Round 5 - Grand Prix Molson du Canada [Mar 5th]

Well done to David, another Stella drive.

My races have all been similar so far , the car feels good but an uncompetitive pace sees me struggling to compete only picking up places as people have problems, I know their is more speed in Brabham , I hope a can improve as I want to race you guys.

I saw the broadcast yesterday. Man, both of ours commentators rock to say the least. You're really amazing, guys
To your question about my podiums. It's my 13th. I had one last year with a certain Alberto Ibanez (and GianLuca Desposito also) at Kyalami . Well it's not an overall one though.
My last overall one is a looooooooooooong time ago (some could say in another life). It was for the Monza round of the 1972 BRSCC European F5000 Championship the 14/09/2011.
But it's my first one in F1 at HSO (had some with GPL in others leagues)


As for the race that so amazing . I really don't expect to be do such performance here. I was sure I'll never score any point this season even with the McLaren.
But doing a podium with the Berger (one of my favourite driver of that era) McLaren at the Gilles Villeneuve (my first ever favourite F1 driver and still THE F1 legend in my eyes) track (one of the track I'm the most found of in the season)...there's no word to express the feeling.

My set was good thanks to the advices David Jaques gave me. I only make a mistake in my brake balance (too much in front). The car was a delight to drive. It was smooth, predictable and manages to keep the same behaviour all along the race.

But it wasn't a easy one although. I was under a lot of stress all along the race.
During the first 10 laps I've to made huge effort to stop my legs from shaking from stress. Then I managed to calm me down but then I've to fight about my mind drifting apart and stay focus for the entire race. I don't know how but I manage to keep my brain for snapping as hard as usual
Big issue to for me when I start catching the backmarkers. I'm not use at all with this exercice. But all of them play it nice. Thanks to all of you guys . You had all of you facilitate the maneuver as best as you can .

I've got again a huge moment of tension when I start to see Greg's car more and more close to me. Not really easy for me to keep myself together and do nothing stupid then. Catching up one of the fatest driver of HSO is not something I'm used to. The task became more epic as I realized Mike was closer than I tought at first.
I closed to catastroph when I saw Mike trying to overtake me in the start straight at the last moment . We hit but no damage to both it seems. My mistakes Mike
Also nearly eliminate myself at the end of the start straight when I miss my braking point. I had to go agricultural there and nearly hit the wall.
Also do some stupid mistakes (wrong choice of gear at the last chicane, lost of my braking point, entering in corner on brakes which my car wasn't set to do and trying to change my brakes balance at the time). That fight was really a very delicate moment for me. But I manage to keep the car and my racing chances intact.

After Greg retires I decided it was way to risky to try to follow Mike. I wisely chose to focus on consistency and make it to the checkered. Easy to said not so to make. But then, again, I managed to
I was checking where were those behind me but none was close enough to be a menace. So I just do what I'm best at....doing a solid lonely race (good gess from our pair of broadcaster when they said I was in my favorite racing position alone with no one close in front nor behind me ).
I've also had to managed my brakes by braking earlier, managing my engine by not using all the revs. I've also no strategy at the start (so sure I was I'll never pass the first 10 laps). So I've to manage my fuel consumption by lowering the mixture and my tyres (I had no idea if my soft compound could make it without a pitstop). It gives me a bit of headache as I wasn't sure I could make it to the checkered with the fuel and tyres.

And it wasn't the last lap who seems like eternity but the 9 last laps. I was afraid I crashed into a lapped car or being hit by that same car. Or just doing the same small mistake I've done at Monza in WEC and crashed stupidly.
But nothing of the sort happens...Well it happens, but after the checkered. It gave me a moment of fright though as I wasn't sure the race was really over.

Gabriele Del Piccolo wrote:

I hoped you left me race on my line, you had not anyone pushing on you , we were not in battle in any case, but it didn't happen...  the question is : why?

