Post Bathurst endurance

Terrific race with a more finishers than expected.

More race report from me later but ended up with 7th and thanks to my co-driver, Benny who ran a fantastic stint

W26

That was epic!

Spent all day working on my mate's new race car, got home and logged in with just 30s to go in final practice. Went straight in to qually and did a good clean proper warm up lap and went into the timed lap, not trying to be quick, just wanted to focus on being smooth and neat. Couldn't believe it when i got a 38 flat, a full second quicker than my Thusrday practice best, decided to banzai on my second lap and it was ugly, locking brakes, bouncing over kerbs, straight lining esses, sideways out of corners and two wheels on the grass, stopped the clock at 35 flat! Yeehah! Amazed to end up 12th on a grid of 16.

Got a ripper start and was right up there, dodged all the carnage and was a little disappointed when it was restarted. Bogged down at the restart and copped an M3 in the door, down to 14th by turn 2.

Managed to keep two cars behind me for the first couple of laps until they dropped out and then i stayed in last place for the rest of the race, gradually creeping up the leaderboard as cars dropped out. Concentrated on keeping it neat & tidy and looking after the tyres, I was on softs all the way and needed 3 stops for fuel. Happy to end up in the top 10, shades of Bathurst '85.

First of all must say thanks to Wally for all your hard work running things each Sunday, and also to everyone who competed tonight, great effort by all

Big congrats to Webber on his win in the big one, you drove so well tonight.

QUAL - I managed to do what felt like pretty much a perfect lap, and managed a 2m14s lap. It gave me alot of confidence heading into the race, i thought so anyway.

RACE - got a decent start and led into turn 1. I had abit of a nudge with Webber at turn 2, and then with Floydie at the Cutting, which dropped me back to third, however by the end of lap 1 i was in second and about 2secs away from the lead.

For the whole first stint me and Webber kept the gap constantly between 1.5s and 3.0s, ebbing and flowing as one and the other did a better lap. We both pitted together on lap 11. During the second stint Webber managed to get the gap out to about 5-6secs, but i was still within striking distance. It was great stuff, i was going as hard as i could.

Exiting Forrests Elbow on about lap 17 i had a lose, managed to gather it up but Webber was then about 20secs up the road. The off damaged the car abit, but i chose to push on with it rather than get it fixed when i made my next stop on lap 22.

For the next stint i was sort of in a holding pattern, i was about 30 or so seconds off the lead and gradually losing time, when on lap 30 i saw Webber was in the pits alot earlier than i thought, and i took the lead.

This gave me some inspiration, as i thought it would be tough for Webb to get home on just 1 more stop. After i pitted on lap 33, i was about 20 secs behind, and thats how it stayed pretty much until Webb pitted on lap 41...giving him a 12 lap run to the end... too much i thought as we'd only got 11 laps on the first two stints.

I made my last stop on lap 44 and pressed on as hard as i could, the gap hovering at around 18-20secs... to my amazement Webber made it the last 12 laps without a stop to win fabulously, there was nothing i could to catch him, so well done Webb on your second Bathurst win in a row, great driving

Yeh! Now THAT was a race. None of this sprint race rubbish!

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Enduro's really suit my style of driving - get out on my own and concentrate on putting in constant and reasonably fast laps, while looking after the tyres as well as possible... All the time flicking through the LCD screens to watch people I'm racing, and their gaps to me.

Was gonna run the VL lebbo wagon again, but just couldn't for the life of me make the tyres last a stint. At all. Could do a low 2:18 in it, but the tyre life was horrendous. Decided to go back in time and run the Merc.... Good times in the old Merc, so I loaded up my WTCC 87 setup, made a few changes and during the week got down to a 2:19.5. Sah-weet!

Quali.
Went out hoping I could get a 19 flat on low fuel, but it didnt happen and I couldn't get into a rythym over 3-4 laps. Managed a 19.8, highest of the Group2 cars. GroupC next to me on the grid in his M3.

