GTR Enduro Veterans 400K

I was very disapointed that I had to leave, but some... uh... 'domestic issues' at EXACTLEY the wrong time forced me to miss the start. Looks like I would have had the pace for 3rd after thinking I was miles off this morning... oh well, theres always next season...

Hey!! I got my internet back!! A day late and dollar short though. Looks like like I would have had the pace to JUST barely keep up with the nGT field.

Scott, there is no shame in your parents making you clean your room, but calling it "domestic issues" is just goofy! :P

Killed the engine with 25 min left when I spun off of the last turn and into the wall. From my telemetry, it looked like the engine was bound to blow anyway. I was lucky enough for my car to be on the front straight, though. That way I could just have someone push me across when the race was over. Too bad the game crashed soon after...

Not sure I want to bother running the Spa race. Since team points won't count for next season due to there being no draft, I have no incentive to keep running the Porsche anymore. If I do run, I'll join GT as a Vette or Viper since those aren't running right now. Maybe I'll run the 360 in nGT...I don't know.

Qual was very tough for me. I got a total of one free lap (which I messed up) and on all other laps a GT car either passed me or divebombed on me.

Race started ok but I couldn't do anything about Conor in front of me. After about 10 laps I got a better exit from T9 and he just let me by - thanks though you didn't really need to yield so easily. Next I spent a number of laps chasing Rory, and eventually I found a way past in a traffic jam, although he didn't try to resist hard. Kent was next on my list, the gap was 4-9 seconds before and after stops. With under an hour to go, I had a total lockup. Nothing was overclocked for this race, I guess the 33.9 C room temp is just too brutal. It would have been interesting to see how marginal Kent was on fuel since he pitted 2 laps before me, and I was fairly marginal as well. Crap.

Today the handling of the #8 OTHR Saleen S7R was the best ever I have had the pleasure to drive. Today the driver of said #8 OTHR Saleen S7R was the slowest he has ever been compared to others in the same class. That is the result of differences in talent.

Congratulations winners and the common people!

Wow, I'm lucky! I don't know what I did to the motor, but halfway into the 1st stint, I noticed my laptimes were down about 3 secs a lap. It would make a weird gurgling sound coming out of the slow exits and hard on the throttle. I don't know how the hell it didn't blow up.

Qualifying:
I was surprised to be on pole, 1:28.3 on damp wasn't bad though. Dropped some 0.3 in last corner being too cautious.

Race:
Started off nicely, looked like I was fastest on damp track, just slightly edging Nuno. Then, after 2/3 of the first stint, I made a mistake exiting T11 and Nuno passed me. I menaged to keep up with him few laps, but then track completely dried out and I was loosing time to him, and couldn't prevent it. I also made mistake right before the race when I increased rear downforce to 9, which made me suffer in complete dry.

Not much to report after that, I was all alone the whole race. Once again I was very unlucky with the traffic. Make no mistake, traffic behavior today was ABSOLUTELY PERFECT, it was just that I caught them at places where I had to sit behind and loose 1.5-2 seconds. In total lost me some 20 seconds to Nuno, it didn't matter in the end. Besides that I was terribly inconsistent, and that made me angry.

At the end I caught Barry and Bob fighting for a position. I was perfectly ready to sit behind and not pass, but Barry went a bit wide and I thought I better pass them now so they can fight in peace without me behind them in the last lap. Sorry Barry if I interfered, wasn't my intention.

Congrats Nuno, dominant performance. Congrats Claus, you're amazing, after a 2 months pause. Congrats podium guys too.

Cya at my favourite track! 3 hours of bliss!

Oh, if anyone has the full log of the race - in other words, you've enabled extra stats in your .plr file - could you mail that file to me? artani@utu.fi thanks

Okay, finally a decent race for me.

Qualifying in the damp was a bit tricky and GT traffic was killin my laps so I chose to pit hoping for some free track. I managed to get it and had a great lap going until the final turn. The next lap I was slower but made a decent final turn exit and it was just enough to get into 2nd on the Grid, between Claus and Rory. What a great qual session with 5 cars all very close on times.

Race started and I was able to maintain the gap behind to Rory and Claus was barely pulling away from me. Then I made a little mistake heading to T5 and went out to the grass, I managed to keep control but Rory closed right up on me again.

I put my head down and opened up a nice 8 second lead, now it was Ari behind me. Again I made a mistake at the final turn, slid sideways across the track and smacked the inside pit wall. This cost me 4 seconds of my lead and allowed CJ to open up to about 10 seconds on me.

Traffic was really working to my advantage so when I saw some GT cars coming 1 lap before halfway I opted to pit in 1 lap early to avoid losing that time when the GT's would have caught me. Had a decent stop and rejoined in 11th.

I had adecent out lap on cold tires and when I came around to see Ari in the pit I was pleased and actually gained a couple seconds. Then into T5 again, I had a 360 ahead and a GT coming so I flashed the GT car to pass, then overshot my braking area and spun off (OUCH). I was lucky to get back on track in front of Ari by 3 seconds.

I was very slowly opening up a gap to Ari but he was faster in some sections and I in others and I wasn't making a lot of progress. I think I had the gap to about 5 seconds when he had his disco. Of course I was releived that I wouldn't have Ari pressuring me but at the same time I think I had the pace in this event to hold the position. Of course that is assuming I wouldn't be making any more mistakes.

I guess Claus had some issues ahead because the gap was down to 8 seconds and I had about 14 seconds to Rory. But near the middle of my stint I found myself struggling to concentrate and soon CJ had that gap to 14 seconds and finally as high as 20 seconds.

I finished the race with another lap of fuel and to be honest it was never a concern to me. When I pitted we were 1 minute 30 seconds from half way and I still had 4 laps fuel so I knew I had enough.

Grats to Claus on a nice race after a long layoff and to Nuno for another fine drive in GT.

I feel for Ari, I think he would have clinched the championship today, now we get to go to Spa and fight it out.

Bob I have had that sound and slow lap times when my pedal wasn't reaching 100%

Posted by Ari Nieminen
Oh, if anyone has the full log of the race - in other words, you've enabled extra stats in your .plr file - could you mail that file to me? artani@utu.fi thanks

Mailed. :P