AC Race #1 Championship Multiclass @Thomson Road, Wed 5th October 2022

[Dzul]

Solid qualy. Good start. Clean first lap. Eventful race. Hectic fun.

Like Andre said on comms, fantastic first lap in general guys, especially in such a track. I could follow closely as the pack stayed well together at speed. That's not an easy feat so cheers yourself with a tall one of your favourite brew.

I had a good start and an incident-free first stint. Other people's incidents got me places but half way I had a few of my own... the outside of the first corner / crest can be treacherous. The first part of the 'grass' is soapy and the second sandy. I know because I had a moment there twice at different times trying to pass, with different outcomes. First, the soapy one, got me on a spin. I careened to the inside, hit a lamp post or a tree (luckily no car), made a 900 but luckily ended up facing the right way on second gear and just got on with it. The second one I kept two rubbers on the black stuff but the 'sand' took half my speed away, yet I managed to keep it straight and carried on chasing after Andre and Thomas.

I also had a brown code on the second sector... Fulvio was behind me, with more speed, I kept to the outside so he could have a clean pass but he had too much exit speed and broadsided a lamp post, being catapulted back on track doing a windmill... I missed that by millimeters and managed to keep going but it was waaaaaaaay too close for comfort.

Pitstop was fast, got back 2 places ahead than CrewChief predicted and had a lot of battles with several Abarths and Mazdas... I was happy I could keep up with Han for a few laps, that's when I finially got under the 8's... I had a few small offs that others profited from and ended up under my starting position due to my own incidents but had a ton of fun keeping away from the bush.

Congrats to the podiums and thanks for organizing Han, I'll see you lads on the next one!

 

[HF2000]

Amazing Race! Very nice to hear that in turn 1 everything went well.

I had a good start next to Ernie but with me on the inside in T1 which was enough to move up to 3rd place behind John and Allan. John wasn't that fast in the early laps and he slowed Allan in the twisty parts so I could get close enough to Allan to overtake him on the straight.

In 2nd I saw John slowly disappear and Ernie coming closer. After a bad turn on the last hairpin, he was able to pass me on the straight. When I tried to stay close to get him back on the straight, I took too much risk and hit a lamppost and was thrown back behind Richard. Frustrated by the mistake and also by Richard's good defense I decided to go into the pits very early to cool down. After my pit I had a very long but very nice second stint overtaking on Mazdas and Abarths and finally I finished 5th. Seeing the top 4 it would have been the same without the lamppost incident.

Congratulations on the podium finishes in each class and thanks all for participating. It was a great racing with 26 participants.

Looking forward to the next one at Bremgarten in two weeks.

But first I'm filling out an old request: Goodwood for next week!

 

[JamKart22]

T1 didn't go well for everyone I was tagged and spun around. Just a racing incident so no hard feelings. Meant that my good quali was all for nothing and I was pretty much last within the first minute of the race.

I know how tricky this circuit is so fairly sure I could depend on some drivers ahead throwing it at the scenery. So head down and I set off in pursuit.

Had fairly good pace here so started catching the pack. Some nice battles with very fair racing and eventually finished P8 in class - so happy with that in the end.

Thanks Han for organising and congrats to the podium (especially my mate Richard, who was P2 in class).

Had an interesting post race analysis with @Programmer_Rich after the race and compared his and my fastest laps on Motec. I can see where I was losing 0.4 secs on one corner and he could see where he was losing the same amount on a different corner! Shame we didn't do this before the race

I'll miss the classic next week but back the week after.

 

[a_murel]

Man... what a race and had so much fun!!!

Indeed what I mentioned on the comms and what Raul said: WHAT A FIRST LAP!! Really well done everybody!

I quallyfied 7th and managed to safely pass and went up to 6th. After Han spinning I was 5th behind Paul. I was taking it easy, not attacking Paul trying to make no mistakes and just basically following him, drafting behind and keeping up on the straights behind his Abarth.

But then my biggest handicap in this season happened again, somehow my concentration slips away for a second and loosing my focus during the race.

So I missed a corner completely and spun and ended up against a lightpost, being frustrated I made the pitstop to get that out of the way.

So coming back in the rhythm I thought I could make up some ground but made a few more mistakes ending up behind Raul but also behind Kimmich who was to my relief also having a difficult race.

We had a great fight a few laps and I managed to overtake him and Raul.

I will have work to get my concentration back, after that I will be fine

Thank you Han for organising and making us very enthousiastic!

 

[HF2000]

somehow my concentration slips away for a second and loosing my focus during the race.

being frustrated I made the pitstop to get that out of the way.

I was wondering if this is a Dutch thing....

 

[maxilogan]

Man... what a race and had so much fun!!!

Indeed what I mentioned on the comms and what Raul said: WHAT A FIRST LAP!! Really well done everybody!

I quallyfied 7th and managed to safely pass and went up to 6th. After Han spinning I was 5th behind Paul. I was taking it easy, not attacking Paul trying to make no mistakes and just basically following him, drafting behind and keeping up on the straights behind his Abarth.

But then my biggest handicap in this season happened again, somehow my concentration slips away for a second and loosing my focus during the race.

So I missed a corner completely and spun and ended up against a lightpost, being frustrated I made the pitstop to get that out of the way.

So coming back in the rhythm I thought I could make up some ground but made a few more mistakes ending up behind Raul but also behind Kimmich who was to my relief also having a difficult race.

