ROOZ NEWS Season 16 (GT6 Season 3) Rd 2 Grand Valley East REVERSE (part 1)

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Welcome to Race 2 of the ROOZ League races, coming to you from Grand Valley East Reverse. The little Mazda's would do battle over the hills and hairpins, screaming their heads off at the end of the pit straight for that extra km/h or two. As always, part 1 will contain Division 1 and 2 reports, part 2 with Division 3 and 4, and finishing off in part 3 with Division 5 and 6.

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Here is the Division 1 report, brought to you by N64TheStig007:

Round 2 of Season 3 saw the drivers head to Grand Valley, for a titanic battle on its reversed "East" layout.

Dan Holland had taken a terrific pole from warrior and Mint, while Mister Bond qualified in 5th.



Lights out, and away we go! All of the field got away well, with N64 getting an absolutely perfect start from 9th position, moving past faine and thestig 13 into 7th. Holland grabbed the holeshot from warrior and Mint, while N64 ruined his wonderful start by putting a wheel on the sand and spinning, collecting an unfortunate Zampli in the process, falling over 13 seconds behind.



Faine barged Cyber out of the way past the tunnel up into 6th. Warrior passed Holland in a brilliant move to commence lap 2, only for Holland to copy him a lap later. Fastboy capped a disappointing race by spinning just like N64 did on lap 2. He would later retire from the race. Anon grew too excited watching the battle ahead of him, and got all out of shape to let faine and Rotor through into 4th and 5th place.



With faine and Rotor holding each other up with some defensive driving, it became a 3 horse race. Despite battling hard, they were pulling away very easily. On lap 9, Mint believed his best chance to win was to pit early. The first round of pit stops had begun.



Warrior had begun to lose time to Holland, before suffering a brutal disconnection on lap 11. It was a bitter blow, and cost him the lead in the standings. Drivers were pitting thick and fast, and strategies were coming to the fore. Despite his horrific first lap, N64 made the most of clear air to be right back on Zampli's tail, before taking the lead of the race on lap 14, being the last to pit. Unfortunately, he came into the pits too fast and wasn't able to clear Zampli.

Mint had used the undercut to clear Holland effectively. However, on fresher tyres and less fuel, Holland was easily able to close the gap and pass Mint as he pleased on lap 19. Two of the three stigs were having a great battle, as stig 13 and Cyber went toe to toe for a number of laps, before 13 came out on top on lap 23.



The final round of pitstops began 3 laps later, with Holland, Mint, faine and stig 13 all pitting, with Holland coming out in front of Mint again. The chase was on. N64 once again stayed out the longest, but this time Rotor joined him, pitting on lap 27. N64 had driven a great drive up until this point and had overtaken newcomer Pringles in the pits.

Unfortunately for stig 13, he would disconnect out of 6th place on lap 30. N64 had hoped to begin his chase of Cyber for some solid points, but instead of this, he started to drive really badly. He half spun on lap 30, gifting Pringles the position and 4 laps later, was passed by Zampli. His hard work was undone.

Holland had a big lead, but his car was not fuelled enough. He spent the last few laps in intense fuel conversation mode. With Mint breathing down his neck, it seemed he would lose certain victory. Anon, who had driven very well after a delayed 1st stint, and Rotor looked likely to grab an extra position from Holland.



But with just 3 laps to go, Mint blew a golden opportunity and spun coming out of turn 2, losing 2nd to Rotor. The win had gone begging. Suddenly, Rotor, who had to deal with faine for most of the race, was now in the box seat.

Starting the final lap, Holland had a 7 second lead. This gap was being disintegrated with every revolution of the tyres. It was too close to call. Surely he'd run dry. Coming out of the final corner, Rotor was just 2.5 seconds behind! 100m before the line, Holland's engine gave up. But somehow, he still crossed the line in 1st, a remarkable 1 second ahead of Rotor. It was his lucky day.



