Season 13 Race 3 SUZUKA - RACE REPORT

[Valerio Vinassa]

one of the best track (imo), so Drivers let the fun loose rain is coming

 

[Valerio Vinassa]

Q. 11th
R. ritired
I'm really angry I do not like to leave the race so but also I dont like drive a race with freeze.

Race was start good for me a good place at start and in lap 2 I was in 8th never happenand Im really happy but in T1 a further little little freeze cost me a lost line run wide smash the wall damage suspension, I decided to continue, hold on until lap 7, then I understand no good continue no for me no for other because when I was near some turns I had flickering so if i have someone at rear sure there is some trouble for him and in more my concentration was on empty
my eyes was 2 balls,someone remember the actor Marty Feldman? same for me. Take the coordination between retard on video pressure on throttle and car answer all on wet is not so easy and a bit dangerous for other and me,is annoying drive with low frame

Congratulations to Podium and all participants c u all at next track

 

[April Dillon]

Well, my first Presto DNF ever. Was inevitable I guess

I think I timed switching to slicks perfectly. Driving became really easy because on my wet setup, it was just a gripfest. Then a little slide, and it snapped when I tried to correct it, and I just went straight on the last turn, face first into a wall. Boop. Race over. ;w;

Ah well. As I say, it was inevitable. Just gonna have to redeem myself next time. Particularly as my PC's looking healthy after the reformat.

 

[Bob Miley]

Started last finished 6th with 30 litre fuel left and very happy and surprised as I thought I would be out after a few laps.

Congrats podium.

 

[Jim Hawley]

Interesting and surprising race

Q, P6
R, P5

I've never had such an up n down race

Start, Away ok but lose a place to Nico R, P7
Lap 5, Vince and Nico R are off the road, up to P5
Lap 9, Peter is off, up to P4
Lap 10, Cramp in left hand, struggling with downshifts
Lap 11, I'm off at Degner 1, still P4
Lap 11, I'm off again at Spoon, Peter n Nico R go through, P6

Here's where it gets interesting,

Pit end of Lap 12, take on fuel and flippin SLICKS! (pit crew picked the wrong set off the rack! numpties!), I rejoin P8 but I'm struggling to stay on the road so I decide to pit again on lap 14 and try to go to the end with a full tank and another set of wets, rejoin P15 with 115ltrs in the tank
Lap 16, I'm off the road at T1ffs
Lap 18, Tito is of at Dunlop, P14
Lap 18, Steeve and Nelson tangle and I'm up to P12
Between laps 21 and 24, Vince, April, Nico N and Valter all pit and I'm up to P8
Lap 25, Kurt is facing the wrong way at the hairpin, up to P7
Lap 26, Reik has stacked it big time at Degner 1 ! up to P6
Lap 27, My wet tyres are shot to bits but I'm not far behind Sean and Bob M, what to do?, I have a huge gap to P7 so I decide to pit for slicks at the end of lap 29, nothing to loose I guess, I rejoin still P6 but some 40 odd secs behind Bob M who is probably struggling on worn wets at this point?
Lap 33, I've reeled him in and pass him to take P5

Grats to Davie, Peter and (who was 3rd?)

See you in? (where's the next race?), I'm of on holiday again next week, returning late Monday the 20th so I should get an hour or two practice in Tues evening

Jim

 

[David Turnbull]

Qualifying - 1st

Got a really good first lap and aborted the second attempt when I saw I'd be unable complete.

