Grand Prix of Brianza

Bad Q...Got held up twice by IM, so I paid the price to start 15th... Sincere apologies to Nick...Too late on the brakes trying to stay ahead of Steve and I hit you in the rear...I waited for you, let you by and served penalty...Bad race...Again, sorry m8!

who the hell wiped out the marker boards for T1 ? Cost me about 4 spins :(

Mr G! :-] Someone has to take it for the team I suppose and it was my turn into T1, one of those things, sweared (did not know who it was so the wording was fairly generic) recovered and hoped the car was ok. No problems, thanks for the apology.

Made it back from 16th to 7th, with some good battles on the way, knew from practice I had a quick car but did not put a Q lap together so paid the mid pack price.

Look forward to next week, and to be honest would have been happy enough with 7th anyway so no great loss.

Tnx for accepting the apologies Nick...Still it was a very unattainable move...

Congratulations Emilio! And the Top 3...

D'oh! Qual went great for me. Hit my pb, and set the track record which I'm pleased with. However come the race I was getting destroyed down the straights and was far too quick round the bends, on a number of ocassions getting caught out by insanely fast closing speeds. I have a feeling it could have been me who caused the brake markers to be lost... sorry about that. I had lost it in a bad way following Bob Fay I think it was into Ascari and after wiping out my nose (which I hadn't realised I'd done until I speared off at the parabolica) I sat out a 55second pit stop.

The car was utter dog shit and I finally blew it exiting parabolica #2, wiped out my engine and tore off a rear wheel. What a complete prat.

I keep getting faster and faster in these cars but I still can't put together a finish... I must be cursed lol!

Congratulations Emilio and the rest of the podium.

It wasnt you that wiped the distance boards out Jon, it happened after you dropped.

I got a great run on Jon as we came off the parabolica and it didnt need a rocket scientist to work out there was a big wing difference. It also made for a differnce in braking and I think this caught Jon out as we went into ascari with me braking earlier than I think Jon expected. I slowly started to open a small gap and was very happy with the car, then Emillio startd catching me, again I had the speed, Emillio had the corners, had some great fun until Emillio made a couple of mistakes and the gap was up to 12 secs. Emiilio didnt take long to start clawing it back but I figured he'd be hard pressed to beat me down the finish straight. Then with 5 laps to go I saw smoke at the end of the s/f straight and yellow caution, then I realised the marker boards were gone and went straight through the escape road at T1. Stop & Go light came on and that was my race cooked. Grats to Emillio on a cracking win and some good racing.

'grats to the podium!

It was my brother that wiped out the markers at T1!

Sounds like he had some kind of game trouble coming out of Parbolica and slammed into the pit wall, losing both wings. Spun again as he tried to make his way down the straight on the inside and wound up against the outside wall. Better to take out the markers than to pull a crippled car into the brake zone there, i guess!

I went straight thru the first time as well, Allen, but i must have got it slowed down enough and apparently matched my gaps when i rejoined, 'cause it didn't hit me with a "stop and go".

Actually Brian, i was thinking you must've been smarter than me and used something other than the distance markers for your break point there, as you were gaining seconds at a time in that spot while i tried to find something that worked.

Anyway, fun race. See you all next time.

Wow a hard fought win for me!!!

Before the race I knew I had a good setup for the race, possibly to do similar lap times to John Weal... but I totally forgot to practice qualy session... which in this cars is a must. So, got all tangled up using the temp boost button in qualy... made mistakes... starting 7th... when I should have been right beside John in the grid.

Then on to race... it seems John and me had similar wing setup... as we were both completely blown away by other cars in the straights. I lost huge amounts of time unable to pass people in the slow sections and the fast ones were impossible... finally got some lucky brakes with guys making mistakes and giving me a free pass... anyway I was over a second faster than the rest of the top drivers but that's not much help UNLESS you are out of their reach in the main straight. So... it was something I knew could happen here... maybe it's better to sacrifice half a second in your lap time but have a faster car in the straights and be able to pass someone... anyone!.

Anyway in the final laps I was almost flat out chasing Cotton... even hit a pretty darn good 1:25.8 my faster lap in race setup all week long. I was closing in (3 laps to go)... 2 secs behind from 12 I was a few laps before... then the unexpected... he cuts the first chicane and gets an stop/go, end of the race for him... lucky break for me as it was going to require a mistake by him to allow me the pass. I was close behind him and when he cut the track I almost did it too... as suddenly the brake markers were gone and I had to brake down to almost complete stop and go back to the track, avoiding a costly penalty... which already happend to me in an F1 mod... so I was not about to make the same error again.

All in all a very fun race... next race I'll go for the pole... but will be hard to get it if John is there hehe, darn fast qualy laps man.

that was the 1st time i d use low wing set-up for race, so very different cars, so i got bumped in 1st corner and rear suspension was bent, from then on, harder car to handle with low wings than high wings, ended up in a few spins and an early pit for a wing, sorry to all that i may have caused issues while i spun :(, and got a fatal spin in chicane before parabolica
Grats to Emilio and podium!!!!!!!!!!!

One thing I learned in 3 or 4 F1 events here....LOSE THE DOWNFORCE. It took me a few F1 races. I also was setting up the car for medium downforce. The Renault was great in the chicanes, but I could never capitalize on it as the lower downforce cars would blow by me and maintain a lead on the straights. So, coming here with Champ Cars, I went totally for low downforce and top speed. Many times I'd have someone catch or pass me in the chicanes or Lesmos, just to then crank on back by on the straights. As long as I either maintained a big enough lead into the turns, or blocked the entrance and took away the line, no one could get by me. If I didnt make the mistake of doing 2 pitstops, as well as cranking in the wrong brake bias (how long have I been doing this shit?) in Turn 1 at the end of the 2nd stint, very light on fuel, then spinning the car out, I would have been much higher up the leaderboard. Grats to Emilio and the podium.