1972 Interlagos 500 Kms [April 14th]

I am also sorry that I missed this race! So much going on after the SJ enduro yesterday. Hope it's a good one and again terribly sorry for taking a spot.

Made the stupid error of raising the brake pressure and changing bias prior to the race and what worked during warmup didn't in the race. The car oversteered a lot during braking. Lost it under braking while having fun with Carl and Tiago and fell back, then lost it again braking in turn 3 and was already dismotivated by seeing that I would not be able to cope with the car for such a long race so decided to quit. Sad because I really looked forward to this race with a mod I like and in a track I was comfortable with.

Lost connexion 10min before the end of quali, was looking forward racing with Tiago

Sorry Guys had a disconnect at about lap 57 I wish to say thank you for allowing me to attend.The standard of driving with you guys is very high and clean. Once again thank you all.

Results are up on the website

Close finish

Guillaume Siebert wrote:

Close finish

Hehe yeah, we were even side by side entering the final lap, but I needed a perfect turn 2 in order to have a slight hope to overtake, but it was far from perfect

Great race with Ricard (and Paul at the beginning), very clean also, it was really enjoyable

Mike Bishop wrote:

Sorry Guys had a disconnect at about lap 57 I wish to say thank you for allowing me to attend.The standard of driving with you guys is very high and clean. Once again thank you all.

Was a joy sitting and speaking with you on TS again, was far to long since the last time, we gotta get the whole TCC group together for another one of these long race, would be really good fun


The event for me didn't go well as I made several misstakes at T3, one saw me in the infield after I tried to rejoin and collected a puncure in the process

Then I came another 30 laps into the race and I jumped at the hill after T3 and the car started steering on me and it appears that when I landed I collected a puncture and suspension damage, how heavy is the Healy to be able to do that?

Had good fun while it lasted battling with Mike as I was slightly faster and had the fun of chasing back the time after my misstakes at T3.

After Mike unfortunatly disconnected I was just trying to be consistent and managed to catch the cars ahead with a consistent fast pace and no misstakes and I hoped to keep that so I didn't have to be last car running but just a couple laps later I went in to hot and wide at T1 as I wanted to leave room to a faster car wanting to lap me.
Ended up in the outfield and survived several perrils, among them the grand seating place but a staionary worker car ended my cars wanting to be in the race and had to pit again.

Just cruised home with cramps in my left leg and a slightly hurting back to take 15th and last running spot, was good fun to drive the car but would have wanted to have more battles for positions but oh well, there will be more events of such fun

Thanks for tonight, was really good fun in total

Andre Cunha wrote:

Well, if its still time to get in the waiting list I would like to join.
Being the race at my country track and using the mod from my modding team , its too much to overlook.

Only catch will be to convince my wife to let me away for so many hours .

André your wife has made ​​you free to race
This really helped to track your knowledge and I must say that I got a very great pleasure
We spent almost the entire race wheel to wheel, it was very fun and very gentleman
Thank you very much for this time (2:45) and next time I hope

Would be interested to see what Strategies people had i went for 2 pit stops and kept with the Soft tyres
was very pleased to finish 7th ...
Cannot understand where my setup went so i found myself with 2 mins to go fumbling around trying to make a non symetrical
setup not ideal but it went ok ....

Also i forgot to assign a key for lights so i would like to say thank you to all the backmarkers you where all very considerate
sorry i did not flash you back as i passed


I Spent most of my race battling with Jean Louis and Balázs Kiss ... It Was looking good until the Pit stops
after my 2nd Pitstop i spent many laps trying to catch Jean Louis managed to get the gap down to 7 seconds
but then the mistakes started creeping in and god did i need to stand up

Had some Nice Laps with Alberto , Tiago , Frank ,Jean Louis , Yves ,Balázs and Paul ..

Congrats to Ricard ,JP and Tiago ... It Looked a very exciting race at the Front ...
Congrats all finishers

Thx To HSO and Ben and Frank for organizing , Managed to beat you both for a change

My first top 5! Must be those right turns kicking my arse.