It was not clear at all you were faster than me. At no moment you were in position to make an overtake. So, then, why should had let you pass? Had you car been in my slidestream in one of the straight I'll had let you as I'll had no interest in trying to resist. But it was never the case. I never got a clear sign you were stalled behind me.

And if it's the reason you deliberately hit my car after the checkered it's a bit juvenile reaction to say the least

Well... A somewhat frustrating evening but I did finish the race so in that regard I'm happy after struggling to survive in practice early on.

Practice:
Did my best to get the car to feel good after later on I had a bit of help from David Jaques, thank you very much for this as it helped me to realize that some things I didn't know about could actually help me in the long run.

Managed to get a decent pace in Qualifying but still wasn't sure I'd make the grid.

Qualifying:
Qualifying 1 was a struggle, the car wasn't quite there for me in regards to speed, I was making tweaks after every run and were improving but my last attempt went down the drain after I made a misstake in T3-4.

Looking at the times I expected 22's to be the pace to be sure to make the grid.

After some more setup work I had reached my limit with the setup and it was now all down to me.

In the end in Q2 I was able to get a 22 lap in there and felt like I could have gone quicker but again my last run went down the drain.

But I made the grid so goal for the season still achieved although it was really close this time around


Race:
It got underway and I immedietely took it easy, maybe too easy as I lost positions and after lap 1 I was behind Didier in his Ferrari.

It was a frustrating opening 12 or so laps as I felt that I was quicker in the infield section but as soon as we came out of the hairpin Didier blasted me out of the water and pulled out half a second before we reached the fast left

In the end he made a misstake and ran deep into T3 so I was able to get by but at that time Brian and Rob was allready 17 or so seconds up the road...

Did my best to go at my fastest safe race speed and I was hitting my times but I still lost a second a lap to both Brian and Rob so I settled down after a few laps and dropped another tenth or so a lap on my max laptimes as I wasn't going to get closer without them making misstakes.

Not much else happened apart from a few faster cars being way too aggressive, especially 2 drivers were very on the edge with their lappings seeing me having to take somewhat evasive actions to avoid contact.

Frustrating race as I said as I want to be able to at least race with someone, but thanks to David I now know where to look for improvements, thanks again

Also thank you for organising the event and thanks Didier for a fair fight even though there weren't passes or passing attempts going on, it was a good fight just to keep up for me

Cheers and see you all in Mexico

Ludovic Tiengou wrote:

It was not clear at all you were faster than me. At no moment you were in position to make an overtake. So, then, why should had let you pass? Had you car been in my slidestream in one of the straight I'll had let you as I'll had no interest in trying to resist. But it was never the case. I never got a clear sign you were stalled behind me.

Into the hairpin and into the chicanes , in many times i was close to your wheels.. i don't understand why you keep me back without any plausible reason. You had two possible and reasonable chioces: go ahead with your standard pace, you have a V12 Honda with 100bhp more than a V8 Judd, or give me the way to race, selecting the fuel economy trim to do the remaining laps without taking any risk..

Gabriele Del Piccolo wrote:

Into the hairpin and into the chicanes , in many times i was close to your wheels.. i don't understand why you keep me back without any plausible reason. You had two possible and reasonable chioces: go ahead with your standard pace, you have a V12 Honda with 100bhp more than a V8 Judd, or give me the way to race, selecting the fuel economy trim to do the remaining laps without taking any risk..

Have you read all I said? Don't think so. You stay just focused on your opinion without hearing my point of view. I write that at no moment had you made your intention clear.

So you should have help me a little to understand them. Ok there's no horn nor light to help. But, for instance, you could have shift your car on the inside of the track at Casino as if you were trying to overtake me there. That's a clear enough signal of "Come on....Let me pass".
You could have also done the same in any straight.

But all you did was to follow my line. ALWAYS. Sorry but it's not the sign of a guy whose trying to get in front of you. It's just the sign of a guy wanting to follow your pace.