We had a great fight a few laps and I managed to overtake him and Raul.

I will have work to get my concentration back, after that I will be fine

Thank you Han for organising and making us very enthousiastic!

Apart from the overtaking part (which I wasn't able to do apart from other driver's errors), it could be very well the history of my own race. Had a good first half of the race, then somehow managed to lose focus and from that moment on it was a procession of errors (more or less serious) until I found myself in the last spots. It has been however a very enjoyable race for the first part, and a very interesting circuit on which I never raced before.

Cheers to the podium finishers, and thanks Han @HF2000 for organising and letting us know every time new and beautiful circuits

 

[Alfred Wayne]

Good hard racing yesterday. Had a decent start, but a misjudged turn put me behind Carsten, who I think was none too pleased to have me hot on his tail... and sometimes hot into his passenger door I promise I had already lifted from the gas and was giving you the corner

After the early race traffic I managed to settle in and have a few comfortable laps. At least until Allan came out of the pits just ahead of me on cold tires and once again, I was filling up someone's rear view mirror Once his tires warmed up he pulled away, but having a faster car ahead of me helped me keep my pace up.

Almost caught Richard in the end, but he had a great pit exit, beating me out of the hairpin by barely a cars length

Hopefully the drivers around me enjoyed the race as much as I did. Thanks for hosting han. Now onto the classic cars, where my luck will run out

 

[stigs2cousin]

Good hard racing yesterday. Had a decent start, but a misjudged turn put me behind Carsten, who I think was none too pleased to have me hot on his tail... and sometimes hot into his passenger door I promise I had already lifted from the gas and was giving you the corner

It's ok, I really liked playing door stop for you faster guys

And I can neither deny nor confirm that I conciously "closed the door" on you

(you of course see what I did there)


MFG Carsten

 

[HF2000]

Next week: https://www.racedepartment.com/thre...-mazda-mx5-goodwood-12th-october-2022.250122/

 

[HF2000]

@Fat-Alfie Hi David, above is a lot of nice messages from drivers who had a great race on your track tonight. You may want to read them.

 

[HF2000]

And as for the talking/banter during the race on Discord, we said that we should keep that to a minimum for racing purposes only and keep the banter and social talks for after the race.
Now I'm aware that in this race I violated that agreement when I got carried away in my battle with Carsten. I apologize for that . Next race I will pay more attention to this.
I shouldn't do it anyway because I loose concentration and start making mistakes.
But that was probably the tactic of Carsten to prevent me from overtaking him .
That rotter, would Ernie say !

 

[Medilloni]

@Fat-Alfie Hi David, above are a lot of nice posts from drivers that had a great race on your track tonight. You might want to read them.

Well said Han , these tracks are simply majestic - beautiful, and you really (@ Thomson Road) feel like you're in another part of the world, such is the detail of surroundings. (notice I didn't mention the lamp posts there)

Tried the Abarth for a couple of laps @ Bremgarten tonight, it reminded me to write my will, smartish

I'm guessing, whilst Bremgarten is one of David's shorter tracks, it will be the most difficult in this championship - narrow, very high speed with very few tight corners/passing places, fraught with danger!

 

[HF2000]

Well said Han , these tracks are simply majestic - beautiful, and you really (@ Thomson Road) feel like you're in another part of the world, such is the detail of surroundings. (notice I didn't mention the lamp posts there)

Tried the Abarth for a couple of laps @ Bremgarten tonight, it reminded me to write my will, smartish

I'm guessing, whilst Bremgarten is one of David's shorter tracks, it will be the most difficult in this championship - narrow, very high speed with very few tight corners/passing places, fraught with danger!

Yes that last turn before the start/finish straight is so hard to get it right. Like the one on the Feldbergring with the strawbails. And for the subject of difficulty level, did you already tried the Battenbergring?

 

[Medilloni]

Yes that last turn before the start/finish straight is so hard to get it right. Like the one on the Feldbergring with the strawbails. And for the subject of difficulty level, did you already tried the Battenbergring?

Fuzzy memory - It's a long time since I tried Battenbergring Han, over a year ago I think - tried it with Escort Mk1 (heaven), Porsche ST (died, saw Angels and went to heaven) and Lotus 49b (died, saw Angels, went to heaven, they told me to do it all again).

Don't have much time to practice right now, but so looking forward to this one - hard to put a finger on @Fat-Alfie 's David's work, but Battenbergring is def the Great Danes bollocks manly (dogly?) bits

 

[HF2000]

Fuzzy memory - It's a long time since I tried Battenbergring Han, over a year ago I think - tried it with Escort Mk1 (heaven), Porsche ST (died, saw Angels and went to heaven) and Lotus 49b (died, saw Angels, went to heaven, they told me to do it all again).

Don't have much time to practice right now, but so looking forward to this one - hard to put a finger on @Fat-Alfie 's David's work, but Battenbergring is def the Great Danes bollocks manly (dogly?) bits

John, I think you mixed up some tracks. Battenbergring is new and only recent available on .GP. I did two races in July as I remember on the RD servers with it. Don't remember if you joined them.

 

[Medilloni]

John, I think you mixed up some tracks. Battenbergring is new and only recent available on .GP. I did two races in July as I remember on the RD servers with it. Don't remember if you joined them.

Oops, maybe I did

 

[HF2000]

Well if you remember lampposts protected by straw bails, then you have driven Battenbergring.