Mint crossed the line 3rd just ahead of Anon who had a stirling drive. Faine finished 5th, 5 seconds ahead of Cyber. Pringles did well to finish 7th on debut considering his pit crew went full retard and sent him out with a full tank of fuel. 8th was N64 after an eventful race which accumulated in a great recovery at the start and in the final 3 laps, to beat Zampli who lost the intense duel. Fastboy was 11th after retiring on lap 27, so thestig 13 beats him to 10th.



An exciting race see's Rotor lead the standings despite having not won a race. The new points system is producing an excellent run to the title. Trial Mountain is next for the sprint round, a track notorious for producing incredibly intense and adrenaline pumping racing. See you then!



Race Quotes:

R0T0R_AU86 (2nd): Congrats to Dan (GTP_DHolland) on a dominating win, only just nabbed FL by .078 of a second Bad Luck to Warrior and feel for MINT... Still holding a lot of pace even with one arm mate! Impressive!! Another crazy race! where to start again... Had a pretty ok qualifying, starting 5th with Anon nabbing 4th, but I think 1st to 5th was separated from pole by .2 tenths of a second, very close qualifying!!! I got off to a OK start, I couldn't see Mister Bond, (even in the reply) so not sure what was happening there? But I got a pretty clean start, I was sitting behind Warrior, Dan, Mint and Anon for the first lap.. I was thinking wow this is going to be some crazy race here! Until lap 2 going into the tunnel I got my apex wrong and hit the wall... I then dropped behind Faine... Here my race could of gone better, I was on recovery trying to get back lost time but battling just cost me a lot of time..... On 5 or 6 Anon touched the grass on the exit of turn two which let us get in front... From here I couldn't shake Faine he managed to stay in my slip stream every lap... I was losing out so much time here battling... I just trying to keep my head down and not make mistakes... The front 3 kept disappearing every lap... I pitted on lap 12, with Faine and Anon pitting on lap 11.. I put in 10 litres of fuel and ended up about 2 seconds behind Faine sitting in 4th place (after warrior dropped out) By Lap 19 I had caught back up to Faine, he made a mistake into the tunnel hitting the wall which allowed me to get past... Until out of the tunnel into the right hair pin, I was on my normal line turning in then Faine hit the back of me pushing me off the track. He should have given the spot back but instead took the spot and kept going........ I got back on track and fought back, I took the spot back a few laps later and kept pushing on finally getting away from battling with him and I started to put some good lap times down. I pushed my pit stop out to lap 27 doing a 15lap stint, I think Anon was pretty close behind he pitted 2 or 3 laps before me? After this pit stop he got in front of me, this time I had clean air fresh tyres and lowish on fuel.. I put my head down and did consistent 08.0's and 2's catching at a rate of knots, doing my FL in the mean time I had a good few lap battle with Anon without losing too much time (thanks mate for good wheel to wheel clean racing mate) Lap 36 coming around T2 I see MINT off to the left hand side coming back onto track... I was thinking Oh NO!!!! I felt really bad and felt like I didn't deserve it however luck just seemed to fall into my lap... After this I see the pace on Dan dropping off massively, I thought... Nah must be playing? :O but he started running out of fuel... my god... I think I still would of hit Dan so he could take the win if he did run out of fuel Again a well-deserved win mate! After all this I think, I am now leading the Championship by 2 points to Dan.. LOL with MINT in 3rd... just 6 points behind... Wow what a start to the season! Now onto the next big event! the sprint round! I am really looking forward to this one! Thanks lads

