Season 2 - NGT Sprint race 1: Barcelona
With season 1 all but a distant memory it's a brand new shiny start back to Barcelona to kick off the new season.
The entry list for season 2 is looking worryingly strong so despite some hard practice during the off-season, I reckon I'll do well to hold my own and finish as high as I did in season 1 (9th if you are interested!).
Barcelona's never bee a happy hunting ground though, as witnessed by my 19th place finish in this event last season. The 1FPS bug tends to always bite here too but I was pinning my hopes on a fix to sort that out (it worked - hurrah!).
Qualifying has always been a weakness but I was delighted (and somewhat amazed) to be lying in 6th on the grid with a new PB and just a couple of minutes to go in qualifying. Went to get a drink only to find PaulW had pipped me with just a few seconds to go! Bah! Still, I'm glad it was a teammate rather than someone else.
So, I was in 7th and new addition Mark Jonzo a tremendous 10th, all three in the top ten. Good going NGT Legends!
The race started badly... Greg130 got the jump on us from 8th with a well timed run on the long start/finish straight, overtaking both PaulW & I. PaulW then went wide on cold tyres a couple of corners later to let me nick through and re-take 7th.
The game was on. Greg130 wasn't pulling away and PaulW was bearing down on me, we were very closely matched. Fate decided to intervene however with Edza experiencing technical problems and his stationary car left mid-track. Greg & I somehow avoided him but PaulW wasn't so lucky going off in spectacular fashion (as viewed from my rear-view). I was amazed he could carry on.
My pursuit of Greg continued, less than 0.5s separated us but he wasn't putting a wheel wrong, despite a few tentative stabs, there was no opportunity to try a passing move. After 20mins my obligatory unforced error, I missed my braking point by a fraction, over-corrected and span, watching Greg disappear into the distance.
As we'd pulled out quite a distance over the 8th place driver, I was able to safely re-join in 7th despite my over-heated tyres.
Rich_A was catching me from 8th though and as we came up to some back-markers I was very concious of this. Trying to get a good run on Tom Cooper for an overtaking move on the start/finish straight I misjudged it, realised I was going to nudge him, over-braked and left the track again to let Rich through. Very disappoining as both mistakes were entirely down to me.
No more incidents saw me finish 8th, a considerable improvement on last seasons 19th! A couple of team points into the bargain made for a satisfactory night's racing.
With season 1 all but a distant memory
The entry list for season 2 is looking worryingly strong so despite some hard practice during the off-season, I reckon I'll do well to hold my own and finish as high as I did in season 1 (9th if you are interested!).
Barcelona's never bee a happy hunting ground though, as witnessed by my 19th place finish in this event last season. The 1FPS bug tends to always bite here too but I was pinning my hopes on a fix to sort that out (it worked - hurrah!).
Qualifying has always been a weakness but I was delighted (and somewhat amazed) to be lying in 6th on the grid with a new PB and just a couple of minutes to go in qualifying. Went to get a drink only to find PaulW had pipped me with just a few seconds to go! Bah! Still, I'm glad it was a teammate rather than someone else.
So, I was in 7th and new addition Mark Jonzo a tremendous 10th, all three in the top ten. Good going NGT Legends!
The race started badly... Greg130 got the jump on us from 8th with a well timed run on the long start/finish straight, overtaking both PaulW & I. PaulW then went wide on cold tyres a couple of corners later to let me nick through and re-take 7th.
The game was on. Greg130 wasn't pulling away and PaulW was bearing down on me, we were very closely matched. Fate decided to intervene however with Edza experiencing technical problems and his stationary car left mid-track. Greg & I somehow avoided him but PaulW wasn't so lucky going off in spectacular fashion (as viewed from my rear-view). I was amazed he could carry on.
My pursuit of Greg continued, less than 0.5s separated us but he wasn't putting a wheel wrong, despite a few tentative stabs, there was no opportunity to try a passing move. After 20mins my obligatory unforced error, I missed my braking point by a fraction, over-corrected and span, watching Greg disappear into the distance.
As we'd pulled out quite a distance over the 8th place driver, I was able to safely re-join in 7th despite my over-heated tyres.
Rich_A was catching me from 8th though and as we came up to some back-markers I was very concious of this. Trying to get a good run on Tom Cooper for an overtaking move on the start/finish straight I misjudged it, realised I was going to nudge him, over-braked and left the track again to let Rich through. Very disappoining as both mistakes were entirely down to me.
No more incidents saw me finish 8th, a considerable improvement on last seasons 19th! A couple of team points into the bargain made for a satisfactory night's racing.
posted by popabawa at
2:29 pm
