cooked too and was able to gradually pull away while keeping the temps in range. From then to the end it was just about keeping concentrated and not messing up, although it was fun seeing Harry and Greg having a close fight as I caught them up , unfortunately I split them up slightly as I lapped them , I'm sure Harry didn't mind too much as he managed to shake Greg off as a result.
Thanks for the racing guys, see you at the next one hopefully and I hope to make some "normal" races too
Really nice grid , very close .... could have been full with a few other drivers ;-)
Carsi really used a lot of the track in the loop , forced me to back out onto the kerb, the rear got loose and I managed to collect it all up, the following was chaos for a few drivers ........ Pelle you could of used caution and lifted, the race was 83 laps !! , real shame, I think it would of been a massive battle with Carsi all race long.
Always love reading these press releases, hopefully I can secure a full time drive with mr cooper soon ...... apparentley my wage demands are too high ;-)
Stunning display from Kelvin ........ -6 laps for me .... wow.
Real bad luck for Harry and some others who had early incidents ;-(.
Pretty much a mess for myself , I really don't like this place and didn't practice thinking I would make some time at some point today ..... never happened and to make it worse I could not connect to the server with 15 mins remaining. After nearly abandoning it all, I had one last try landing with 5 mins left, but, no set up ...... arghhhhh!!!. I did one lap to set 5th gear and just guessed the rest using a milwauke set up, It happened to be not too bad ....... only problem was the right front which was RED , vey RED after only a few laps. The race went by very fast as I was close to Pelle in the eagle for 2/3 of the race ..... in the end the right front totally gave up ...... but, I was glad to just finish.
Apologies to Pit for the start ..... I assumed I was last on the grid ..... I was confused and my head was all over the place as we were fighting to be at the very back of the grid.
quite a fun race, battles with the Brm's in the early part. I was behind Kelvin for the start and Claudio, Mario were behind trying to squash the little Cooper bug ;-). Eventually I managed to get on the inside of Kelvin for a pass into the esses .... it was tight and I lost the rear a little sending me wide , this probably caught out a few of us and I was nudged off the track with a small bump. Upon recovery I could see cars all over the track and got a place or two back, my damage was small and the car actually felt better!!!. A notable event was Lasse showing us all how to drift a honda out of the final turn (wow what a save), that made me smile ........ anyhow .. I ended up chasing Fabian for the last half of the race, but, I could not get close enough to his Brabham.
Well done to the podium guys and Fab, also respect given to those driving the Brm's ..... thanks for the apology Claudio ;-).
Very interesting car choice from Harry ! , although it was something I had considered too...... i just was not brave enough ;-)
Kelvin I guessed would want to avenge the broken engine from last year and it just paid off after a great battle with super Mario , grats guys.
My race was very much fun all the way , I stupidly lost the tow to Claudio and Rainer in the early laps and I had Ferdi catching me in the Lotus, luckily the Brm's came to my rescue as we lapped them and I could just hold off the Lotus. Again luckily for me Rainer and Claudio were battling very close and maybe losing a little time, when eventually I think Rainers tyres may have overheated allowing me to get close and pass.
Claudio kept his pace going very well and as he said it was just 0.01 here and there that enabled me to close in slightly for the last 20 laps ..... not close enough for a good tow though ;-( .
As normal it was a clean race from all, Grats Claudio on the podium and thanks for the apology Fabian (it didn't effect the result really)
Nice to be back on the ovals for what already looks like an interesting season.
Hi all , the race was very tough , I normally only do 1hr races, so, by the finish I was very tired.
Luckily we all know kyalami without too much learning.
Qualifying was very close , I was 5th with 1 minute to go , the next I looked, I was 7th !!!!.
The race started with the big heavy cars near the front ..... it looked like 2 or 3 of us had pretty bad starts and cars were passing on all sides, most recovered well down into T1 and I slotted in about 5th place , Chris soon passed me in the honda on the straight which I could do nothing about. Following the train for a few laps the two Brm's were fighting hard until contact in T1 put Kelvin out , me and Chris were lucky not to join them as they spun, but, we were in podium positions as a result. For the next laps me and Chris had a great fight with him using the Honda power on the straights to keep me away , in the end the power overcame his tyres on the exit of T1 and I could squeeze past on the outside of T2. From here I just watched Rainer pull away at 1 second per lap , I did try to close the gap after the halfway point and it started to work until I made some silly mistakes which were typical at Kyalami ... In the end I just tried to not make another mistake and bring it home safe as Chris and Mario were not far behind.
Thanks for the great racing and to all drivers for being aware of the leaders trying to pass
That was a FUN season , really happy to secure 2nd place against really great drivers , congrats to all who gave it a try.
