1953 Round 4 - 24 Heures de Spa

Unfortunately time to race has been really short lately. Was able to practice a bit yesterday evening, just to get to know the circuit.

Today I started from the back of the grid and had a great time. Was able to pit without any issues. But as I didn't even knew the average fuel consumption of my Ferrari, made the silly mistake to missing the braking point into Eau Rouge while checking my fuel load versus the previous lap. Hit a wall and destroyed the right front of my car...

Anyway, it was great fun! I hope to be back for the next races, particularly the longer ones!

Cheers!

Championship standings updated .

I will do the race results sheet after I eat something . Meanwhile, provisional results on the hotlap page

--> Official Race Results

That was one messy ride yesterday. I'm getting used to be slow with all these young guns in the field (grats Isidoro and thanks for the setup). But all those mistakes I made... I got spun in La Source in L1. Not an ideal start of the race, but those 10s lost didn't play any role in the greater scheme. I spent most of the daytime fighting with Martin and Mia. I passed them multiple times (no wonder, their cars were at least 20kmh slower in the straight line), but then I pitted, needed more fuel and fell behind them again. Mia then dropped off and it was mostly between me and Martin. Unfortunately, I dropped my wheels on the dirt very often. In most cases I understeered off the track and had so many close calls... I had a great deal of good luck that none of these situations ended up in a massive crash. Night was quiet with barely any cars around. When the sun came up again it was clear that I'm going to fight for P5 in the end, unless something happens. Well, me being me, I got busy with counting the fuel needed to finish the race with half an hour to go, lost concentration and completely forgot to slow down into Blanchimont. Incredible. I smashed into the guardrail pretty hard and ended up in the ditch on the right side. The car was badly beaten, with steering wheel some 20-30 degrees off center. As I had no idea how long a repair of such damage would last, I decided to nurse the battered Jaguar around the track. It took some time to get used to this facelift, but it wasn't totally undrivable, so I went on. Losing 10s per lap, any chance to fight for P5 was gone and I got passed by Rhys in the end, too. Still, finishing at P7 is a small miracle, considering the number of mistakes I made.

Anyway, I enjoyed it a lot. The old Spa is a super important track for me. I had my first ever league race here almost 20 years ago with www.eolc.de and it was also here where I did my first online race with HSO when I got back behind the wheel after my little affair with GBS. And one more thing - that night was awesome. I'm not new to driving in the dark. But doing a night stint at Daytona, modern Spa, Suzuka, Laguna Seca, Dubai or any other purpose built track isn't much different from daylight racing. This was something else. The sense of loneliness while flying 250+ on a broken tarmac in the middle of nowhere was almost romantic. And scary at the same time. The latest addition to my sim rig made it even more intense - I purchased a wind simulator. Buttkicker rambling all the time, darkness, scream of the engine and cool wind blowing in my face... wow. I loved it! Thanks for chosing this accelerated 24hr format. Let's do it again in future  

Grats to Isi, what a drive! And respect to all finishers. See you next time.

I started 3rd in the 2 liter class, but had John Cook and Doc Slappy right behind me and I knew both are better drivers than me.
My start was very cautious, because I wanted to make it through the start and the first laps. This proofed to be quite a challenge with cars and hay bales on the road that we needed to avoid. Fortunately we made it through the first laps and we had a nice fight going on between Doc Slappy , John and me. This did not last long however. Someone crashed in La Source and while avoiding him, I shifted down to early and went sideways. I almost crashed, but kept it going and was able to cut through the grass of La Source. I did lose a lot of time on John and Doc Slappy there, but was still in one piece.
After this drama I relaxed a bit and focused on my own racing. I knew the Maserati was faster than the Bristol so I kept my head down and started chasing @Doc Slappy . I was able to overtake him. Until we made our first pitstop, his stop was much quicker than mine, so I was back to chasing. I overtook him once more and was able to pull away a bit, but not much. Doc was so fast in the Bristol I had a hard time to really get away!
I think I was running fourth then with John, Erwann Burguiere and Mark A Warmington in front of me. All three way out of my league.
Then my luck started (our their bad luck...). First Erwann Burguiere went off and then John.
Without really racing I all of a sudden found myself in second place in class, the best I had ever done.
The rest of the race was about staying alive which almost failed when Petr and I misjudged each others speed going into Masta Kink and he hit me in the back, fortunately we both survived.
Again someone had bad luck, Mark A Warmington went off and I passed him while he was in the pit. I was running FIRST
More careful racing from there on with a late pitstop to make sure I could make it to the flag!
Grats all finishers!