Race.
Got a good start, and thought about a nibble up the inside of Shanos puss-nugget Sierra, which he can't seem to get off the line, but knowing the chances of holding anyone with a turbo or 8 cylinders behind me up the hill we 0%, backed off.
Got barged off the road on the run up mountain straight by a couple of sierras and had to back off and try and get back on track. Came back on and had GroupC and Wally cruise past. Darn it!

Struggled to find a rythym initially, but started to get into a rythym when I got up the inside of GroupC at T2, and then was chasing Wally down when he pitted early....??

Anyway, after that it was a dead quiet race against the clock.... Was trying to close the gap, which was around 7-8 seconds to the shaynskyline, Floydie, Peter308 and CortyGT battle, and while they were all sorting each other out, I did managed to close it, then got stuck behind Corty in his Mustang, which was horribly slow across the top lol.
By the time i got past him, Floydie had pulled the pin and Pete had had a few spins and stuff and I was now watching the LCD with the name shaynskyline in it. Old shayn has improved epically over this season, and he managed to pull the gap out to 12 or so seconds before his pitstop, which is where it went 120Y on him (pear shaped). The old damage repair trick hey!

Anyway, the end result was me coming out about 7 seconds ahead of him and pretty much for the rest of the race, the gap stayed about that.. Dropping to 6 at once stage, before I managed to drag it out to 15 or so by the finish...

Ended up chasing Shano, but I was never gonna make up 32 seconds to a car that's 30kph faster down conrod lol.

Erm. Yeh, other than that. Made 4 pitstops, and was really able to stretch 'em out, with the old Merc getting it's usual damn good economy.

Honestly, if it wasn't for the Mercs ability to get through the top of the Mountain so quick, it would be shot, dead and buried everything lol. But yeh, old Shano found out near the end when he came out of his pitstop, that he could pull away up mountain straight, but he was holding me up by Forrest elbow lol.

Long and short of it - I'm still in love with my Merc!

Well done to Webber, Racer and Shano. Sierra top 3, would would've picked that!? LOL

Thanks to Wally for running and epic season. I've missed the vast majority of it, but I'm glad I have been able to run the last 2 events. It's always a pleasure to race with you TTR guys.

Catch ya's at the next one!

Thanks Racer, couldn't have put the whole thing better myself, and congrats on winning the series with consistency round after round. Wally fantastic season, best yet.

I'm on a working holiday / apprenticeship style jazz in Victoria (sort of near Benny in fact, and gotta admit this daylight savings crap is pretty decent), and no way was the G27 fitting in my backpack. So the old XBOX controller I soldered to work with USB got wheeled out, which for those who weren't around then, I used for the first 9 months or so of rFactor before splurging on a wheel a year ago.

Felt like an absolute retard for the first 5 laps of practice. With patience and training, you can make the right movements with the controller, but where a wheel excels is you can react predictably to counter unexpected things like slides or oversteer. Pretty much impossible on the XBOX if you're reacting to something out of the blue. I found the controller a full 1.5 seconds slower in race spec than the wheel because you can't rely on going opposite lock with more throttle (eg at Turn 2, dipper, mcphillamy park, second part of the Chase).

Still I put in 2 or 3 full fueled stints of practice through the week, to try to send off the power of the RS500 in style.

Qual - bombed a 16.5, not my quickest but nothing I could do would have come close to Racer's epic 14.x !!!! Very worthy lap. Mine was good enough for 2nd.

Race - first start, I absolutely cained it, more than a car's gap in front of Racer by the first corner, only I forgot to actually brake! Ended up in the sand trap, which gave me 30 painful seconds to condition mentally for the epic catch up ahead.

Wasn't complaining about the restart made a decent getaway into 2nd, drafted Racer up the hill, we were side by side into T2. Without checking the replay, I think we were both braking straight and there was a bump, which unsettled him and put me in the lead by a second or so. Then as Racer said, the first two stints were an epic tug of war.