My quote of the day:

"No Jonatan don't do it...DON'T DO It...SEE THE BLUE FLAG...AWWWW $%^&!!!! ..........Man, I hope he does not slide too far in the infield and get DQ'd"

I do not think you could have timed that much worse. FYI, I was in 2nd at the time

Man you scared several pounds of sweat out of me there. The hit tweaked my front end but I was still pretty fast but pushed like a truck from then on in turn 1 and 2. Once my tires wore down I almost got butt boned by S2000 and S3000 cars I was able to pass on the pit straight. Damn that was a bit scary.

75% of the field finished, not bad!


Thank you to the lapped cars, especially David Jundt. You showed super restraint when we came upon that crash. Much appreciated.

Edit: Grats to Ricard but double grats to JP in that S3000 Alfa. Man you carved that track up!!!

Edit: Oh no #$%^, 2 from the US in the top 5? No right turns...must be the reason.

Wife and kids pulled me out this afternoon unexpected. Sorry to have taken a spot. I was so looking forward to the race in the Chevron...

Mike Becnel wrote:

Edit: Oh no #$%^, 2 from the US in the top 5? No right turns...must be the reason.

Mike, the same thing flashed through my mind when I took the lead from Ricard and JP early on!! These "left turn only" Americans are running up front for a reason.....hahahaha.

Well, I've always been a sports car guy and although I did have a little bit of a "Stock Car" setup on the car it really wasn't very radical. Finding myself in first was a unique experience I don't get to feel much anymore and eventually old age settled in and I found myself losing concentration enough that they both got by. JP and Ricard were battling pretty hard so I thought it wise to sit in third a few feet back. As it turned out I was able to regain the lead when they had issues but my pitstop strategy and sheer number of laps would prove my undoing. They both pitted earlier than I and the time they made up on fresh rubber was incredible. By the time I was done with service they were 1/2 a lap ahead.
I had a few offs and found myself in big trouble with Yves in another Alfa right on my tail. We battled back and forth several times. Towards the end I messed up again and he was by to the tune of 6 seconds!!!!! Luckily I remembered something I'd learned in practice with fresh tires and was able to catch and pass him back for 3rd.


Thanks to all for a great race.

je me suis bien amusé même si j'ai fait la moitié de la course en hard , ce qui n'était pas le bon choix , car j'étais 1s moins vite.
Après le 2e pit j'ai pu remonter dans le classement , avec une belle bagarre avec Carl !!

merci aux organisateurs !!

Carl Larrad wrote:

Also i forgot to assign a key for lights so i would like to say thank you to all the backmarkers you where all very considerate
sorry i did not flash you back as i passed

Probably because your car DID NOT have lights!

Quote :

Also i forgot to assign a key for lights so i would like to say thank you to all the backmarkers you where all very considerate
sorry i did not flash you back as i passed

Well your car didn't have any headlights so don't worry about that

Today I feel a bit sad to have quit the race so quickly, but now I have had a rest and see things differently. To be honest, starting a 2.5 hour race at 9 PM is a bit too tolling for me, I am tired after battling all day with the kids and being out from home. No wonder when I felt the car difficult to drive the first thing that went through my mind was hitting ESC

Mike Becnel wrote:

My first top 5!

And first podium in class

Jean-louis Petillot wrote:

même si j'ai fait la moitié de la course en hard , ce qui n'était pas le bon choix

Ah ?

Moi, j'ai fait toute la course en hard avec un seul arrêt, nickel !

Yves Plaçais wrote:

Jean-louis Petillot wrote:

même si j'ai fait la moitié de la course en hard , ce qui n'était pas le bon choix

Ah ?

Moi, j'ai fait toute la course en hard avec un seul arrêt, nickel !

moi aussi j'ai fait un seul arrêt , mais les softs tenait sans problème , et je gagnait 0.5 à 1s au tour avec
j’aurai fait un meilleur résultats mais avec des si !!!


au fait je sait pas si tu es au courant mais Gogo ( greg ) est décédé à l'age de 37 ans !!