I qualified 26th behind all the Masarati but ahead of the Gordini. I felt I could have gone a bit quicker as my time was set at the start and I felt it rubbered up later (but that could be my imagination). However, I made a mistake into Les Combes and so abandoned my last flying lap. It probably wouldn’t have moved me up the grid anyway (Lord knows how Darren got the Bristol around here in 4:22 last year) and I felt it more important to get some laps in, on full fuel, to prepare for the race start.
I made an ok start and this time I was lucky and the track opened up in front of me. By Eau Rouge I’d made up 5 places. Though Frank and Erwann both powered past through Raidillon. I knew I had a few faster 3l cars behind (and my 2l buddies) but I didn’t want to try anything silly in the first few laps. It turned out quite nicely as I had space to myself for most of the lap up to Stavelot and was able to settle in and feel how the car was.
Climbing up the hill I could Mark and Sebastian queuing up to pass me. But with the rest of the 2l gang close behind I didn’t want to just pull over and I didn’t want to risk a strange line through La Carrierre, especially the tricky second part. Mark got ahead into La Carrierre and I stayed out on the wide line and then followed him through. Unfortunately, he ran wide, then off, on the exit. Sebastian then drove past me down the straight to Blanchomont. I hoped to keep with him through the twistier parts, to be able to get a tow down then up the hill, as now John was catching me.
Next, we all safely got through Eau Rouge past a sideways Rory. I had a decent run up the hill and through to Malmedy and was able to get past Sebastian when he ran wide. He was right back with me though by Stavelot and he was towing John along too. Into Blanchimont he passed me and I tried to hang on in the hope of another tow. Unfortunately for Sebastian, he then ran wide and off on the exit.
That left John, Martin just behind, and me alone in our 2l fight. And we were only on lap 2!
John seemed to have a half-hearted look into Burnenville but wisely held back. Though he didn’t have to wait long as he was through along the Masta straight. Then Martin went through down Holowell. Oh well, a long way to go and I’m still 4 places up on my starting position. Just as I was resigned to a lonely race more drama ahead when Martin got mixed up passing Bruno’s stricken Ferrari at La Source. Up to 18th and having a lucky day.
At this point I started to wonder about pit strategy and race pace compared to my 2l buddies. They were both clearly quicker but I knew my 60l tank only takes 21 seconds to refuel and I should be able to get away with 3 stops. Soon I had other things to worry about as (a recovering?) Austin and then Ricardo both caught and passed me. Back to 20th.
Lap 6 and Martin was passed me again into Blanchimont.
I now settled into a long lonely stint. That gave me time to think properly about fuel. In pre-race prep I’d been using about 6.9l per lap and was planning an easy 3-stop race. Now, despite driving more conservatively, I was using 7.9l per lap. That meant I had to have 8l left in my 60l tank every time I stopped to be sure of not running out of fuel, especially if the pit box was already occupied. So I would only be able to put in 85% of a tank at each stop. Suddenly a 3-stop was going to be tight. Soon after, I had my first stop and saw that at least it did only take about 21 seconds to refill. That got me back ahead of Martin. And maybe a few others as I was now 18th. I spent the next few laps asking Crew Chief for estimates and doing mental arithmetic and hoping that I’d suddenly find some spare fuel as it was now looking like a tricky 4-stopper! It was affecting my driving so I decided to ignore fuel and just pit when I needed to. Of course, I then just kept coming back to the same old internal debate, on and off, for the rest of the race . Afterwards, I checked my calculations and it was estimating I’d only complete 28 laps rather than the 32 (?) I did.
Evening
The game looked beautiful as the sun was setting. Or Golden Six Minutes as it’s known in 10x time photography circles. I was looking forward to driving at night. I found it really atmospheric in the pre-race practices and always found working night-shifts relaxing. I lapped Matias just as he pitted on lap 9.
Night Time!
Martin caught and re-passed me as night fell on lap 10. His extra lights were useful and I managed to hang on for a lap or two before his headlights slowly disappeared from view. I don’t know what had been happening elsewhere but somehow I was up to 15th. Lap 13 and Isidoro lapped me. Then Tom, then Niklas, then Darren and all, while I made my second stop on lap 15. And I nearly choked on a biscuit .
I found driving through the rest of the night really challenging. I don’t know if it is the extra immersion of being in VR, but I felt like I was driving for hours and really struggled to keep my concentration. I ran wide, without incident, coming out of La Carriere then, as night was ending on lap 20, I had my main scare of the race. Coming out of Malmedy, still having vague notions of saving some fuel, I coasted rather than dabbing the breaks, ran wide and got into snap oversteer. I fought the car from lock to lock and tried my best to scrub off speed and avoid anything too solid. But it is always luck in these moments and mine held true. At the time I was convinced I had rolled the car and taken lots of damage. But the replay shows I just slid the Bristol’s well-padded rear-end up the bank and hit a post. There was no other car around so I was able to get going without trouble. The car showed no damage but paranoia convinced me something wasn’t right, and I had an unplanned, but ok, drift through Blanchimont. My next pit stop was due anyway, so I stopped at the pits to check and repair. There was only 6 seconds of bodywork damage to hammer out so I soon set off again, determined to be more careful.
Frank re-passed me coming up to La Source on lap 25 and then Isidoro lapped me again. Somehow I was in 13th. Other than that, it was a lonely run up to my 4th and last expected pit stop on lap 26.
I’d stopped a lap earlier in case my stall was occupied and I knew I didn’t need a full tank. But, to be safe, I decided to keep it simple and fill her up. Luck had one final twist for me though. Crew Chief ‘helpfully’ arranged to only fill me to the end of the race. Unfortunately, no one had explained to the Chief that I had to do an extra lap after time runs out. So the Chief left me with at least one lap of fuel short. At the time I let this bother me. But it made no difference to my race result and the 5! stops gave the pit crew a good workout.
Lap 27, a flying 3l Race leader Darren Andrews lapped me again. Lap 29 a late splash and dash and Frank passed me to retake 13th.
Sorry all, that’s a long recap for a race where I was on my own for nearly all of it!