I wasn't even game to check the time gaps, seeing the flash of red livery in the rear view was enough to get my heart pumping at 150 bpm plus. Was giving the absolute beans and was stoked to be able to keep Racer behind me -- after his untouchable qualy lap, I'd psyched myself out into 2nd at best.

Couple pitstops in I was stretching out a more comfortable lead, when I made a big mistake. At Sulman Park , was doing the usual thing when the back end slooooowly got away. Off throttle, both "feet" in, but the car hit the barrier on the left with a sickening thud and it was straight away obvious that things had broken. Steering was way out of whack -- hard to deal with on an XBOX -- and the bastard wouldn't turn. I shat myself, all at once I was checking the gap back to racer69, trying to figure out if I could pit now and still finish on 2 more stops, race back to the pits, and avoid hitting the tyres at the esses. Only managed the first three, and almost totaled the car on the tyres, which Mozza hid a Claymore in. Luckily nobody else was around at this stage to have their race ruined by hitting me!

Limped to the pits, 41 agonising seconds of damage repair, and then realised there was not enough fuel to make it.

There were 2 full stints left and one would have to be 12 laps, one more than I'd ever done. Plan: Stint One - drive the balls off the thing. Stint Two - if the gap more than 40 secs to racer, stop for a splash-n-dash. If not - try to make it home saving fuel.

Unfortunately Racer was too smart and realised what was happening, was pushing hard, and though I was wringing the RS500, he pegged the gap at 22 secs.

Luckily there was enough fuel saved in econo-mode, short shifting halfway down straights and rolling off into braking zones, to make it home by 1 or 2 litres. In the end there were 18 or so seconds in it.

To be honest I counted myself very unlikely to keep it together for 2 hours on the controller. That makes this my most satisfying win ever, especially considering the quality of competition.

Serious well done to all finishers, and mega props to all the drivers we lapped and came across, that was a better show than you found in the actual ATCC 1988 in terms of politeness and driving standards. This especially goes for David Paterson, ttr sonofa, who I came across a couple of times but were polite every time.

Look forward to next series, might choose an abnormal car to do a GrpC and have some midfield action!


edit - oh yeah, been meaning to say for a while, Shano's been putting in some quiet but amazing performances this series, every race the gap in qualy and in the race gets closer. With the right car he could be very dangerous very soon....

Well done to every one who made it to the end of the 53 laps. Great effort to go the distance. BL to those that dropped out early for whatever reason.

I wasnt planning on running this race as i had to help my parents with moving house. So i hadn't done very much practice srsly. Only really managed low 19s.

I managed to make it home and onto the server with 1 minute to go before qualifying. I got in some good laps and made a PB of 2:18.80x.
Taking 5th spot on the grid. Pretty happy.

I got a decent start and got off pretty well, only made it to the top of the hill before the race was restarted. Got en even better start and jumped Shano off the grid who was wheel-spinning like a crazy guy. He passed me on the first straight of course, but i pulled a late brake and got him back into T2. Prolly scared the crap outa him. Soz man.
Sitting in 4th behind Floydie and Racer who were bashing doors at the top of the hill, i was just waiting for it to turn really bad, but they managed to sort it out and kept going. Would been more carnage there for sure. Lucky.
Shano got back by at an obvious part of the track, and BillyBob started to close in. He also zoomed by on Conrod a lap or so later, no point fighting it, beeped him as he flew by.

Now i was chasing Floydie in the VL with CortyGT hot on my bumper. Floydie made an error and got by into 5th spot but a bit later the Mustang of Corty caught me on the straight and took back 5th. I chased him for about 6 laps, the mustang is very evenly matched with the skyline, id close on on the straights, and in the turns be he still kept it infront me. Corty made an error at skyline? and i zoomed by in the trickiest part of the whole track. A move i was pretty happy with. I would never have thought of trying that kinda shenanigans until recently. No where near confident enough.