Race - 1st

Started very well, by lap 5 I had a 7 seconds gap or so to Reik and around 12 or more to 3rd place, I really was in the zone and everything just seemed to work , well...until lap 6 when i smashed into Damien , this altered things big time, I received suspension damage with a slight offset of my steering wheel, for a while it felt terrible and Reik managed to pass into turn 1 on lap 8 or 9, I tried hard to stay with Reik but had no confidence through the corners I was waiting on it suddenly kicking out on me , I toyed with the idea of fixing the damage and loosing more time in the hope of salvaging a 2nd or 3rd come the end, I decided against and just hoped that if it felt like this now and didnt change again I could handle it until the end. I noticed the track drying around lap 19 and saw it fall fast on RTT, I made the call to pit for fuel and slicks,

I was now at 90l and slicks on a drying track and Reik was 45 seconds ahead, I knew I'd gain alot back come his pit later and when he had I was 7-10 seconds behind cant remember exactly, a few laps later Reik again pitted and I wondered what was going on, I was now in the lead by about 12 seconds, tyres feeling decent , I was now used to the damage and my fuel was at a normal 2 stop level so I went for it to stay ahead of Reik but 1 lap later he disappeared from server and I was miles ahead , I made a couple of mistakes that brought the gap down to 22 seconds at one point but on the whole the end was fairly comfortable with a big lead.

I'm shocked I managed to get the win after the incident, I feel without that i couldve been away quite comfortable but its never that easy in racing , Grats all finishers and racers, really was an exciting race for me, nerves left shattered, I'm off to the docs for some valium , cya at ????

 

[Nicolas Rouge]

Q 7th
R 4th
65(wets) + 60(wets) + 60 (slicks)
No real issues until last stint, where drying track made things very tricky, with the car unexpectedely became understeering in some turns like T1. The first 2 stints were perfect for me, I couldn't have done better. I was happy to see that I could match for some time the pace of Sean. I had some good fights with him and Peter mostly, but in last stint I made too much mistakes. Fortunately the guys behind were very far away so I only lost my spot to Sean in the end, but I could be on the podium!
Happy witht the result anayway, thanks Nico & Daniel for incredible event, and all racers.
CU at Zandvoort

 

[Reik Major]

Grats to David, Podium and all finishers!

Qualy (2nd):

On race day I decided to raise wings from 17/20 to 22/26, wich was a good move. I managed a very good lap time in my first attempt, not far away from Davids pole time.

Race (DNF):

Lap 26, Reik has stacked it big time at Degner 1 !

Do I have to say anything more? Frustration is still on a high level after such an own mistake.

Start went well and I managed to stay in 2nd. I could follow David for a few laps and found a nice rhythm. Making 2 small mistakes opened the gap to 7 seconds but Vince in 3rd and Sean in 4th (right?) still were a few seconds behind. Then David had his incident with Damien so I finally could pass him before first stop in the end of lap 12. I knew David must've received damage otherwise he would've been faster.

Taking fuel for 12 laps and wets I was back on the track and when David stopped one lap later I was back in the lead. I felt very comfortable and saw the chance to win. In the end of the stint raining decreased (stopped?) and I was unsure what to do. I finally had to stop for fuel and when XD still showed "W" and the tyre temps didn't Show more than 140°C I decided to play it safe and take wets again, also in the hope it could start raining again.

Well, I was wrong. My gap to David after my second stop was 17 seconds and quickly decreased, so I knew I was wrong and he was on slicks. I thought I should bring home 2nd in asafe way and go in to take slicks too. I left the pits and half a lap later got a little wide at Degner 1 and straight on in the wall, no chance tpo brake or turn. Wheel off!

Afterwards I question myself why I hurryed to go on slicks and didn't wait for a more dry track, because gap to P3 was very big. However, you never stop learning and I need to be more focused for each corner.

C U in hell in two weeks (be it close to the green hell or the bumpy hell in netherland's dunes)

 

[David Turnbull]

Afterwards I question myself why I hurryed to go on slicks and didn't wait for a more dry track

Reik at the time you pitted for slicks the on path wetness was actually around 0-5% rainfall was at 0% but that god damned off path wetness was still up in crazy numbers so i can see why youve thought it was still wet at the time, as usual race07's racing line differs slightly to the fastest lines so i think we encounter the offpath wet track more than we would if we took AI lines.