Really hated to miss this one but life got in the way.

Paul Nadeau wrote:

Really hated to miss this one but life got in the way.

Hopefully we will see you at Bremgarten Paul!

For posterity and those who are not on Discord, here's my video recap:

As suggested by Frank, I will add my race recap from Discord here.

Short review from my perspective:
I was happy with fourth position in qualifying although I crashed in my last lap at Malmedy while already beeing up 7 tenths on my previous best. But way off Isis pace anyway.
Both Jags made a very slow start, so I was second out of Eau Rouge behind @Nicolas Hillebrand . Halfway through the first lap Isi passed me. Then had a brief battle with @Tom Dee who also passed me. I settled down in 4th and started saving fuel to make it through the race with 3 stops. The first and second stops went well, altough Rod de Vries and Darren Andrews passed me because of their shorter stops. Repassed Darren when he went wide in Les Combes and touched the barrier. Made memo to myself to take it easy at Les Combes. A few laps later I ran wide at Les Combes, hit the barrier and broke my front right suspension. Lost some 20 seconds on the lap plus an additional 50 secs in the pits. I was somewhere around 8th then, but could pass some 3L cars in the pit stops and some people crashed out in front of me. For the last 45 minutes I was back in a comfortable 4th. With big gaps to 3rd and 5th I took it very easy for the rest of the race. In the penultimate lap, @Tom Dee crashed in front of me at Burneville and threw some hayballs on the track, but could avoid them and finished 4th. Could have maybe challenged Rob for 3rd without that mistake (or could have crashed trying...). At least finished in a long race for the first time, so quite happy after all. Grats to all finishers and thank you to all who were involved in organising the race!