Round 8 - RAC British Grand Prix [Apr 23rd]

Steve, we are with you.

I don't want to say "my condolences" yet, but I am sorry to hear that Steve Stay strong!

Take care Steve, we're all thinking of you...

sorry my dear Steve

Not a very happy news for you Steve ....let's hope he'll go peacefully surrounded by all he loves in his life.

Was having great fun, but then as i entered the complex the engine decided to let go. It's a shame, but i hope to be back in a car for Hockenheim. 

The good:
- head tracking is AWESOME! I absolutely love it, it makes racing so much more intense and natural. I can only recommend it
- i made some significant changes to setup from Francois (in general moved everything towards oversteer) and the car FINALLY does what i want.
- this was by far the most competetive race i've had with F1 91. So many wheel to wheel battles, i had a lot of fun. Though Richard or Jan might think otherwise, as sometimes it was maybe a bit too close.

The bad:
- pretty much nothing

The ugly:
- unfortunately, i didn't judge properly passing of one slower car. That car happened to be driven by poor Jason and i knocked his rear wing off. It ruined my race, too, but Jason was an innocent victim and i owe him an apology
- obviously, i crashed out, as i went into gravel and ended up in the wall with broken suspension.

All in all, it was the first race in 1991 season that i really enjoyed. Apart from the bad taste in my mouth for hitting Jason, of course...

And now off to watch Indycar at Barber's

I have to consider driving F1 1991 car. I did not have any time for practise for qualification so I was fortunate to get a place on grid.

Preparation for race looks better until I saw what times other drivers did. I was totaly of the pace. No matter that I decided to make setup as save as possible and try to stay on track at least. From the beggining it was quite fun, I even gathered some positions. Pace was as I expected but few drivers were slower then in warm up so I was comfortably on 16th spot. And sudenly without any reason totaly stupid mistake...agan, in Magny Course it was the same. I am realy ashamed for my stats and going to be the best crasher around

I am affraid I am simply not able to finish the race with this beast (and Lotus is even one of the most well raedable cars). I will decide after next race...

Yet another DNF...

I mean, I had a wonderful start. I absolutely like having a longer 1st gear for the starts and I think I did pretty well in the first two laps, until Ludovic hit me in the side at Stowe in lap 3... knocked my front wing off and damaged my suspension.. I mean, it most likely wasn't on purpose, but that kinda ruined my race already.
So, I had to do an emergency pit stop and I landed in... I think 21st.
About 30 laps later, I find myself in P9, chasing after David Jundt, who had an even more crippled car (I didn't know that but I thought "I'm catching up on him pretty quickly, that should be doable") and just as I was behind Francois, at Bridge he spun and stopped on the track and I, at 260 kph, couldn't avoid him... So, I basically knocked him clean off the race. Really sorry for that, I should've tried to evade.

Well, next stop: Hockenheim!

Once I finally get a "weapon" of a car, I freaking crash it at the pit entry.

WHY did I decide to pit? Damn, I should've stayed out and waited for Dave to catch me(or not).

This was my big chance for big points, my first '91 win(to end DJ's streak) and generally a great position.


Really disappointed after such a great start to the race...


But imo, I wasn't far too good for the Benetton(as I thought). It actually really made for a great and exciting battle with David for the win.

Hope to get another chance for big points later in the season maybe...

At least I got to lead a race again, even the most laps.

ANTHEMS

WINNING DRIVER





WINNING CONSTRUCTOR

I enjoyed this race very much.
I had few nice "battles", even, I lost every one

Hard tyres showed great, I could have tryed even not to pit, but late pitstop allowed soft for last 20 laps, and I anulated that loss of time.

If Jason hadnt slowed me down for a sec (just a missunderstanding), I could have cought Mick for 2nd.

Nice race, again, thank you all!

EDIT: there is a nice feature in my "race status" bar, with every race I finish, I have one win more!!
Kool!

Well that was a de Cesaris type race for me. Had a decent start, went too conservative into Copse and at least 2 guys got by me. Made it through the smoke, debris, and carnage in Maggots and Becketts. Heading into Stowe I got on the brakes early, and drove right into the back of Yves, losing my front wing. I then got ping-ponged through the next 2 or 3 corners just simply trying to get out of the way. After pitting and replacing I got back out and just tried to stay out of the way. I had a pit of suspension damage but it wasn't really enough to warrant parking.

 Through attrition I made up 2 positions from where I started. This one upset me, the car was fast. Even with damage it was still fast. David and David would pass me and drive off into the sunset, everyone else it would take 3 or 4 laps to just get away from me, a few of you guys I could've unlapped myself from but I opted to slow and open a gap up so I wouldn't.

 Either way, was a decent race, I think I could've scored points this time and I finished so...


 Yves, I am really sorry for hitting you, I was trying to avoid issues in the opening laps.