Next time think about it. Don't assume the driver in front of you will naturally react the way you want. Give him a sign of your intention. It will help him to better understand and make the better call.

As I said had you given me any clue I'll have let you pass.

Bien que loin du compte en performance j'ai au moins vu l'arrivée et c'est déjà un succès pour moi sur un Mod avec lequel je n'ai toujours pas le feeling....mais ça va surement venir !.....Une solution pour moi serait déjà de passer plus de temps en préparation car ce Mod est très exigeant, mais je n'ai pas plus de temps, donc je me contente pour l'instant d'essayer d'atteindre l'arrivée, et de ne pas faire d'erreurs......Au passage, je n'en avais pas fait non plus à Monaco (d'erreurs)......mais je n'avais pas vu l'arrivée .

Bref.....merci d'abord à Michal qui me fait bénéficier de ses excellents set up de la Ferrari (même si je reste encore à 3 sec au tour en moyenne de ses chronos), et merci à Jonathan pour cette course parce j'ai pu avoir avec lui un peu de bataille bien sympa, ce qui a agréablement animé mon début de course, comme quoi un très bon pilote avec un mauvais châssis.......et l'inverse....peuvent se retrouver sur la piste :-)

Après, j'ai été très seul tout le long de la course et j'ai juste essayé de ne poser de problème à personne quand j'étais lappé.

RDV à la prochaine course

NB: juste un avis qui n’engage que moi....je ne sais pas si le Mod ne peut accueillir que 26 voitures sur la grille...mais s'il peut en accueillir plus, quitte à déroger un peu à la réalité de la saison 91, je trouve que ça serait sympa que plus de pilotes puissent prendre le départ parce que de très bons pilotes se trouvent privés de participation à cause des châssis dont ils disposent (exemple mon ami Yves à Montréal)...et je trouve que ça n'est pas très équitable même si je comprend la philosophie de "coller" à la réalité.

Well, My initial plans were to just make the race. Early on in practice I was running 25's with my own set, which told me that I could gain at least 2 seconds with a proper set. David shared his work thus far with me and I was wrong....I gained 3 seconds....Which put me well into the 22's, which is where I thought I needed to be to make the race. Q1 was a disaster for me, I had relocated my shifter to a more stable mounting on my desk. This was a bad idea, IO wasn't used to reaching that far for it and it was also moving on me, add to that I had my 8 year old bothering me. When I finally moved the shifter back to it's normal location I put in a conservative lap to get a time in and ran a 25. I began pushing for the next lap and as I was coming down the back straight I was greeted with everyones favorite message to pit now or be DQ'd to say I was pissed would be an understatement, I was nearly 5 seconds up on my previous lap AND I was only on Lap 10, per the lap counter.

Q2 was better I managed to get it to a 22, but I wasn't able to replicate my pace from my last lap on Thursday. Regardless, I was in and thats all that mattered.


Race day, I had one primary plan and a few secondaries. Primary and most important was to just finish the damn thing. If I was in a position to race I would, but I needed to get through the first couple laps first. But coming to the "bad" chicane after the hairpin, I dunno if I was hit or what but I braked like I normally do and it pushed out way wide and I lost the front wing and did some suspension damage as well. After pitting I limped out and the plan was to see if I could catch anyone....It was pretty obvious right away I could not. So I buckled in for a long race and just tried to stay out of the way. I ended up needing 2 possibly 3 more front wings as the cars handling became very erratic. There were a few places where the car was normally very stable that it would just, seemingly at random, become unstable. But, I DID Finish, and I stayed out of everyone's way.

So we'll move on to Mexico and start all this over again.

Well Ludo, we have two opposite opinions, nothing to say anymore. I will try to be more visible on your mirrors with the Lola-Larrousse Hart-DFR.. not more

Thought id just let you all know i didnt just bail and quit early on. My g25 decided to shift alignment,

To go straight i was at a 45 degree angle left