USA Rhez: Laguna

What a fun race, wish I were fast enough to run with the bigger pack because it looked like a blast from 10 seconds back.

The first lap was an adventure- Mike fouled up the fast left hander turning up the hill and nosed into the wall- I scooted past just praying he didn't bounce back hard or we were both toast. Then I come down the blind left hander after the corkscrew and there's Justin sideways on the edge of the track- missed a reverse-repeat of our practice crash by a foot or so.

Justin went back by shortly, and I had a great 7 or 8 lap fight with Doug for 10th- then he finally faded a little bit and I focused on running consistent laps. Fedor eventually closed up with about 3 to go, only to disappear again just before he would have been ready to go by me- must have been chewed up by the sand monster out there somewhere.

With 3 to go I realize I only have 6 liters of fuel left. Uh oh, I'd calculated 2.2/lap so this is bad news. Once Fedor went off I tried short-shifting like crazy but sadly, it wasn't enough. It hit zero on the hill above the corkscrew, and finally died coming out of the penultimate corner. Fedor and Doug scoot by and my first top ten melts into a 12th place DNF. No worries though, I didn't get lapped, didn't make any big driving mistakes, and actually ran laps close to my practice times- the first time for any of those results. Next time- 2 or 3 liters of extra gas.

not fun at all 4 me. had bad stomach flu and was running slow to begin with due to a lack of an attention span and illness. just figured i would run in the back and get a top 10 but in practice i began 2 struggle with the high speed corner before the corkscrew. on lap 1 i got 2 the corner and sure enough i spun out and hit the wall. i was in last after a 50 second pit stop and went a lap down. i simply let the leaders go by and ran a slow but respectful race. overall, a boring race and day 4 me. nice race 2 all especially matjaz

My race wasn't very great either. I had a good start up into 3rd but coming out of the corkscrew I was flying so I tried to overtake the 2nd place car but he scooted over and I had to avoid hitting him so I dropped a tire in the sand and spun. Re-started at the back and slowly worked up to a guy who was lagging really badly. I spent a really frustrating number of laps driving slowly behind this guy because coming into corners behind him, he would seem to slow down a lot (so I slowed down a lot) and then suddenly he would warp 15 feet ahead of me, which meant I could have gone much faster but for his warp. This went on and on, preventing me from passing him for a long time. Once I finally got around him, I left him in the dust. Really aggravating. That threw my concentration for the rest of the race and then when I had made my way back to 7th and was going to try for 6th, I just went into the corkscrew too hot on the inside and the bump took away my grip and I hit a wall.

For some reason my car would not start. I hit the started a billion times and finally it DID start. No idea what's up with that, but it didn't make any difference. 2 laps left and plenty of damage and I get 9th. Meh.

i think it was doug who was lagging really bad

Sorry Mike I think it was you I punted out in T2 ...
Lack of focus and a bit of lagg made me hit you pretty hard(at least I think it was you, didn't have the "labels" on)...
After my drive through (I didn't get any but as the rules state I had to make one , felt realy bad about the punt too)I tried and catch up . I got to Josh but then made a mistake shortly before I was able to pass him), man bad luck with the fuel , you earned that 10th place ...
Anyway I've driven poorly with tooo many mistakes starting from Q where I was 0.7 slower than usual...
But when I think the race started at 3.30 AM my time it's not so bad after all :)

I have *no* luck in these things.

Qualy:

Ok. In most series I'm about 1.5-2 seconds off pole, but in these things I typically seem to be 2-2.5 second off pole. Here I was 3s off. Still, I can't complain. Well, not much anyway. :-)

Race:

I got whacked a bit during the reconnaissance lap, but the car was only slightly damaged. Got a good start. T1 and the hairpin were ok. I stayed to the outside of the hairpin. As I was coming back to the left to get ready for T3, the pack bunched up and I had to jump on the brakes. That's when Fedor's left front bumper met my right rear bumper. :-) I spun off, but the real damage was done when the front of my car met the wall. Bye-bye hood (bonnet), bye-bye air in left front tire. After my pit stop for repairs, I re-joined with the leaders only about 10s back. I did get to watch the battle for a couple of laps after I let them by on lap 9.

At the end, I was closing on Antonio, but there just weren't enough laps.

Oh that was you William , sorry , your hard braking cought me by suprise :(
And you're right it was T3 , I just always think T1 and T2 are one corner as they are driven as one...
Sorry for the punt again...

Thanks for the apology, Fedor.

I was a bit upset at the time, but after the race finished I watched the replay from your car. Somehow it never looks as bad as it felt. :-)

Actually, I believe T1 is the kink in the front straight. Somewhere Scott Michaels is saying "Only an American would call that a corner!" And to that I will point to Jeremy Clarkson's drive of an NSX at Laguna Seca. :-) Check out his comments at about 2:50 into the video.

u didnt wreck me i took myself out

The kink in the front straight is, indeed T1 and you don't need a video to prove that, you can check out the official laguna seca website. They have a map of the circuit there with the turn numbers.