asyed, at the request of Eclipsed I have tidied away the misleading post and resultant chat. It seems you all understand the problem now and everyone has an increased awareness of timezones and how to avoid a repeat of the problem.
I can certainly understand the frustration of investing time in practice only to have wasted it but that's no excuse to act unreasonably. I hope both sides can forgive and move on.
I'd still like to bring to attention that in post 75, I have proved that there should have been no reason I wouldn't have been allowed to race. I had set my lap and everything, easily accesible by Airio tracker.
I explained that in the post,which I didn't wanted to be cleared away. Anyway - it's obviously my mistake when I assumed that everyone will understand that the time must be set in the official qualifying session. This will be updated in main info.
My race surely didn't go as planned. I was involved in several racing incidents during the race. Still, when it was around 10 laps to go, I managed to get in the lead, because I wasn't the only one having problems. However, when I was leading I went out of the track, because I didn't (or my car didn't) downshift in last turn and that cost me the win. Don't really know how that happened and actually noticed it only after the race from the replay. Very mixed feelings after and during the race.
It happens I guess. You had a very eventful race but ultimately you got a podium and you take the lead in the championship. I enjoyed my race-long battle with Niko, but ultimately my race was written when I chose my setup before the start, the tyre pressures were too high and I couldn't keep them switched on after lap 40. Wasn't expecting to be on the podium today, let alone leading most of the race. I wish I had more time to practice and prepare these days.
In front of the field this was a race of ups and downs - everyone of the podium finishers led laps and everyone of them lost the lead due something,either being passed,making mistake or getting involved into incident. First incident happened very early - polesitter Altsu slipped sideways exiting turn one and hit the other front row starter Botsi to make way for rest of the field. Altsu decided to retire after this,but Botsi carried on and started the big chase. Unite used the chance to slip in lead after this incident and led first 10 laps before getting passed by P.Butcher on the back stretch by slipstream pass. P.Butcher led 32 next laps,but made a mistake and spun due hitting patch of grass just before 2nd split - he was lucky to recover quickly and without other damage than lost lead. Unite led another 6 laps,but then picked the wrong side to drive around from earlier incident recovering car,allowing P.Butcher to regain the lead,but not for long - Botsi was back at front after rally through the whole field and made a pass for the lead in turn 1. After such performance from Botsi most would think the race is decided,but Botsi run wide in exit of last turn in 53rd lap,allowing Unite to slip by,who had the pace to hold on to the lead until finish,deciding the eventful race for himself. Botsi could not set up for a pass during last 9 laps and finished just 6 tenths of a second behind,P.Butcher could not keep up with the two finns in late stage,finishing 3rd 7 seconds behind winner.
Since the round 1 winner did not join the race,we have a different leader in the table - Botsi now is on top of the standings with 2 2nd place finishes and has 4 points lead over P.Butcher,who has 2 3rd place finishes. Unite is 3rd with 6 points gap to table top. Both active VERL champions are 4th and 5th with 20 points - 12 point margin to leader. With practically no competition,P.Butcher can decide the Rookie of the Year award for himself already in next round - his closest rival UTracing is already 24 points behind and currently has no access to S3 track.
Not only A.Wiśniewski was missing in this round - so were his both Team Vires teammates,meaning that also here lead has been changed. By finishing 3rd and 4th TC Racing picked up 24 points and took over the lead in Teams Championship,Vires is now 2nd with 10 points gap,Genuine Racing 3rd another 3 points away. If Vires return to action,this might be a very intense battle. 1-2 finish for Finland deffinitelly tipped the scales in Nations Cup for 3-time defending champions,Finland has now a solid 20 points lead over UK,3rd is Poland with their neighbours Lithuania on their heels with same points count.