The Formula for chassis choice was excellent .... not just Lotus's every race ;-).
Massive congrats to Harry for the season win .... totally deserved, and of course to Kelvin who was unlucky at Michigan.
Onto Grenzland ....... wow! ... what a race .... Don't know how I ended up on pole and made a real mess of the start (gear was "N" , stupid me).
At first I thought I could get away from the pack , the Honda was quite fast from the start , then the Eagles hunted me down ;-(. Rainer was hard to follow when he passed me , so, I let him go (Harry was in 8th at the time) .... Kelvin stayed @400m behind fighting with some more Eagles until he retired , then came Claudio .... who I did try to stay with and hoped he may drag me to Rainer ..... bah then Rainer went off (real bad luck, I hoped he would win), Fab "I always crash at Grenzland" had also crashed ;-(,leaving Harry in 4th or 5th ..... championship over I guessed. Then came Albrecht in another Eagle !!! man gimme a break I thought ... In the end I managed to finish in 2nd .... just ..... a few laps more I would be 3rd.
Really hope all the Geli guys want to do this again next year.
Glad to get this track over with , luckily I had the Lotus to help me.
Light fuel loads were fine and I was able to be pretty competetive , Race fuel was terrible , although I think I know why now (needed to use the shifter).
Shifting I thought too risky for the whole race distance, so, I was stuck with my strategy of staying in 4th gear........ everyone else seemed to be fine with it !!! bah.
A lesson learned I guess , great drives from Harry and Kelvin as I would expect by now ;-). Also great drive from Mr Alpen who had 3rd position nearly in his hands.
Thanks to the guys being lapped for making it easy , really needed that in this one.
Grand Finale at Grenzland should be very interesting ....... good luck to all in advance , see you guys soon
Qual was ended early for me after avoiding Axel in the track and removing the left rear corner , I was amazed to keep 2nd place, although Kelvin came so close in a Cooper !!!.
I figured very low 29's would be the pace I needed for the race and when Harry pulled away in the early laps I was impressed by his speed ..... I was lucky not to be attacked by Kelvin, which meant I could fix my eyes on the "small" Brabham in front.
Time passed very quickly, the first time I looked at the pitboard nearly half the race was gone and I was still fighting to keep Harry from having an easy ride , the race report showed Harry to have some damage on the front right @ lap 50 which I think probably helped me to make some small gains , by @ lap 80 he was becoming larger, I kept pushing to the maximum every lap knowing one tiny hit on the wall could end it.
With @ 30 laps to go I managed to throw a rope onto his roll hoop and make a pass , then I just drove as hard as I could while trying to work out if I had enough fuel.
This is the hardest race I have ever done , no time to relax, 117 qualifying laps in 1 hour is tough !.
Damn shame David wasn't here ;-( , but , really good to see some new faces and a returning Mario who had a great race with Kelvin and Fabian (getting faster too Fab!)
Two more races to go , thanks guys ..... a real pleasure
A very difficult track to run with other cars , even more difficult with a BRM ...... quite brilliant pace from Kelvin.
I figured the Cooper would be good , handling good/braking good/good off the corner. I could run in the low 20's without much problem while keeping the tyres cool.
Qual was pretty good and I hoped to try and stay with the front guys in the race. Kelvin was close behind until a mistake from him gave me the chance to stop checking the mirrors , Harry was pulling away with Lasse until a mistake allowed me into 2nd place, I was waiting to be caught again as Lasse was very fast, but, it was never to happen after an accident put me out of the race. I can see how the incident happened so no problem , thanks for the apology .... the track has no banking right at the top and it is easy to spin .
Grats to Harry on a very smooth win and all who finished ........ the championship is very close now ..... onto the next one
Wow what a difficult track , really hard to battle other drivers, the battle was not hitting the wall ...... which I managed to do 3 times, but, only slightly.
Kelvin did a great job to make sure he picked up max points , as he knew he had to , myself I just took the bogey car to get it out of the way , it was a big bonus to be able to get close to Harry in the Honda from @ half distance .... for a while I thought I may get the chance to challenge ... then the damn leaders kept interfering with our battle ;-).
It was another really interesting race , whoever thought of this formula for the oval cup is a star , its good to drive all the cars and tactically make decisions on which is best for the track , I even enjoyed running 5th in a Brm 2 laps down .
Massive grats to Fab who drove a great race in the Cooper, good to see you spraying the champagne along with Lasse who is proving to be a strong competitor.
Damn shame there was no David or Mario (or Carsten) on the grid ........... onto Thompson which also looks pretty intense to me.
Sie sind vermutlich noch nicht im Forum angemeldet - Klicken Sie hier um sich kostenlos anzumelden
09.04.2016 01:46
.