Petr Hlavac wrote:

The good:
- this was by far the most competetive race i've had with F1 91. So many wheel to wheel battles, i had a lot of fun. Though Richard or Jan might think otherwise, as sometimes it was maybe a bit too close.

I lost 2 seconds per lap and it ruined my first set of tyres (LF had no grip then), but thats racing. Was a bit surprised because the fight cost more time than it helped you even you could have hold the two Leyton House behind you

Race

Happy to clinched 5th place, it was the maximum. I hadn´t practiced much, but was happy to reach the 1.29s. But against the group 1 and 2 cars i have no chance with my pace. Going 4th for the title race after the race isnt bad, but well i would like to go further up

Results and points are up

not too satisfied today after effort put in preparation, Q are good but speed in races is stil poor


and i am today angry to some lapped racers, some of them didn make room readable and once i was about to crash with him , and there was one i blue car who 2 time lost me many seconds (once 4 and i lost tempo then a little) so it destroyed my undercut by pits to Raul

so i went again to track and set new PB for hotlapboard to make little better feeling from today effort

grats to David for another win


next time is track which i didn like a much and i am afraid if the fuel will last whole race

race dedicated to Bob Wilson

he helped me to my first overall hso win, and started off this streak. he was always great to talk and drive with, he will be sorely missed.

dave

Jason White wrote:

Results and points are up

hmm 2nd fastest lap of the race and by + 0.028s

Like many others, I'm bummed and frustrated.

First few laps went very well, until Ludovic botched the slow left and hopped curb in frt of me. In the worst place I tapped brake to avoid hitting him and losing my frt wing, this pitched me sideways in frt of Petr and pack causing contact and lost my frt wing anyway...also pretty bad left frt susp damage, and last on track.

Carried on to eventually have some fun with G. Ryon as we headed for top 10, but he spun in frt of me after a successful, bold move, and again I lost frt wing.

In last few laps got very close t Riddall for top 10, but car was a mess, Ray was steady, and a lapped car thumped me 3 times as I tried to go by. Not sure what that was all about? But I spun in a fit of anger, and limped to finish line. I've finally cooled off and now happy to finish after all the nonesense, but these results...

Congrats David, Mick, Raul

Jason Fitch wrote:

Yves, I am really sorry for hitting you, I was trying to avoid issues in the opening laps.

No problem, Jason , it's the race !

Well... That was an interesting nights racing...

To get the 1st bit out of the way, I'm sorry that you felt that you were held up by me Michal but at all the times you tried to lap me I was in a battle of my own, hence me not stopping at the side of the road to let you by. 2ndly, a couple of the places you tried to lap me was strange, once into Maggots (where I felt lappings was done way too dangerously due to the way the circuit is run there, this applies to several faster drivers), once into Club from very far back, I left the room just in case, had I turned in like I usually do I'm fairly sure there would have been contact, had you waited you'd have gotten me coming through the righthander instead, and finally coming into Bridge, another place where lappings is close to impossible, had you not forced me to take a slightly wider entry there I'd have been able to move out of the way coming into Priory.
Again, I'm sorry that you felt like you were held up but it takes 2 to tango and at times it's difficult for cars to move out of the way, especially in situations like those mentioned above, I could be wrong in my view though but in that case, could an admin please point me in the correct direction...


Practice & Qualifying:
Struggled with the AGS around here. Its understeery nature made it a handful in all the faster turns (Copse, the Maggots section, Stowe, Club and Bridge) and I couldn't find a way to solve it until I upped the wings but that had a terrible effect on my Qualifying speed, as could be readily seen in Thursdays session...
Played around with the car during Friday and Saturday, and with a bit of help from Pascal and then David Jaques (compared what the 2 were running and compromised 3 different setups from what they had to say about their own ones) and it worked out as I was able to get a 28 qualifying time on my final run, which in itself was .004 from estimated ultimate laptime, which meant I was very satisfied on Saturday evening
Also being able to outqualify Martin, who I consider to be faster than me, was a nice experience as well


Race:

Was quietly looking forward to the race as our mid 34's early race pace in the AGS'es was looking to be competitive with some of the other driver & car combinations.

The race time came and I 1st thought I had jumped the start as I flew past several other drivers but no penalty was issued so I must have done something right. Was up into the top15 by the exit of Copse but then all hell broke loose in the Maggots section when there were smoke, wings, body parts and stuff all over the place, the guy ahead of me checked up locking his brakes so I had to swing the car to the left, slightly nudging his rear end, I hope you didn't have any damage, as I escaped any damage myself but had to drive slowly as to not recieve a penalty for cutting the track and found myself back in 24th or 25th position at the end of Hangar Straight...

"Well, so much for such a fantastic start" I thought but quickly got into the grove and set after the rest of the field and climb a couple of positions as others went off the road or had to pit for damages after that lap 1 debacle.