Got the first stop done at about lap 11. And came out in 5th place. Chasing Shano who was about 5 seconds up the road. I knew i couldnt catch a Sierra so i just sat back and went for clean, fast laps. Mozza was about 6 seconds behind me according to the LCD. He was there for about 7 laps, gaining then falling back over and over again. So i knew if he got any closer id be in trouble. I wasnt getting away from him at all.

Second Pit at lap 22, and because rF is an idiot, and i forgot to turn it off coming into the pits - my crew decided that my rear bumper would take an extra 20 seconds to fix.
RAWR!!! In the pits for 43 seconds, so angry at this point because i knew it would cost me later on. Finally got out in 6th with Mozza in third about 15 seconds up the road!!!

So for 12 laps im chasing this guy, closing in .500 on the straights, then falling back the same when we reach the top of the hill. At the end of each lap the result was the same. 8-9 seconds behind Mozza. For two fricken stints. I couldnt catch the guy. The combination of his speed and the nimbleness of the stoopid Merc were annoying me alot. It seemed like he was never going to pit. I had to though on lap 34 this time making sure i turned of damage repair coming into the garage, even though i had done it 5 times during the stint.

Now ive lost Mozza, RAWR!!, he still doesnt pit. And he's 30 seconds ahead or something rediculous. He's at the top of the hill and im crossing the start line. Make that 40 seconds. More of the same lonely driving chasing a stoopid merc that i cant catch up to. He even pitted and came back out 8 seconds infront again.

DAMN YOU STOOPID REAR BUMPER FIXING BONEHEAD MECHANICS!! YUR ALL SACKED TMRO!!

Ahem*

I had caught up to Mozza due to his pit stop and i came into the garage for the last time, you guessed it, 8 seconds behind the Mercedes.
"Screw this, chuck the Mediums on boys, GrpC is miles back so 5th is in the bag, lets try and catch that pesky Mozzie"

Didnt work. No matter what i did i couldnt make up any ground. And the Concettina effect of pitting kept him ahead. With 3 or 4 laps to go, the german bucket was 15 seconds ahead due to me frying the Medium tyres trying to chase him down.

I came home in 5th place. Parked on the grass and took a breath or two.

It was a super race, i drove extremely well, if i do say so myself. Bar a couple of wall nudges at the top of the hill. I didnt make ONE mistake for 53 laps, no spins, grass clips, broken steering arms, sand trips, just clean consistent laps. So i am very happy with the race. Disappointed about not catching Mozza, but all innuendo aside, he must've been driving the guts out of that thing. So hats off. The extra power i had made no difference what so ever. Well done Mozza. But get stuffed also.

Um i cant comment on many other opponents, because i didnt see many. CortyGT put up a very good fight, woulda been nice to extend that battle. BL on not finishing.
Floydie was very good also, but honestly, watching the replay back, i just had better lines than him tonight. Woulda been a great battle.

WD Webber on the win, and Racer and Shano for the podiums. You guys are super fast and a great target to aim for one day.

Thanks also to Wally (and Benny?) for running the series like a clock. Super job mate. And to all the drivers, thank you for your racing and respect on the track. I owe all my progress in rF to all of you for making me want to go faster. I seriously cant wait for the next series.

The skyline is a love/hate kind of deal. I love it to bits, its so smooth and powerful, but at the same time its sluggish and annoying. Gonna miss driving it. I have really gotten used to it this series. And i think taming it has made me a better rF driver. Start of the series i thought, what have i gotten my self into. This thing is horrendous. Im glad i picked it. Its an amazing car, so much fun.


Great nite, hope i didnt ramble on too much. Thanks for reading. See ya's soon.


Ps. Sorry to David for a dodgy overtake on the pit straight, i shoulda given you more room. And to Racer on the first straight about 47 laps in. I honestly didnt see you coming up behind me until you flashed your lights. I was in autopilot/tunnel-vision mode. So yeah. Soz.

