Race Report
Firstly, a big thanks to the team at ARC and RD for putting on this event. Thanks to those that signed up and dared to brave what was a monster of a track; 25+minutes of 160+ mph averages for all racers. This is one of those events that those who raced it will talk about for a long time and those who didn’t race will wish they had. Look out for this combo again and get signed up whether it’s in Pro, Sports, or even the rarely run Extremes. Only those monsters will do this track layout justice.
Practice
Came late to practice for me and jumped in the glorious DBR9, fortunately Adam V had produced a competitive set up for it I guess that if I’d run it some more, I may have become more comfortable with the oversteer in Curva Grande, the Lesmos and Parabolica. However, it soon became evident that the car of the night was the Viper, all that low down grunt and 200+ mph outside the draft. I downloaded Keith’s set-up which interestingly was a 5+1 for the draft. I’d driven this kind of set up at KWS in ATCC seasons 1 and 2 so kind of knew what to expect. Even the ‘vette was having trouble living with the Viper!
Car was easy and stable to drive and in the 7 laps that I had available before quail, managed to get the lap time on light fuel into the mid 2:14’s as the leaders were running mid 12’s. Normal for me to be a couple of seconds down. Only time to soften the front roll bar by one click to help with the turn in
Qualifying
Never managed to get a draft during qualifying but still managed and improved 2:13 for 13th overall on the Grid.
Race 1
Reasonable start but had to back off when John Amutenya was slow off the line in front. Rather than risk the wrath of the race director by running outside the yellow cones onto the other half of the track I backed off. Once we were underway, I had that rarest of things, a clean race with only very small mistakes that didn’t really affect the result. A few highlights were 210+mph in the draft before passing Keith B into Curva Grande. Running 8th for a chunk of the race thinking, “pole, I don’t do pole”. Fortunately, for me, Adam V had run into some problems and I picked up a place for my highest finish in a “full” race in any class at RD 7th, and some points. Still on the front row, but in P2 rather than Pole.
Race 2
Poor John A found himself in the middle of a nest of snarling (or should that be hissing) Vipers at the start. I had Keith and Tyler behind me so needed a goods start to keep the pressure off. Start was OK but poor John quickly found himself engulfed into the first bank with Vipers passing left and right. Kudos to John for holding his nerve and line as this could have been a nasty one. Fair result for me, running P3, close to Keith and Tyler with a bit of a gap to Eric N. Then comes my only mistake of the whole event, with Eric N closing in the draft, I out braked my self a little into Parabolica, saved running too far into the kitty litter and rejoined the track 4 places down in P7 Eric N having passed with Stefan W, Yves and Adam close together in front also taking advantage of my beach holiday. Culley was behind in P8. Still had plenty of speed but running alone was struggling to catch the threesome in front. Culley caught me with the draft and we had a nice scrap with him passing down low on the 2 banked curve, only for me to pass back with a pass through Curva Grande. Close racing with me a little quicker through Lesmo 1&2 and some close drafting down the back straight. Unfortunately, Culley missed me braking into Parabolica and I soon found myself deep in the sand trap with no front splitter. One out and now down in P12 I tried to run a lap without the front splitter but it became evident that there was too much understeer. Pitted, replaced the splitter, got a stop and go even though I waited to accelerate until after the “click” of the limiter going off. Managed to move back up to 11 but couldn’t catch anyone as my top speed was down to 185 mph
Still, my first proper points result especially in the GT’s is quite satisfying. 2 points and 9th overall, but a little disappointed as I could have had more points but for a knock in the rear.
Like Dijon Prenais, highlights video to come.