MINT_GTR (3rd): Wow, doesn't this car produce cracker racing, great race everyone Qualifying was always going to be close this round, so I was pleased to start 3rd off the line. For the opening laps, I enjoyed a front row seat to the "Dan and warrior swapping for the lead show" as I waited for a gap to appear which finally happened on lap 7. Being in the show wasn't much fun though so I pitted early on lap 8, to avoid any contact on my behalf. It proved the better option as I was closing the gap in fresh air until warrior DSC?!? I almost crashed in shock, bad luck mate I regathered to find myself in the lead after dan's pitstop. That was short lived though, as my pace was shocking for some unknown reason so dan cruised up, chewed and spat me out with relative ease. I struggled to the final stop on lap 25. I came out 4odd seconds behind and with a comfortable gap to 3rd. I was content and started finding my normal rhythm again. That was all well and good until my left arm starting tiring towards the end and at the exit of cnr 2 on lap 37, the grass proved too hard for my arm to correct and I spun I regathered and finished on the final step of the podium. Congratulations to Dan, pole, FL and win, too good and well deserved Well done to Rotor or should I say Mr. Consistent, 2 2nds, great start to the season After all that, I am all smiles this week, to be able to grid up and race instead of spectate was awesome considering the outlook earlier in the week. I will take each week as it comes although next week, reverse grid sprint race.....OH GAWD!!!!

Anon666 (4th): Lot's of battles and grass on my tyres, glad it's done.

N64TheStig007 (8th): It was a pretty eventful race from my perspective, despite it being rather lonely for most of it. I was spewing that I managed to ruin it all on the first lap like I had done so many times during practice, if that hadn't of happened, I'm sure I could have gone for a top 6 finish. But racing is all about IF's. IF I hadn't have spun, IF warrior hadn't of disconnected, IF Mint didn't spin, IF Dan ran dry 30m earlier, the list goes on. It was pleasing to catch the pack by the pitstops, and then pass Pringles in the pits, but I got too far ahead of myself and lost focus. The battle was fantastic @zampli, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Well done Dan, just remember to put more fuel in the car next time! Can't wait for the next race where hopefully my championship will be back on track.

Mister_Bond_747 (10th): Yeah, well done Dan , Rotor and Mint. Bad luck Warrior. Something was definitely up with connection as I couldnt see anon or rotor on track!? Qualied well with an 108.4. Started well, finding my groove. All going well until about lap 3 after @Faine (really want to check this relpay) pushed me wide into corner 2, hit the grass and spun!!!!!! Came back on and had an epic battle with stig 1 and stig 2 with pringles in the mix. All went well until pit stop and hit a full tank of gas . The rest of the race was down hill. Felt like the car had an anvil stuck to it. Almost like the fuel was not running out. Was running in the 1.09s for the rest of the stint even though my prac race pace was low 1.08s, my best lap 1.07.85. Anyway, there's always next week. Hope to be challenging somewhere up the front again. Certainly going to be interesting it being sprint and reverse grid. I think might end in tears.

fastboysmith (11th/DNF): That race went to from lap 1, spun at entry to turn 1 and then proceeded to put it in the wall at the tunnel entry at like 100km/h only 50k slower than normal, then coming out of the final hair pin put it on the grass and spun. After about another 15 laps and about 25 more F ups I lost all motivation tried to set a fast lap on low fuel and only got a 18.5 then parked it.

Nice write up there N64TheStig007. Well done GTP_DHolland for the triple crown: Pole, fastest lap and race win (just!). Well done also to R0T0R_AU86 and MINT_GTR for the final podium positions.

Now we will move on to Division 2. Here's t_b_williams with the report:

Round 2 of GT6's third season saw the drivers head to Grand Valley's East Reverse layout.



Natmanscoop secured pole position from CobMcCool, Leeboy, T_B_williams, Crunch630, Motorsports560, Come_And_Get_Me7, BeauAlbert6, Razor4797, Tovey_4Saken, Slambobagan,F1R3W1ND, and Stucar rounded out the 13 car grid.

