This won't surprise anyone, but I had a ball. Any racing in the great ol' Mini is fun for me, I just love it, and in GTL it is sooooo close to my real Mini.
Brilliant track selection from Stuey, these were terrific fun and nicely suited to the Mini, especially St. Jovite and Limerock. These tracks also allowed very close racing, and it was a pleasure to see how close everyone was without touching. These GTL events deliver much better quality racing than GTRE, IMO.
Race 1: Qualy P2 just behind the flying Sam. As usual, fluffed the start and Stu and Cam slipped past. Stu seemed to make a big boo boo at the last hairpin, letting Cam and I through. I pestered Cam trying to put him under pressure, but he was driving well. I took emergency evasion to miss hitting Cam, so Nigel then jumped me. Finally, after many laps (and a mistake from Cam) I slipped into P2 but Sam had a big lead (for a Mini race). Slowly I managed to reel Sam in with a couple of laps to go, but I needed a mistake from Sam to get him. As we all know, Sam doesn't make mistakes and took the win.
Race 2: What a qualy session, I managed a superb lap (I thought) only to find Sam pipped me by 0.001 sec. Wow Sam, brilliant. Muffed another start, dropped to P4 again as Stu and Amir slipped by. I had some great racing with Stu and Amir, swapping spots, driving through turns side by side, fantastic stuff guys. Finally managed to squeeze into P2 with Amir hot my tail, but again Sam had a gap in the lead. I reduced the gap again (a little) but Consistent Sam was too good.
Race 3: Sam decided to take pity and let us fight it out without him. Pity, I'm sure he would have produced the hattrick of wins. This time I qualified P1 and managed a better start. But the race was a cracker of a battle with Amir. Amir was obviously quicker in the first half of the track, but I had the edge in the second half. I had two heart-stopping moments when I went onto two wheels at the chicane :eek: , but somehow got it back on all fours again. Screenshots to follow, but I'll bet others had similar (or worse) experiences there. Managed to hang on for the win with Amir hot my tail all race.
Special note re Stuart, what a hot hotlapper, he managed fastest lap times in two of the races (or was that all 3 ? ). All you need now is a little more luck and consistency, and you could be our Mini king pushing Sam off the pedestal.
Thanks to all who raced, I agree with earlier comments, some of the best racing at RD. :clap::handshake::cheer2:
EDIT: Great to see Cam dragging himself out of bed at these insane hours to join us too.
