04-12-2019, 08:31 PM
Q left me a second short of my PB in training. I could not put a decent lap together, also the tyres usually gave up on me after two laps anyway. But I was in the upper third of the field, so I can not complain too much. The chaos of the first start did not bother me, nobody really lost out because of it, but it would have been a shame if it would not have ben restarted.
Anyway, I got away well, no incidents on the first laps. There was some interesting stuff going on with the long straights where a slipstream pass is always possible, so I sneakily re-passed faster cars a few times. Luckily for me, some of those got entangled in their own arguments, so after a while I found myself in P4-ish position and tried to settle into a rhythm. The big question for me: I started on mixed tyres, hard on the front and soft on the rear, but the in-car pitstop menu did only show a global soft/hard selection for all 4 wheels. So which ones would I get on my 1-stop strategy? I pitted on lap 18 and I could feel that the car behaved differently, so it was soft all around eventually. Whatever, I tried to concentrate on the driving, not slip too much, and keeping up a consistent (albeit slow) pace. I was lapping in the 1:43s, if I remember correctly. Through pitstops (and mishaps?) of others, I found myself in third place even! Only to find that DC rejoined from the pitlane just behind me and immediately made some pressure. But on those straights, when I thought that he would pass me easily in the slipstream, he pulled out and just could not get past . And in the complex, I was trying not to open doors too wide. That continued for a nice while, but I felt that I could not really keep this until the end, I was already making too many small errors that hurt my tyres. So when DC passed me finally on the entry of T3, I was a bit relieved. I had a tiny contact with Marwin while lapping, but no damage done and I did finish in a glorious P4 with what I am very satisfied.
Teamy Ramon did not fare as well, but bravely soldiered on to P7 with a car severely damaged in the very early phase of the race.
All in all not sure if those tyre games are really my thing, this rubber is really quite unforgiving, overheat them once and you never get them back. But its the same for all and those cars are quite a challenge. The track is OK, the graphics are too dated for me and its such a featureless terrain! I am not really a big fan, but it has grown on me a bit. Its not an easy thing to master.
Grats to the podium people, I was miles off your pace (as usual).
Anyway, I got away well, no incidents on the first laps. There was some interesting stuff going on with the long straights where a slipstream pass is always possible, so I sneakily re-passed faster cars a few times. Luckily for me, some of those got entangled in their own arguments, so after a while I found myself in P4-ish position and tried to settle into a rhythm. The big question for me: I started on mixed tyres, hard on the front and soft on the rear, but the in-car pitstop menu did only show a global soft/hard selection for all 4 wheels. So which ones would I get on my 1-stop strategy? I pitted on lap 18 and I could feel that the car behaved differently, so it was soft all around eventually. Whatever, I tried to concentrate on the driving, not slip too much, and keeping up a consistent (albeit slow) pace. I was lapping in the 1:43s, if I remember correctly. Through pitstops (and mishaps?) of others, I found myself in third place even! Only to find that DC rejoined from the pitlane just behind me and immediately made some pressure. But on those straights, when I thought that he would pass me easily in the slipstream, he pulled out and just could not get past . And in the complex, I was trying not to open doors too wide. That continued for a nice while, but I felt that I could not really keep this until the end, I was already making too many small errors that hurt my tyres. So when DC passed me finally on the entry of T3, I was a bit relieved. I had a tiny contact with Marwin while lapping, but no damage done and I did finish in a glorious P4 with what I am very satisfied.
Teamy Ramon did not fare as well, but bravely soldiered on to P7 with a car severely damaged in the very early phase of the race.
All in all not sure if those tyre games are really my thing, this rubber is really quite unforgiving, overheat them once and you never get them back. But its the same for all and those cars are quite a challenge. The track is OK, the graphics are too dated for me and its such a featureless terrain! I am not really a big fan, but it has grown on me a bit. Its not an easy thing to master.
Grats to the podium people, I was miles off your pace (as usual).