Everyone got away reasonably well and piled into the first turn, but it would still be Natman to remain in the lead, with CAGM fearing the worst, being dropped back to 12th. The opening laps were hard fought with the pack still close. Leeboy had an unfortunate off at Turn 2 which would see him drop back to 9th from 3rd on lap 3, and T_B_ did the exact same thing while in 3rd spinning out of Turn 2 on lap 8, only he had to wait for all but one car to pass by before being able to rejoin a clear track. CAGM had already pitted early on lap 5, trying a different strategy to try and climb back up the order after a disappointing start.



By lap 10, Cob had taken the lead, driving a great race for Bruce Hale Racing, 2nd was Natman, Motorsports, Slambo, Stu (great drive from last on the grid), Beau, Razor, Tovey, Crunch, F1R3, Lee, CAGM, and T_B_ now last.

Stu was on a charge, after suffering a disconnect during qualifying, necessitating a last place grid spot, the Division 2 captain was in 6th chasing Beau before pitting on lap 11.


Racing was close. Tovey and Razor.

Pitting early had worked for CAGM, by lap 14 after most had pitted, the NLR driver found himself in 3rd! Slambo and Stu had also been having good runs, now in 4th and 5th respectively.

By lap 20, Cob still had the lead from Natman and CAGM, Slambo and Stu were still 4th and 5th while Tovey was 6th showing pace but having been involved in a few 'racing incidents'. Razor, Motor, and Beau were 7, 8, and 9 while Lee was hounding F1R3 for 10th. Crunch was in 12th in close company with T_B_ as the pair fought for position whilst trying to catch back up to the pack.



With the pack now spread, the racing subdued, with only a couple of battles remaining heading into the final stops. That is until Slambo put it on the grass and into the fence at Turn 2, dropping him back into the fight for 4th with Razor and Beau.



Lap 26 saw another unfortunate DSC for Stu after having worked his way from last on the grid, to running in position for the last spot on the podium.

By lap 29, everyone had stopped for the final time and the order was:

1. Cob
2. Natman
3. CAGM
4. Tovey
5. Slambo
6. Motorsports
7. Razor
8. F1R3WIND
9. Leeboy
10. Beau
11. T_B_
12. Crunch

The battle for 6 - 9th was fought hard with positions changing every lap, but the top 3 had made the time and had a gap on each other and the rest of the field.

CobMcCool would come away with the victory with well driven race, from a fast Natman, and a determined CAGM. The podium was followed by Tovey, Slambo, Leeboy, Razor, F1R3WIND, T_B_, Motorsports, Beau, and Cruch.



Next week see's the sprints and reverse grid that goes with it. Will this shake up the Division 2 results? Only time will tell.

Till next time race fans............................



Race Quotes:

natmanscoop (2nd): So tight in Quali, I was 6th or so on a 1:08.7, then caught just a sniff of draft on my last lap to bag pole with a 1:08.53 - lucky and happy! I let Cob by early on so we could gap the pack without slowing each other down, but ran too deep into T2 the next lap and touched sand at the turn-in, D'oh! I never made that ground back, Cob was just too consistent. I started a run mid-2nd stint, but Cob found another gear on lap 21 and gapped me while I was on P.B. pace.. . WTF?! Did a string of 1:08.4s in the 3rd stint and got the gap down to 2.4s but I blinked before Cob did, well done on the win it was a super-solid drive.