In the last stint when i managed to find the onpath dry track i could do near enough what i was doing through practise, but always once or twice a lap id be on the wet stuff and it would ruin lap times, i couldnt seem to find a consistant line at all so ended up off track in the wall a few more times.

 

[Peter Decker]

Q: 3rd
I planned for not a 2-try but a 3-try to evolve my time significantly - which I did on the 3rd try. Sadly sessioned ended and I got realised my maths werent that good. However, I put in a really good lap with inspired driving!

R: 2nd
Wooppooopiiiidooo my best finish ever!

In start Vince came as a rocket from behind, I thought me, him and Reik went 3-ways into T1 and T2 so I put myself almost too wide. Kind of heart-stopping already. More of those would come.

Rest of the race I just tried to drive stable with margins and "hope" for others to make more mistakes than me, which obviously worked (Seans wing, Reiks solo-maneuver, Tim missing the race, Vince missing lots of times (right?) to not name all )

I made a not so well-cut compilation but as last time you can at least enjoy some Swedish morning-radio as well as some other tracks! It became quite long, hope it has some good points anyway

Thanks for my first finish this season! Thanks for my computer holding stable, no unfortunate crashes, you good people and last but not least our heroes, the admins Davie and Nico (together with weather-God Daniel o/c!)!

Grats David and all finishers!

 

[Sean Greenlaw]

Winner of best Video goes to...wd Peter good watch lol

 

[Jim Hawley]

Nice vid Peter....interesting mix of music @10'30" was my fave

 

[Peter Decker]

Thanks guys Tried to make a point here and there, hehe. Yeah the lyrics in the end explains it all!

 

[Valter Ostman]

Congratulations to the winner David, podium and everyone who made it to the finish.

Q:14

R:8
The wet start and first lap went well. We are really experts on "the first laps survival". That's one of the reasons why it's still fun to race after all these years .
L2. In Spoon I slide of and go down to 17th place.
L6. I pursue Nicolai. It rarely happens in dry weather. I love rain.
L12. I pass Kurt when he has a moment in Degnar . P10.
L13. Pit. I come out as 10th on wet tires.
L15. Now I'm catching up with Nicolai. Too bad I screwed up in the Spoon again. Down to P12.
L16. I slide in front of Nelson and we go of. Sorry Nelson. P11.
L20. Jim and Vince chasing hell out of me.
L24. P8. Loading fuel and putting on wet tires again. Out on the road again as 11th.
During the few last laps Tito was chasing me. My rubber was burning by then. We had a slight contact and lost one position, but it was worth it.

Thanks all CU in Netherlands.

 

[Sean Greenlaw]

Q:4th, made a error into chicane lost some time.

R:3rd 67 wets, 67 wets, 67 slicks, wing+susp fix and slicks

Start was ok but lost out to fast starting Vince, managed to get passed later a few laps from slight mistakes Peter and Vince also.

Made quite a few mistakes in 2nd stint lost quite bit of time from a few offs but noticing it was drying up. I went to slicks early and seemed to be going well being faster but small spin last turn I lost fwing against wall. After completing the lap I had to pit and fix wing and now damage.

In the end Just getting passed Nicolas after a slight mistake and just getting podium after my troubles felt extremely lucky.

Grats David and Peter well done finishers! thanks for everyone I raced with.

Cyas in Zandvoort !

 

[Steeve Fournier]

Q: 8th

R: 11th, just glad i finished after all the mess i've been through. See the video for more explanation. PS: it doesn't match Peter's video, but i thought it was worth to show most of my FAILS.

A few near miss here and there with Nelson, Nicolas, and some others, luckily none of them turned out badly. Sorry guys for scaring you.

I am one of the worst driver on wet. It's really sad but i am not able to have fun when it rains

Big thanks to Nico, Daniel, David and ev-1 for making PrestoGP what it is i.e. the best league i ever known.