As the chaps have already said, definitely a mixed night.
Race 1 - TC65's
I chose the Mini - as it turns out so did pretty much everyone else, and it was probably the right choice on the track. I loaded up my setup, and was there or thereabouts in practice all the top 4 or 5 within about 0.5 sec, so I thought "hmm this will be nice and close", and then I saw a little bit of chat between Amir & Avi saying "short gears". I thought yep, I'm on the short gears that's what I tested on and found the best, Warren's on the shorts, that's the way to go, but for some reason I checked my setup again, and I was on mediums I think when I did my testing (which was about 30 mins the other night, 10 mins per class) I imported a set up I liked that was med gears, changed it to shorts, but forgot to save it. Double
Changed to short gears, and dropped the diff power lock 1 click to stop too much wheelspin, and got pole by about a second.
Got a decent enough start to still be in front by T1, and from then on, I was off and away, the car feeling superb, and I was pulling away at about a sec per lap (still to my surprise - I thought the pole lap was a bit of a fluke, tbh). Of course, very few of my race stories have happy endings, and it wasn't too long before this fairy tale went the shape of a pear. I was doing low 1.40's lap after lap, and pushed a bit too hard to get a 1.39, braked too late into T1, and had to go into recovery mode. Now, T1 & T2 are almost like 90 degree esses, and normally, you're accelerating out of T1 and braking/sliding around the first part of T2, pointing the mini's nose at the inside of the apex, but using the drifty understeer to avoid actually hitting anything on the inside. Because I was recovering from T1, I didn't have enough speed to drift across the apex, the front tyres grabbed and I went straight into one of those bloody wooden stakes. And got stuck between them. I watched pretty much the whole field go past as I manouevered out, but I got a horrible surprise once I was out - the impact had ruined my steering.
I was having to steer at 10 o'clock to go straight, turning right was really sharp, turning left, well it pretty much didn't. Gutted.
Muddled along, trying to alleviate the worst of the new handling "features" but the hardest part now was the esses going into the little "forest" section, and this is where I came a complete cropper, the extra tight right turning mini threw me into a roll and I ended up inside one of the little tyre circles, but whoever made the spectators/marshalls made them solid, so I couldn't even reverse out. Decided to write that race off to experience, and took the positives out of the first part of the race.
WD to Warren for keeping his head while all around were either crashing, or in Glenns case, exploding.
Race 2
Took the Alpine, and straight away you could see it was a mistake from the practice times - all the bigger cars in the 1.38's, me & Avi in the Renault's doing about the same times as the Minis - 1.40.5xx or so. Quallied 5th due to a few people having offs, but knew I wouldn't be able to hold on.
Hans had pulled out a superb pole time, and via the media of XD and Teamspeak, I could see him run off into the distance proving his pole time was no fluke, he was clearly unbelievably comfortable in the Elan, and it showed.
Meanwhile I slowly went backwards, finishing dead last I think, due to not driving sensibly, and pushing the Renault beyond it's limits - inside it's limits its magnificent, but go beyond them and it can be evil. I got the evil side last night, and it was all my own fault. On my journey to the back of the pack, I could see Hans getting further and further ahead, and was willing him on to get the win. If it had been a 10 lapper, he'd have strolled it. Unfortunately it was a 12 lapper, and the Elan can get a bit unruly if the tyres wear, I was as gutted for Hans in this race, as I was in the first race for myself. If anything he was even more in control than I was.
Warren was Johnny on the spot as Hans had his turmoil, and benefitted with a win in the E-Type. WD again.
Race 3
Lots and lots of Porsches - and me & Croucher in the Dagenham Dustbin.
I loves the Escort, and I felt as comfortable in it as I was in the mini in Race 1, but man alive, did Avi throw in a blistering pole time in his red 911, and also the 906's looked really well planted, so I thought I'd be pretty up against it.
Quallied 3rd or 4th, was still there come T1 & T2, had a small off after getting on the power too early, but spent the next few laps catching and passing most of the field as they either had offs, made small mistakes or whatever, settling in 3rd behind Amir, who was leaving all sorts of smoke and skiddies on the track from his 911. I expected to see him sitting in a cloud of smoke at almost every corner, but he held it together, and my closing was minimal.
However, again the most difficult part of the track - the esses into the tress section - sent him a little off balance and I was through and chasing Warren.
I was about 19 sec behind Warren and the incident free 906 with 4 or 5 laps to go. I also had an incident free run for the rest of the race, and the gap had only got down to about 17 sec, suggesting that these two cars are also very well matched (I was pushing, Warren was consolidating, I suspect), Amir proving that the 911 is on a par with both as well with his earlier times and laps.
This bodes well for season 4 of RDHGP.
Warren crusied home in an immaculately driven race for a hat-trick of wins, WD mate.
The track itself was, well, only OK. It is a very difficult track, plus a few of us found that there were some fairly medium to high performance drops in certain circumstances (more than 1 or 2 cars in view, or when the shadows covered the track extensively). The TC65's are probably the best cars round here, IMO.
It definitely won't be used in a League setting, although we may revisit here on the occasional sprint night. It won't make the list of Core Add-ons, though.
arty2: 