COME_AND_GET_ME7 (3rd): Well I have mixed emotions after that race.....Qualified 7th after my close to PB 1st lap dropped down the grid from poll. Get a decent start up to 6th in to turn 1 have to ease off a tad to prevent going into the rear of 5th then I get pushed onto the grass on the exit as 2 tried to push up on the inside and make it 3 wide . Just like that I drop 5 or 6 places. By lap 4 I had been pushed and prodded by everyone in the back few and was losing a ton of time. So my original pit strategy of 13, 26 with no fuel on 1st and 50 on 2nd went out the window and pitted lap 4 just to simply get some clean air. Laps 11 through 14 come along and I get to see just were I stand with respect to the rest. I had made up 5 seconds on the leaders who didn't appear to suffer from getting held up in traffic and I simply flew past the rest of the field. A then lonely cruise to the finish line. 18 lap stints were far from ideal as I had to run an extra 1/4 of a tank of fuel than I normally would and after 10 laps the tyres begin to noticeably wear and by 15 you've gotta go 10-15k's slower to keep her off the grass..... While I'm happy with the result, I'm still disappointed in my race. If I had been allowed to run my original strategy I knew I had consistent 1:08.5's in me and a best of a 1:08.2 after the 1st pit instead my best lap was only a 1:08.6 with the last 5 or 6 laps of each stint in the mid 9's. Well done Cob and Nat. Not looking forward to the sprint round as I cant simply get out of everyones way by pitting early....

Slambobagan (5th): We'll I had a much better race than last week had no pace at all in practice and qualify was 13th untill my last flying lap and got 10th woohoo. Start of the race was interesting just sat back first few laps and waited for things to settle a bit. Then a traffic jam happened in the tunnel on lap 3 and I thought f** it I'll have a go here stuck it up the Inside at the right hander and got stu and Cagme in one move, after that I was fizzing with excitement that I had pulled that one off and slowly pulled away from the pack and picked my way up to third somehow. Pulled in behind Cagme after the first pit and tried to keep up with him, my lap times getting quicker every lap, had a spin just before my 2nd stop lost 2 spots and got in behind beau and razor who wer going at it. They Both went off track at turn 2 1st razor next lap beau unfortunately got tangled up with beau as he was struggling to find traction on the rejoin and slowed it up a lot to make the turn into the tunnel wasn't expecting it and tagged the back of him. Felt that it wasnt entirely my fault I continued on and found myself catching Tovey setting pb lap after pb lap made a small error 3 laps to go so just backed off a bit to bring it home in a unexpected 5th. All in all pretty good race made plenty of good passes and was contact free apart from beau. Sorry mate.

leeboy910 (6th): I threw it away after a few laps, had a half spin and my tyres were stuffed for another half a lap. Completely ruined my rhythm and then it was just trying to get home in one piece. Made a couple of passes near the end and climbed up to 6th, but pretty annoyed with myself and how pathetic the PD tyre model is. On to next week, championship looks done for me already.

razor4797 (7th): Another round of push and shove.. I qualified 9th I think after an 08.8 which was a decent lap time for me. The field was so damn close! I got a very average start and ended up a few spots ahead after some door-to-door action in the first couple of corners. Pitted on lap 13 and 26 or 27, and both of them weren't great because my pit box was so far back in the lane, alike Crunch's spot. Ended up finishing a decent 7th place which isn't a too bad result on my part, even though I felt I could have been about 5th if I was more consistent. I was pushed off line a few times and off the track twice but I'm okay with that. I understand it's only racing incidents and they aren't too malicious, just need to be a little more cautious. Congrats to Cob for the victory and props to Natman for your pace, and also CAGM for that improvised change in strategy.
Cheers guys and will see you next week for the sprint round.

F1R3W1ND (8th): Pretty easy to back off the throttle a little when you make contact just so you dont take the advantage I had a great race at the back. I missed all the drama this week, or should I say I didn't cause the drama this week

t_b_williams (9th): That was a race that I'd rather forget. Qualified 5th?. Opening laps were mayhem. Got settled and after being dropped down to 7th, managed to claw my way back up to third. Was keeping Cob and Nat in reach and started thinking about the undercut when it happened. Ran wide out of turn 2, right rear caught the grass and looped the car. There was a gap back to 4th place but it wasn't enough for me to get the car straight again so had to wait for the entire field (bar 1) to go by. Pitted on lap 9 and put my head down for some quick laps to try and catch the pack back up. That might have worked, but I lost it in the tunnel all by myself, and then Crunch must have had an issue somewhere as he found his way to the back and we had a massive battle. (great racing) But ultimately I think it slowed both our pace. Beau dropped back to us and now that it was a 3 horse race I was going to pit and find clean air again, but the other two decided on the same thing, so I pulled back onto the track and did one more lap. It was enough to pass and gap Crunch and in a lap or two I was in a fight for position with Beau. That spot changed a lot until I was able to pull away and hunt down Motorsports. Managed to get by with a lap or 2 to go, so managed a top 10 finish, which is better than I thought I was going to get.

