AC GT3 @ Thomson Road, Sunday 23rd May 2021

[Kek700]

I probably agree with Stefan, but personally, I had a great race with Han, Stefan, and of course Luca.
it was most interesting.
These mid-engine things are a nightmare to drive, the Nissan, I quite often have an easy set of laps, and when I make a silly error, a correction sorts it.
The Mclaren want your undivided attention, 100%, and it punishes you severely if not, plus it gives you half a lap of tyres in the red to add insult to injury.
I had two off for just changing my driving line approach, that's all. next thing it has gone in slow motion spin, how it then give tyres in the red for a slow-motion ballet pirouette.
For me an enjoyable race filled with incidences.
A well done to Luca and Andreas for their well-deserved podiums.
A great event @HF2000 but I have a feeling most will not agree, I probably agree with them too.
The Audi TT was a much easier car to drive here, GT3 not sure.

 

[Interslice]

Thanks han for organising! Such a tough track to try and relearn in the 30 minutes before the race, in a ferrari especially. As ernie says, undivided attention required with these. I drove here last year in the audi S1 quattro, but the sea of trees is fairly confusing and the corners are all blind. I binned it three times in 20 minutes and probably would have been lapped before the pits at the rate i was going! At least i got my gear all sorted again now. Back stronger! (said that alit this year )

 

[Partick Eaton]

I had great time chasing down Elijah for the last few laps. I could catch him, but never pass. I ended up clipping one of the lamp posts, but spun right back onto the track. I only lost 4 seconds. I ended up right back behind him crossing the finish line.

Great drive Elijah!

Thanks for organizing the race Han.

 

[Luca Badin]

Results: https://simresults.net/210523-4eC

I definitely didn't belong on the podium lap time wise, but I did manage to keep the car on the black stuff for once, except for two quick rubs of the guard rails at the first right hander in the twisty bit, so I'm still very happy for just my second podium here at RD. I just wish I had managed to keep this consistency last week as well...

The R8 definitely needs some setup adjustments for some flaws that only became apparent during the race in the context. The hairpin in the jungle and at the last corner really were weak points where I think I lost most of my 0.5-1 seconds to the fastest laps, and maybe some diff coast tweaking would have helped. Another weak point was the long loop, but I think there's nothing wrong setup wise, I just need to learn the line and to trailbrake better.

Of course I'm biased because of my finishing position, but I still enjoyed this track, it wasn't very different to the Nordschleife with the long straight, narrow road, no runoff, elevation change, etc. but I agree that you can get lost as the jungle scenery is same-y. I'm also sure GT3s don't lend themselves to overtakes in the jungle, no way I would have stayed in front of Ernie if this was a MX5 race.

Congratulations Andreas and Ernie for the podium and thank you Han for organising. I'm looking forwards to the Luccaring, since I will likely have to miss the multiclass endurance

 

[640er]

Thanks @HF2000 for organizing. Beeing there on Wednesday was definitly a big help. Got used to the GT3 speed pretty quick and could do some decent laps in qualy. Still some time on the table left, especially sector two where I was 0.3 in front of my PB but couldn't bring it home. Interesting learning curve at this track. With every lap you find more ways to take some corners and push it even further.

Decided to start with less fuel than usual to make sure @Kek700 won't overtake me down to T1. Therefore I had to pit early. Came out around P5 and found myself in traffic. Couldn't resist and started batteling with Pat and Ernie which wasn't really necessary as they all still had to pit. Immediatly made some erros and found myself in the barrier at T1. Had to reverse and lost some time but in the end it wasn't enough to lose P1

Btw @Luca Badin the simresults are missing a complete sector ?

 

[Luca Badin]

Btw @Luca Badin the simresults are missing a complete sector ?

They seem fine to me except that each person's average and fastest laps on the lap list does seem to be missing a sector, even though the individual sectors are there and look right, so you'd have to do the calculation by hand. No idea why that happened.

 

[640er]

They seem fine to me except that each person's average and fastest laps on the lap list does seem to be missing a sector, even though the individual sectors are there and look right, so you'd have to do the calculation by hand. No idea why that happened.

I'm missing sector 4 completely. Wanted to check my theoretical best possible and can't find a sector 4 on any page. But it's not that important anyways

 

[pattikins]

I'm missing sector 4 completely. Wanted to check my theoretical best possible and can't find a sector 4 on any page. But it's not that important anyways

It has happened to me a few times, & I sometimes use a spreadsheet to find the 'missing' sector times. If you still want to know, your best sector 4 time in Qualifying was: 27.774 & 27.955 in the race.