Sunday, 25 January 2015

2015S01W06 - Bathurst 40 min - Race 01

Okay!

I finished my first race of the week. First race that is longer than 40 minutes for me. When I signed up for the race, there were around 35 signups. Pretty large field is what I thought, but it split**.

For someone who didn't get any decent qualifying I was surprised to be on pole position for the race. I think this is my first pole in iRacing yet.
Lead car. Something I am not used to being.

I made a decent start, but conceded 1st to CF and we ran together for a while. Never more than 2.0 seconds apart.
There goes the lead.
The going was good and the Solistices in the race were doing a decent job of letting us through. I noticed that CV was spinning a little out of a few corners and got a little sideways. I had made up ground and was right behind him.
Catching catching.
Going down the hill, I remembered some advice about braking markers, which worked. Got my knickers in a twist and pressed the gas pedal, which made it all go wrong. Had to take a tow.
NOoo!
While sitting in the garage waiting for the tow to complete, I was trying to recollect something I needed to do get out immediately.
Hate getting towed. I wasn't the only one.
Only once the pit stop started and the car got jacked up I realised what it was. Switching off the Fuel Top up and Tyre change. Damn.
You'll see I have the steering turned right in an attempt to flee the pits!
Better late than never, I hit the black box control and stopped the fuel filling, by which time the pit guys had dumped about 30 laps worth of fuel. No worries, keep driving.

NF gets a little squiggly and I dive for the outside.
It was basically hot lapping and treating the session as testing after that. At some point I noticed that NF was slower than me and catchable. I think I had 7 minutes at the time. Some focussed driving had me catch him at the white flag lap and pass him. I thanked him for keeping the passing clean, good on him.
Pass complete. Top 5. Best in this circumstance.
Finished 5th. I really hoped for a podium finish this race, but I guess this is how it goes. I think I like the longer distance. I may do a few more races before track change time.

Race Highlights Video



( ** I'll explain the funda of splitting sometime in another post.)

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