GT3: Valencia

Congrats Tristan. Job well done

I didn't qualify because for some reason I thought if you came into the game during qualification, you weren't supposed get on track. I'm not sure where I got this from but I guess it's not a rule, maybe one I made up my own self?

My apology to Paul Hieb for the tap from behind. I waited a bit for your recovery but decided to go after a bit. Continued the race and notice a yellow GT3 behind me so decided to slow down and let him by because I thought that it was you. I just finished watching the replay and found out it wasn't you and let someone else by. :(

Good driving on everyones part.

Man, that was a frustrating one. Had been feeling good about it going in; found decent pace out of the box and was running mid-high 15's in race trim offline and flirting with a 14 in qualy trim. Did a few laps early this morning before heading to office and hit a 15.1 straight off, so I was looking forward to it.

Naturally, I get home barely in time for Q so I don't have any time to settle in - just walk in, turn on the pc, mount the wheel, floor it and go. Such is life these days; work is so inconvenient!

Couldn't find a clean lap in qualy, but still ended up 2nd with a 15.8 which surprised me. Figured that would be good for maybe 5th at best. So OK; Tristan put up a killer 14 that I just didn't have a prayer of matching online, so 2nd felt like a gift. I really need to pony up for some new PC hardware; fighting online FPS issues and stuttering is really annoying as it really makes on vs. offline driving a different game. Or maybe NAGT will get me back into rF - that thing's very well optimized.

Anyway, the race start went ok, but I again hosed it in T1 just like the G4 race! Both times by being too cautious - only this time instead of trying to stay really wide, I was inside Tristan and choked it down inside so hard I got up on the curbing and nearly looped it. Didn't though, and got going in 8th, realizing I hadn't driven the race set in a few days and was going to have to readjust! No problem, plenty of time and some good guys ahead to dice with, if I could get over being hugely annoyed with myself.

Took a while to refocus, and got a present of several spots when Rob and Heinz had a bit of an issue in the last corner. Garret, George and I all scattered around them, and I came out in 4th behind Garret with Gregg up ahead. Tristan was already checking out and headed back to the home planet... ;-)

Had a nice, if frustrating dice with Garret for a while then; I seemed to have a bit of pace in hand, but just couldn't find a spot to get it done cleanly. Tossed one late-braker Hail Mary into T1 and got by only to lose it again immediately since I'd overshot my braking point - heck I was lucky to keep it on track. Garret did great grabbing the spot back and was doing super defending, and it looked like the rest of the race was going to get really fun as we were getting up to Gregg. Good stuff!

That's when the night's capper came. It was a first for me; one that adds to my ever-growing list of excuses for losing! My mouse, a Logitech MX Revolution, fell off my desk from the shaking of my G25. No biggie ordinarily, but the MX, you see, has a one button search feature. And the button's on the top right behind the scroll wheel... guess what it landed on... So one second I'm staring at Garret's rear bumper and the next, my GTR2 screen is gone and I'm staring at a Google search page. Acckk!

Managed to grab the mouse and click back into GTR2, and amazingly hadn't hit anything yet. Was pure dumb luck that my bad luck came at a good spot on the track. I had lost a few spots but considering, I was just glad I was rolling and the game hadn't locked up since GTR2's not so keen on the alt-tabbing thing.

Just tried to bring it home from there not knowing whether to laugh or cry. Managed to get close enough to Heinz late to be wishing for a few more laps to have a go, but no dice. Frustrating; another promising one down the tubes. But hey, at least I have a new loser excuse now. ;-)

Grats to the podium!

@ Kevin - sorry for getting into you with a couple of laps to go - thought you were staying wide between 1 and 2 so I turned low to go past, unfortunately just about the same time you did the same. We probably were thinking for each other and got our wires crossed!

Big apology to Heinz, hit him in the rears on the last corner onto the front straight. So sorry Heinz, that was the last thing I wanted as it seemed we could have caught up to 2nd spot.

Then I made another stupid mistake passing a lapped car, I was just was too impatient -- my apologies again.

Ugh! Terrible race for me. I need to go back to racing 101.

Congrats to podium.

Well done to the podium & everyone else. No DNFs; that's great considering the size of the field out there.
I'm glad I raced this event cuz I gained experience in lots of traffic. I managed to stay on track throughout despite my inexperience at this track. I also want to thank Gregg M for helping me out Wed night with lots tips & pointers. This will definitely help me for my Exige race next Tuesday at this same track.

Exciting race this. Lost 2 places after Rob and Heinz did what they did in the last turn. After that I had Heinz breathing down my neck for most of the race but I managed to keep him behind me. Got 3rd when Gregg and Garret argued about a turn. Gregg ... I understand your frustration but looking at the replay both your noses were equal heading for the turn. It was the stupid GTR 2 netcode that sent you off track imho. Too bad those things happen. Grats to Tristan ... nanoo nanoo. :-)

Congrats to Tristan, Gregg M (unlucky 4th) Garret and George..

Found some speed in the Usa race, didnt have it in the Euro race, but nice to get up to 5th in quali with a PB 1m16.2

Start was good, Dropped TomO, but had Rob and Tom both trying to make T2 interesting, got passed Steve when he put it off on T1, so was now running in 3rd behind a really Quick Gregg M.

Rob was putting on pressure from behind, and was a little concerned about how close his braking was getting at the last corner, It's such a strange corner for braking aswell, so I wasn't suprised about the bump from behind, Thanks for the apology and waiting for me to get back up to speed Rob.

Now back in 6th, I was racing with determination and slight grumpyness, and I was hoping a good battle with George would put a smile back on my face, I raced hard to catch up, but thats all i could do, and so just tried to pressure george from behind hoping for a slip, but the veteran he is, did not faulter. Steve had is mishap and promoted me to 5th ...

not bad, but that podium would have been sweeter, and i needed it .. well done to all finishers

Wooohoooo way to go Tristan! nanoo nanoo lol and as a bonus I have retained my second spot in the championship even after missing this one. Actually going to be interesting to see if I can make any of the remaining events since me and the wife start winter bowing leagues next week and yep we bowl on Thursdays so probably miss the last 2 also.