First off, bad luck to webnomad for turning up, and then getting disconnected just as Qualifiers was starting!
Well done to everyone that shows up week after week! Don't be disheartened if you feel you are too slow in this division! Just look at Tovey! He is making all of us look slow!
Review of the race from my cockpit:
I actually wasn't looking forward to Motegi at all.
After doing a pit of practise on Saturday night in Stu and Anon's room, I was able to get some tips off them about what lines, where to brake, gear selection. Even with all this, my best lap that night was only in the 2:00!
So I decided to hop on a little earlier on Sunday to try and get some laps in... good thing I did!
After only the 3rd practise lap, I finally hit a 1.58! A couple of laps later I got into the 1.57's!
I then concentrated on lap consistency and was able to keep it in the 1.59's so was VERY stoked with my progress!
So come, qualifying, I had 3 flying laps, with my last flyer being able to land me 3rd on the grid.
Race start was a little weak, combined with a blinder of a getaway from alzoroz, had me and him going into turn 1 almost side by side.
I was able to get better traction though and managed to pull ahead after we came onto the short straight.
The next few laps I started pulling away slightly from alzoroz whilst also watching Tovey and T_Vue pull away, with T_Vue doing a mighty fine job keeping Tovey on his toes!
Not too sure what lap it was, but about 1/4 of the way into the race, Darko managed to break away from the chasing pack and started hunting me down. Some nice jousting went on for a number of laps, with positions swapping between us a number of times.
Up the road, Tovey managed to shake off T_Vue when he became unstuck somewhere.
This allowed myself and Darko to close up right onto him.
The following laps were quite intense with the three of us battling it out for 2nd spot and a number of swapsies occurring.
During this stage I had a MASSIVE 'OH
!' moment where T_Vue and Darko's onscreen names blocked out the brake marker I was using which caused me to do a massive dive bomb/lockup going into Turn 4! Thankfully my car ghosted itself as I locked up and went straight through T_Vue! That would have been a VERY unpleasant moment for both of us, especially him being an innocent bystander in it!
At this point, I had to clear my head and keep it clean on track, but the strange thing I started to notice was that, even though my tyres still looked reasonably fresh (8's on the front, 9 or 10's on the back) the tail seemed to lose out a lot more than it did compared to my practise runs, although I was still managing consistent 58/59's.
So on we went with our battle for 2nd, when T_Vue decides to face the wrong way at Turn 11, the right hander after the long back straight! DOH!
This allowed me back into 3rd, which I happily took, and then put my head down and started chasing Darko.
After another couple of laps, I managed to catch right up to him and we again had a good tussle for the next phase of the race.
A couple more position swaps, and then caught patg65, unfortunately, I wasn't able to take advantage of this moment to pass Darko, so had to settle with sticking behind him.
While all this was occurring, T_Vue was slowly catching us up again, and Tovey was pulling away in front.
Towards the latter stage of the race, as I was patiently sitting behind Darko and taking whatever opportunities arose, I overcooked it while approaching the esses and landed in the sand pit!
This allowed T_Vue to take my position, and Darko to sprint away to maintain a gap for the rest of the race!
The last 3 laps of the race was pretty nail biting for me, and presumably for T_Vue as well!
Unfortunately, some of the lines T_Vue were taking, weren't agreeing with me, and I tapped him a few times (redressed on track).
I then decided to bide my time until the last lap, where I knew I could catch him on the back straight and hold a defensive line against him going through the last turns. Alas! That didn't work out exactly as I wanted!
Coming onto the straight, I wasn't as close as I wanted to be, so slipstreaming him down the straight I could only manage to get side by side with him going into Turn 11!
We took Turn 12 side by side as well and I believe I manage to clip him going into Turn 13, which sent him off course for the last turn, so decided to redress that issue as well, which, sadly for me meant I only ended up 4th.
I haven't watched the replay yet, but I would be interested to see what actually happened in that last turn.
That was the most epic race I've had to date! And apart from a few laps in the beginning, it was all edge of seat racing for me!
Thanks guys! Really stoked to be racing with you fellas!
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