I had fun last night, with plenty of good racing.
There was also plenty of contact and a great deal of lawnmowing. The contact and lawnmowing was pretty evenly spread throughout the field including very fast guys, midfield and slower guys. In fact a significant portion of the field failed to reach the line in each race. There were probably drivers who didn't get to the line in any of the races.
I put in probably 1.5 hours training or more in each car, and in spite of some contact and driving wide a couple of times, I made it to the line in all races, with my best result 3rd in the F1.
It is my belief that the relatively high number of driver errors was at least partly due to the format. Birmingham is a tricky track to be sure, but I believe that having 3 different formulas greatly increases the likelihood of mistakes.
A simracing veteran once told me to choose a single sim, and preferably a single formula, and concentrate on that. These days most of us have multiple sims with tens of classes in each. I guess we learn to adapt more quickly than anyone would have thought possible. Still I dont think you will find any real-life racing driver expecting to race at the limit in 3 different cars in one hour.
As will be clear by now, I am not keen on this concept. I would prefer to race in any ONE of the three formulas we raced last night. I think we would all benefit from only having one car and one track to practice on before the race.
I started racing at RaceDepartment on Thursdays about 3-4 months ago. I believe it was WTCC the first couple of races then Formula Masters. Most of the period has been in F1. I have particularly enjoyed the F1. After F1 I prefer any openwheel formula, and if I can't get open wheel just about anything will do.
I have been racing Thursday nights, different places, for 5 years so I will look to see what is cooking here on Thursdays in the future too, but if I can find a single-formula race I will prefer to put my energy into that.