Well that was a long race... Not really too much to report from my end.

Quali: Set a PB on my 1st lap, so that gave me plenty of time to drain the tank before the race hahaha

Race: Got a decent start... tried to stick around the outside into Hell, got a couple but then had a massive drag race up Mountain straight with Mozza & Wally... Wallys move into Griffins WAS MASSIVE, inside... latest of the latest brakers... I'm like shit!! Turn 2 and its on hahaha

Both those Mercs were really speedy in the early laps and i really struggled to match there pace. Trying to stay with them on lap 3 i think i did my best KB attempt coming up into Sulman/Reid Park... After hitting the inside & outside wall a few times, i lost my bumper and got a flat front so i limped back to the pits and really from there my race was toast... I passed a few due to DNF's and or disconnections and really from there i just consistently lapped in the 22's for pretty much 2hrs hahaha

I had a pretty good dice with Wally/Benny in the Merc... Trading times for what seemed like forever, the gap was pretty close to 10secs for the last 15laps.

I held on for 6th, just enough to get 3rd in the championship which i'm stoked!!
Never thought i'd get into the Top 3 at the start of the season & get 3 wins!! It's been a long season with many great performers.. WD Racer... WD Webber.. 2 top competitors that deserve the top 2 spots...

Thanks again to Wally for running a great series, it has been alot of fun!!

first congrats to the top 3 in the championship.....

10 points behind GRP C in fourth so i pretty happy wit that..

qualy was goin good until i seen +2.400 on the split and i was like WTF.. lol... so only got a 17 mainly cause was bangin out wtfs to my self... top stuff racer....

race was massive... just took it steady at start behind floydie and waited to get paste... didnt want to bang up me vacum cleaner early on lol...
settled into 3rd and just tried to run 20s and odd 19... could not get close or run the pace of webb and racer...

after every pit i would just pop out in front of mozz... he was pushin me to make mistakes lol which i was too...but lucky for sniff i could get a break on him...

pretty much spent the whole race on me own givin good ol dave a toot here and there .... mega pilote drivin manner run by dave and rest of back markers... is bloody kewl...

dont think i mixed paint wit skyline this meetin which upsets me lol...

i did bounce of a wall or 5 towards the end but held it up... amazing race the long stints are ace when there still lots running around....

congrats to all for ace series i had mega fun... im retiring the sierra and gonna see wat available in the next series....

wd to webber and racer for the race 1 + 2 and me for 3rd lol...

and thanks for the kind words webber i allways try to do my best and get to the pointy end off field... slowly gettin there but is hard in this series with so many fast drivers.... and thanks to billy and shayn who i think i spend alot of mid week online time with... and that girls blouse mozza lol.....

thanks wally too for runnin a great series...

shaynskyline wrote:Ps. Sorry to David for a dodgy overtake on the pit straight, i shoulda given you more room. And to Racer on the first straight about 47 laps in. I honestly didnt see you coming up behind me until you flashed your lights. I was in autopilot/tunnel-vision mode. So yeah. Soz.

No need to apoligise Shayn, the only reason i flashed my lights is so i didn't suprise you in your mirrors at the Cutting or something, you never got in my way at all and were very courteous to me at Griffins

Kudos to Brent & Luke on their wins and Shano for being too quick for the rest of us. Huge thanks to Benny for giving us somewhere to race and Wally for organising the best series ever.

due to xmas coming up really fast, i propose we put a hold on our upcoming series until around mid january.
ie. TCL on tour/ Historic GT-Touring and 1985 ETCC.

Let's have a muck around fun events with 1972 Bathurst Legends at various tracks until then.

Sunday 11th, qualifying @ 1830 hours (qld), 1930 hours(nsw.vic)
Bathurst legends 1972
@ Winton Club circuit.
fuelx2
tyresx3

race1, with formation lap, 25 minutes
likewise for race 2 including top % of results from race one .. reverse grid

sounds like a great idea wally