TC-65: ENDURANCE Jaguar MKII 4.2 @ Zandvoort 67 - Thu 15th August 2013

[Antonio Tavares]

Overall a good race for me, although a solitary one. My best time in practice was 1.44.211, with 85 liters in the tank, and I was expecting to shave 1,5 secs with fuel for 3 or 4 laps only. Yet, the car felt different with less fuel, and I never managed a good lap in qualification, so I had to settle with my 6th position in the grid, with 1.43.5xx I think.
I'm not sure if it was Dmytro or Yves, but the pole was a high 1.41! Good fast driving there, congrats!
After first laps, the race didn't had much history. I was mainly concerned with saving tires and keeping a regular pace, as tire wear was very rapid. My strategy did pay off, as many drivers that were in front of me in the first part of the race had accidents, which allowed me to take 2nd position around my second pit stop and keep it until the end of the race.

One thing I should mention is that I was blocked twice by cars reentering the track after an off-road excursion. They were both in front of me in overall classification, and as faster drivers they should know better and let pass incoming cars before reentering the asphalt. Goes without saying that I won't mention names here, but they know who they are and this saves me the trouble of writing two PM's...

 

[Dmytro Botnarenko]

You had your brake lights come on a lot so your brake must have been spiking

Yeah, you're right. It's hard to beat my own times while braking on the straights. Thanks, Guus.
Damn, first time I have this issue with my pedals. Need to search for solution.

 

[Norman Bruce]

I was surprised by my qualifying pace and got 5th on the grid.
I lost a couple of places at the start but kept a steady pace during the race. This paid off when @Steven Walker made an error enabling me to finish in 3rd place.
I'm not often on the podium so I was really pleased with this race.

 

[Tony Wiltshire]

Disappointed to be taken out on the 2nd lap as the result of someone elses misfortunes but that's racing for you.

 

[Warren Schembri]

Well just before the end of practice (or quali can't remember), I changed my setup from what I was using to a setup Rupe had uploaded (thanks Paul for the tip).
Rupe's setup was more stable though I felt that I was a little slower in it. The setup that I had been using was not really stable and while it was possible to drive with it, I didn't feel that I could go 40 laps with it. Anyway, changed my setup.

On the second lap, there was Roland, Kjell and Tony in front of me and they were three wide approaching the first corner. I was thinking to myself to back off a bit and give them some space because this cant end well. Surprise, surprise, it didnt
From there, I had a 2/3 second lead over Roland and held that all the way till I made my first pit stop where I made my only mistake for the race. Was going too fast down the straight to slow down before entering the pit lane and spun the car. No major damage but it did cost me an extra 20/30 seconds.

By the time Roland had taken his pit stop, he was 20/30 seconds ahead of me.
Did not have any major challenges apart from that but I was slowly but surely closing the gap on Roland throughout the race. Got it down to around 10 seconds for the final lap where Roland spun at the first corner. I maybe could have passed him but I did not want to cause any booboo's on the last lap of the race so I sat back and enjoyed the ride.

Apart from spinning when going for my first pit, I'm very impressed with myself in holding it all together for 40 laps.
I qualified 11th and finished 6th. Kept it clean and was nice and smooooooooooth!!!

Congrats to Yves for winning the race and thanks to Hans for organising the event!!!

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Disappointed to be taken out on the 2nd lap as the result of someone elses misfortunes but that's racing for you.

Yeah I'm terribly sorry for that, in hindsight I should have eased off and just taken it easy, but I carried so much more speed through the last corner onto the straight so I thought I would pass and clear Roland before the end of the pits, but somehow I lost momentum when I was side by side with him and when I started braking I went too far right. A racing incident IMO but it could have been avoided by me being more careful for sure.

 

[Yves Larose]

nice little combo, didn,t get any practice before the event so i didn't know what to expect.

qualy: took second place .400 behind Dmytro who was flying.

Race: that was an exciting start, my initial jump wasn,t that good but the second part of the start was very good but we kinda enter 3 wide in T1 and me being on the outside i lost 1 spot then for a few laps it was very exciting being almost a 4 way battle for the first place then on lap 3 (i think) Guus who was in second spun coming out of T3 gifting me second place. then for a few lap i was trying to catch Dmytro but was only able to maintain the gap when suddenly i was catching him and eventualy pass him due to his pedal problem. from there the race was lonely for me and easely took the win.

thanks to Hans for setting up the event and thanks to Rupe and RD

 

[Tony Wiltshire]

Yeah I'm terribly sorry for that, in hindsight I should have eased off and just taken it easy, but I carried so much more speed through the last corner onto the straight so I thought I would pass and clear Roland before the end of the pits, but somehow I lost momentum when I was side by side with him and when I started braking I went too far right. A racing incident IMO but it could have been avoided by me being more careful for sure.

No worries mate. You gave me some great racing at Zolder so we will have to meet on track again soon

 

[Rui F. Martins]

I don't believe you could just go about turning up without practice and then blowing us away without sticking in the practice time to... oh no. wait a minute. that rings a bell

unfortunately i wasn't able to make it, i thught i would be at home at that day, but it turned out i had to travel a couple of days before and iu couldn't make it, i hope i can do some more club races during the summer when i get back home

 

[Roland]

Sorry for late response, RL sh*t is taking over my life ATM.
Just want to thank everybody for some good racing, and thanks Hans and Rupe for your efforts .
IMO the track was a little bit too much full throttle, but then again for this car and race length that could well be a good thing.
I'm sorry I was involved in a lap 2 incident that took out 2 fellow racers although I still feel there wasn't much I could do about it besides, in retrospect, maybe stick more to one side of the track leaving you guys with only one option ..
Other than that my pace wasn't impressive, much like my preparation, but I still had good fun chasing Warren in the 1st stint, and keeping my tires alive for 24 laps in the 2nd stint.
Yeah Warren you really came too close near the end and could have beat me in the end but Thx for not risking it as there wasn't any money involved anyways.

So again, thanks all and hope to meet you guys on track again soon.

 

[Kjell Eilertsen]

Real Life is taking over your life? Damn that stuffs! Stay virtual!