NGT Sprint: Race 8 - Oschersleben
With my closest rival in the standings, greg130, not taking part in this race, it was a great opportunity to pull ahead.
Despite the return of the dreaded 1FPS bug right at the start of qualifying, I managed to improve my recent qualifying performances with a 10th place. Experience has shown in the previous races that a fairly high attrition rate should see me picking up a few places provided I didn't make any mistakes.
As the race started, I was one place behind Picnic, another fairly close rival in the standings, my plan was simple, stay on the track, pick up some places and try to finish ahead of Picnic.
For the first few lasp, Picnic was pulling away very slightly, I was a little quicker on the first section, he pulling it back plus a little more through the final section. We were pulling away quite quickly from 11th place and behind.
Coming through the tricky left double-apex section, Picnic span to let me through, up into 9th. truetom than also span but recovered to keep a bit of gap between us.
Unfortunately, my usual mistake of 'driving in the mirrors' and trying to defend my position against Picnic instead of just concentrating on driving. Picnic make a super move to get past me and put me down onto 10th again.
I then settled to get back into a rythym and try to claw my way back up to Picnic. Although I was again slowly losing ground Picnic span again to let me through and again truetom lost it but to let me through this time! Up into 8th.
This really put the pressure on though, truetom was a fair bit faster but I'd learned from my ealier mistake against Picnic and defended my line valiantly, coming through the first corner, truetom overcooked it and span out into retirement.
10 minutes to go, time to try to relax and continue to hold off Picnic. Despite a couple of attempts, I was managing to grimly hold on, then with 3 laps to go, got the braking wrong on the last corner, Picnic got it right and outpowered me down the start/finish straight. I managed to hang on behind, attempting to return the pressure but to no avail, a 9th place finish.
Some outstanding driving by the top 10 meant that truetom was the only DNF which was very unusual. The race felt like a bit of a lost opportunty to pull some points away from greg130 but at least Picnic only picked up a couple of points on me and I extended my run of top 10 finishes to 7 races.
Not so rosy in the team standings as I failed to score and the Kerb Crawlers pulled to within 4 points.
Good result for PaulW though, a hard-fought 6th place.
With my closest rival in the standings, greg130, not taking part in this race, it was a great opportunity to pull ahead.
Despite the return of the dreaded 1FPS bug right at the start of qualifying, I managed to improve my recent qualifying performances with a 10th place. Experience has shown in the previous races that a fairly high attrition rate should see me picking up a few places provided I didn't make any mistakes.
As the race started, I was one place behind Picnic, another fairly close rival in the standings, my plan was simple, stay on the track, pick up some places and try to finish ahead of Picnic.
For the first few lasp, Picnic was pulling away very slightly, I was a little quicker on the first section, he pulling it back plus a little more through the final section. We were pulling away quite quickly from 11th place and behind.
Coming through the tricky left double-apex section, Picnic span to let me through, up into 9th. truetom than also span but recovered to keep a bit of gap between us.
Unfortunately, my usual mistake of 'driving in the mirrors' and trying to defend my position against Picnic instead of just concentrating on driving. Picnic make a super move to get past me and put me down onto 10th again.
I then settled to get back into a rythym and try to claw my way back up to Picnic. Although I was again slowly losing ground Picnic span again to let me through and again truetom lost it but to let me through this time! Up into 8th.
This really put the pressure on though, truetom was a fair bit faster but I'd learned from my ealier mistake against Picnic and defended my line valiantly, coming through the first corner, truetom overcooked it and span out into retirement.
10 minutes to go, time to try to relax and continue to hold off Picnic. Despite a couple of attempts, I was managing to grimly hold on, then with 3 laps to go, got the braking wrong on the last corner, Picnic got it right and outpowered me down the start/finish straight. I managed to hang on behind, attempting to return the pressure but to no avail, a 9th place finish.
Some outstanding driving by the top 10 meant that truetom was the only DNF which was very unusual. The race felt like a bit of a lost opportunty to pull some points away from greg130 but at least Picnic only picked up a couple of points on me and I extended my run of top 10 finishes to 7 races.
Not so rosy in the team standings as I failed to score and the Kerb Crawlers pulled to within 4 points.
Good result for PaulW though, a hard-fought 6th place.
posted by popabawa at
7:39 am
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