Crunch630 (12th): Haha! Did anyone have an enjoyable race? No-one's posted about how fun that was yet. Unfortunately, I'm not breaking that spell either. Race was horrid, but I really didn't think I would go so well here after just not being able to find the pace. It's a very silly track indeed. I qualified higher than I thought I would, and the start was good, however just a few places where cornering wasn't right and I was back in the thick of the pack, something that I definitely didn't experience in the first race. I learnt where all the complaints and comments last week came from basically =) I enjoyed the pack racing a lot however. It's very different to previous seasons, and more reminiscent of what I've seen of touring car racing; passes are never clear cut, and you need to get that nose in and complete the pass over the entire turn, meaning the car behind needs to be cut off and bow down or cause a collision on exit. Never been in a race where sheer brutally was as prominent as in this one. I like it. To that effect, after 3 laps of a brilliant battle with TB, I tried to call it quits and get either one of us to take control and lead on and have the slower car pulled along via racing line and slipstream to try to grab some additional spots. Unfortunately, we were a bit too close in terms of pace, so it didn't work well, lol. Thank goodness that track's over! It just didn't flow like Deep Forest or Trial Mountain does. Judging on what I saw Beau and TB do last week, I'm sure they likewise don't know how it could go so wrong.

stuart170773 (13th/DSC): Different strokes for different folks.......I love that track, and was glad cyber picked it. I got stuck in the 2 packs in the first 15 laps, was certainly some push and shove going on, nothing too bad from what I could see, but with the car being relatively underpowered, if you make contact or go offline it does cost bulk time...I had some great battles with tovey and Beau, and a few others who seemed to give me enough room. I think I only had very light contact once or twice, which in pack racing like that has to be expected to some degree.... Now I have cooled down I should explain what happened......in qual with about 5 mins to go I was sitting in 3rd, happy as I knew I could hold my own with the guys on the front row, but, when you have to go, you have to go !! Sorry for the message in the lobby, but I didnt want you to start without me! Anyway, when I got back I had been DSC so started rear of grid.....these things happen. I got a reasonable start, but with the 2 battle packs I lost a heap of ground and couldnt shake the few guys I had managed to get past. I decided to pit at the end of 11 to try the undercut, and it did work a treat, jumping 2 spots in the process. I think at that stage I was 5th, behind slambo and CAGME, Slambo spinning I think, and getme pitting for a long last stint. When Getme pitted he was only a few seconds up the road, so I was pretty confident I could cover him with fresher tires in the last stint. I saw cob and nat head into the pits so planned on pitting the lap after, so on lap 27 I made my way into pit lane only to be hit with the "you've been disconected from the network" message as I started thinking about a half decent recovery. Ahhhhhhh, thanks PD, made my night. Well done to Cob for a great drive and Nat for his second. Getme keeps telling us he is slow and rubbish but the last 2 results would suggest otherwise On to the sprint round where things really cant get any worse !

Nice work there t_b_williams. Congratulations to CobMcCool for his race win and fastest lap. Well done also to natmanscoop and COME_AND_GET_ME7 for the final podium positions.

Some great wheel to wheel action so far, lets see how the rest of the divisions faired.

Division 1 Reporter/Photographer: N64TheStig007
Division 2 Reporter/Photographer: t_b_williams
Tables: DRZ-Hatfield
Editor: Jamie (Ad2mny)

I can't take all the credit. Well done to the reporters too