After a few laps and I was up behind Martin and Didier in the AGS and Ferrari and I joined in on the battle.
I was able to find my way past them, I can't remember where I passed Martin the 1st time but I know I passed Didier in Priory after he made a misstake under braking, think I could have passed Martin the lap before in Brooklands for the same reason.

I set after Ray in the Brabham but once I caught him I made a misstake in going into Maggots and understeered off and both Didier and Martin was able to make their way past again.

What commenced then was a hard but overall fair fight for the upper placings in the teens and then the lower placings in the top 10 as the race progressed. Didier was way slower than me and Martin in the high and mid-high speed turns but had a lot of speed down the straights. Martin was slightly faster while getting the power down while I couldn't drive my usualy style of high mid corner speed and take the speed with me coming out as Martin at times was, comparatively speaking, stopping at the apex of some turns

After what felt like ages, probably around 20 laps I had become quite agitated so when the chance came to once again pass Martin I took it, it was forceful and not very friendly, I'm sorry for the pass Martin, that was not the way I usually pass, I let frustration get the better of me instead of using my brain

Thankfully we both survived and I braught Martin with me as the AGS boys once again hunted Didiers Ferrari. We were able to catch him relatively quickly and I once made my way by but as it was in a situation of Didier braking on a straight to let a lapper by, I felt compelled to let him by once again as he had done in France in the last round.
In the end both me and Martin was able to get by Didier but I can't remember exactly where or when it was as a lot happened in a short time span.

After Pascal went off the road and David had his off at Club I was amazingly, and once again in F1 at HSO, sitting in 7th place with Martin closing in on me little by little.
But, thankfully for me, lappings mostly worked in my favour and when Martin copied my misstake at Maggots from earlier in the race it was more or less sealed.

So the AGS boys finished in 7th and 8th, an excellent result for the AGS team considering our struggles earlier in the season, and great to score our 1st top 10 for the team since Monaco and great job by Martin to get the AGS to move so well with hardly driving the car before jumping into it if I am to guess

Also thank you to all I had battles with and thank you HSO for organising it.

Also, thank you Bob for watching us and smiling as we did our best to live up to your greatness

I have a great feelings from this race. I have finally accomplished my goal, to finish the race. The fact that i finished it on 8th place with such a car as the AGS is something which i didnt expected at all. Again i have to thanks to Jonatan for the race setup which is a bit better than mine and was stable during the whole race. In qualy i used mine setup based on the default with any adjustment and i did 1.28.8 but only in offline session. Anyway with the starting position i was satisfied because easily i got the grid position. In the race i had several nice battles with Ray, Didier and mainly with Jonatan. For Ray i have to apologize for my late braking in T1 where i hit him and damage a bit my front wing (I hope i i didnt cause you some damage on your car) Fortunatelly it didn affect the behaviour of my car so i can continue without pitstop. Situation was good when i was ahead of Jonathan until the first car begun to lapped us. In this traffic i unfortunatelly lost my position towards Jonatan and then i couldnt took it back because of heavy traffic. I hope i will catch him in the next round.

I belive that Bob enjoyed this great race with us.

Still coming to terms with my silly error, not just for me, but for the team(Benetton aswell as Mick and Juha). Juha could've seen his car finish in the points while Mick had a big influence in my steady performance, can't thank him enough for the help. Too bad Benetton didn't make big inroads on McLaren in the end.

I have to say though: This has been the race that I enjoyed the most with this mod. Back in 2013, I wasn't using RF and Leo at all and struggled with the car's strange feeling, not enjoying it as much as I thought. We were also running the "old" Carrera GP4 tracks.

I've got to thank FD for his awesome track edits, aswell as both him and Martin for the setup help with the Dallara.

I also want to thank David(for recurring setup tips) aswell as Jonatan, Mick and Jason.

My thanks also go to the admins(Jason&Richard) for letting me have the Benetton yesterday, it was a blast with it and I may have fallen in love with the B191(I love yellow and blue too). It seems to be a car that's between tier 1 and 2 to me.

Which makes me wonder: Was this a "once-in-a-life-time" exception to drive the car or would I get a second chance?


Btw: I found it a tiny bit... disappointing of Marc&Paolo not returning to the pits when Jason pleaded to, in respect of Bob Wilson

Alberto, where are the

a new engine a better tweaked setup and p3 in the make
just trow it all away by myself and some help
aint gonna spit fire but i was furious and not only of my little mistake


the start was very nice and from the beginning i had p3 even starting to think i could catch Davids Jordan but LOL no way!


realy enjoyed the battle with Jareb and Janak , it was cat and mouse who was going to pit first
i was stretching it to lap 40 so i was sure to keep pace and the backmakers did help to keep the distance
seeing the end result Mick played this race very smart , WD mate!
what was your strategy?

thanks for the kind words guys , means alot, will working this week at hockenheim and have it ready this friday, meanwhile you can practice ofline the 1988 version till its here
sorry but work and short time limits are catching me now , im glad when summer brake arrives

FD