Je ne pensai faire qu'1 seul arrêt avec les soft mais j'ai du mal calculer ma conso et j'ai du m'arrêter à 8 tours de l'arrivée pour en rajouter une louche ce qui me fait perdre le podium de la classe 2 l au profit d'André
Celà dit vu qu'il roulait en Porsche 910 et moi en Chevron, il a bien mérité son podium

Sinon existe-t'il beaucoup de circuit routiers qui ne tournent qu'à gauche
Je dis ça parce qu'hier soir j'avais le bras droit tout endolori

Merci encore à l'organisation pour nous permettre de participer à de telles courses

Paul Nadeau wrote:

They both pitted earlier than I and the time they made up on fresh rubber was incredible. By the time I was done with service they were 1/2 a lap ahead.

My strategy was straightforward : I pitted when the tank was empty, and I was quite happy it happened just after mid race

Bien content d'avoir réussi à terminer. N'ayant quasiment pas essayer le circuit avant, j'ai fait les qualifs avec le plein et les hards pour avoir les sensations de la course. Du coup, j'ai fait une stratégie à 1 arrêt, et n'ayant toujours pas idée de la tenue des softs, j'ai repris les hards pour le 2ème run.

Thanks a lot at all the lapped guys, sorry when I overtook you, and make fault just after.
Grats to Ricard and JP, nice race.
Carl : Frank and me, we'll take our revenge at the next race.

A very loooong race.

The start was weird, mainly because most of the people still have a hard time ligning the cars into order before the "green". Had a small bump in my rear at the begining, damaging the car, but not too serious. Then disaster, watching Ben in my rear mirror , wasn't aware that Frank missed T3 and hit him pretty hard when he was coming back into the track so had to pit because the car had a puncture. It was a shame because I could've easily made the entire race with 1 stop and soft tyres.

The Chevron is really an enjoyable car

Mike Becnel wrote:

My first top 5! Must be those right turns kicking my arse.

My quote of the day:

"No Jonatan don't do it...DON'T DO It...SEE THE BLUE FLAG...AWWWW $%^&!!!! ..........Man, I hope he does not slide too far in the infield and get DQ'd"

I do not think you could have timed that much worse. FYI, I was in 2nd at the time

I'm terribly sorry for that Mike, I thought I was all alone on that area of the track for another bit of time when I tried to rejoin there

Congratulations on your top 5, very well done

Well, what a race!
At the start JP got me and I followed him for the first laps, I overtook him soon and tried to open a gap.
He followed me closely until he made a mistake in T3 and he went to the grass. I was alone in the lead for some laps, but I relaxed too much and I also went long in T3, spinning and losing all the gap I had, I was 3rd behind Paul and JP.
I couldn't go as fast as I wanted because my right rear tyre was up to 120ºC sometimes, making my car oversteer too much.
We fought hard for the lead for many many laps, eventually Paul fell behind and then it was JP and me fighting for the rest of the race. At one point during the race I gave JP a little hit in T3 and he spun, I waited for him to rejoin and it wasn't too bad, I hope.
At more or less halfway point JP pitted, I emptied my fuel tank and a few laps later I pitted as well. I started the race with soft compound, and I was glad to find out that they lasted more than I thought, the front wheels would easily make the full race, so I only changed the rears and filled the tank.
When I was back from the pit lane JP was nearly 10 seconds in front of me, so I started pushing as hard as I could.
I made a big mistake in T3 again, going long and losing some more seconds.
I slowly closed the gap, and starting lap 118 I was right behind him. I outbraked him in T3, and I thought I could open a gap. But I was wrong, he stayed right behind me, and we had a very close fight, we arrived to the last lap side by side, I braked hard in T1, I knew I had to get T2 perfectly to prevent JP from outbraking me into T3, I made it and I could cross the line first!
I was exhausted, It was a very very hard race, but very enjoyable.

Big grats to JP for the fantastic race we had! Also grats to Paul for the podium, and to Tiago for the S2000 win!

See you in more open events.

Guillaume Siebert wrote:

Mike Becnel wrote:

My first top 5!

And first podium in class

I thought the podium was a soon-to-be-corrected stat error. Sweeeet. Two zeros gone. I may need to mount machine guns (to the rear...for use when being lapped) to eliminate the 0 under wins.


And no worries Jonatan, we both survived! I will install a cattle bumper on future cars