Q: P4, Wet compound, Reik´s latest setup. I took it easy as I had not practiced in wet too much, ok lap.
R: 3rd.
I used Reik´s latest setup. I had a plan of doing 2 stops, starting with 50L of fuel onboard and wet compound. The plan was to take 50L of fuel in each stop, as I thought 150L would be enough to complete the race (52 laps). I was able to stick on my plan even though the weather was changing all the time, until it became cleat that I was not going to be able to finish the race with the fuel I had left 6 laps before the end of the race.
1st stint: I started with wet compound and got an ok start and kept my place. For the first stint I was chasing Vincenzo (2nd) and Anthony (3rd) in front of me. During the first stint I tried to pressure Anthony heavily, but I did not manage to overtake him despite being really close a couple of times. I went to pits from P2 after Reik and Anthony had pitted before me.
2nd stint: I came back from pits at P9 right behind Antony. Now I was running with intermediate compound, and I noticed that I had more speed compared to Anthony than at the first stint. On lap 19 I managed to overtake Anthony at T4 (Repsol), but I ran on the gravel at the next corner. Anthony was able to overtake me and make a ~ 3 second gap, because of this. I catched him again on lap 22, and on lap 23 I overtook him at T5 (Seat). We had a slight touch there, but no damage to either of us. Reik went to pits on lap 25 after which I lead the race until Reik overtook me on lap 27. I pitted on lap 30 from P2. I overshoot my pit box and lost ~ 5 seconds reversing back to it.
3rd stint: Again running with intermediates I came back from pits at P3 right in front of Kurt, who span on lap 31, after which I was able to concentrate on catching Anthony once again. I catched him by lap 37 and on lap 38 I overtook him round the outside at T1 (Elf). Reik pitted on lap 43 and I inherited the lead for 3 laps until he overook me again. On lap 45 or so I noticed that I lacked some 3-4 litres (annoying!) of fuel to finish the race, so I had to pit again. At this point I was over 20 seconds ahead of Anthony and I thought short pit stop would maybe allow me to still stay ahead.
4th stint: I decided to change tyres too as they were pretty worn. My pit stop was surprisingly not much faster than normal pit stop and I came back from pits at P3 almost 10 seconds behind Anthony. I decided to drive the rest of the race flatout with a little risk to try to catch Anthony for the last time, but on lap 49 I lost the rear of the car at T3 (Renault) in 240 km/h. I slid sideways for maybe 400 meters, but did not hit anything and was able to continue. I finished 3rd.
Conclusion: I did not enough time to prepare for this race, and I was surprised to be even that competitive. I had great racing with Anthony practically almost through the whole race. Three overtakings, several overtaking attempts, close fighting and touches too to entertain us during the laps we had to make
. I think I had edge in terms of speed, but small errors from me here and there meant that I was not able to beat him.
Looking forward to Monaco, as I like street circuits. At least some of them, such as Macau with f3000