Despite having 5 drivers less on grid than in previous round,the race deffinitelly was as hot as round one. That might be due track being "easier",where drivers could concentrate more on their rivals than just pure survival. Interesting how situation will evolve in round 3,which features the big unknown - I'm not aware of any competition held with Formula V8 in the Rockingham National configuration,a rather sprinty track located in the infield of Rockingham oval,just 2.7km long lap,which can be done under 1 minute. At this point 7 of the entered 43 drivers do not have S3 licence required for this round,none of them is in the top half of the points table though.
Sunday,14th October
17:30 UTC / 19:30 CET / 20:30 EET
In this years schedule the round 3 is deffinitelly the biggest question mark for everyone - a track never used for such races,meaning no proven setups have been posted around,so everyone has to make something to fit here. This configuration has some very tricky turns,like turn 1,which has probably the most inviting outside grass area of all tracks. Also it has 2 streaks of turns to same direction,which might load the respective outside tyres to their maximum. And then there's the final hairpin,which is everything else than symetric or even round. If you're not running under 1 minute laps,you're not between candidates for victory here.
Round 2 brought interesting changes to championship table - currently 2 winless drivers are leading,followed by both round winners and defending champion,who is also defending round winner and there are still some "outsiders" who have the skill to jump into leading action. Let's see if this rare track will bring more twists towards this year's plot of championship battle!
Round info:
Track: Rockingham National (RO2)
Laps: 75
Previous winners: TEM/Y.Laprevotte (2017), Teho | Altsu (2016)
Server info and password will be PM'ed saturday to all entrants,until then server remains publically accessible: V8 Racing League
This round was tough. No straights to rest and reset mentally... My tyres totally froze down during last 15 laps and didn't really know how much I could push them without spinning or popping a tyre. So I took last laps extra carefully looking after lead that was gifted to me. AdamW had a nice different tyre/fuel strategy and actually I thought about doing the same before the race.
Was a nice race, but for me it didnt worked well.
In Quali i didnt managed to set a good lap...turn 1 was my personal neck breaker. In race it was even worser...i changed the tire pressure between quali and race...one kind of a stupid idea... tyres where totally overheated after 5laps, until i spun out later in the race. After stucking there for 4-5laps, my tyres cool down.
Very stupid move by me to chnage the tyre pressure without testing it, and unlucky too.
But hey, better luck next time
The race was exhausting.
I think the longest real straight might have been the start/finish-straight... Anyways this caused a lot of concentration errors on my end. I was lucky that my first one did not take Niko out (I hated the flatspots I had after this) and that my biggest mistake came close to the end, so I did not loose any position. However with my decision not to pit, I must have confused the drivers around me. My car bottomed out in lefthanders but felt ok in righthanders hence drivers behind me seemed to be unsure weather to pass me or not. Sorry to Soini & Co for this.
I had to shower afterwards, but it was fun to race again and a Top 10 result was unexpected. Overall I'm happy with this round.
Also big kudos to everyone on track around me! Wheather I was in a battle for position, lapping someone or being lapped by someone everyone left room to survive and seemed to be very fair, even when I was not too smart with the spot I tried to defend/let the leaders through.
After giving it a bit of time, i come to conclusion that my race sucked hard. Spun out like a nub 3 times. I quess i picked up best possible tactics, but did not benefit of it.
Grats for Botsi for keeping alive for such a ridicolously long and fast stint.
Pretty nice competition in general
There was not much fight for positions in front of the field this time,probably because drivers were busy fighting the track - the less familiar track turned out to be big challenge. But surely there were few who would rate this challenge positively,especially if they finished as they expected to or even higher. After missing round 2,A.Wiśniewski was back and took the pole position again. He started quickly and run away from the competition early,but that was just because of his strategy that involved pitstop,which turned out to be longer than wanted. Botsi took over the lead and was able to keep it until chequered flag,allthough he lost his pace drastically during final few laps. A.Wiśniewski tried to catch Botsi,but had few too many mistakes,resulting him just 2nd place. The gap between them both was just 1.52 seconds,which is the 2nd closest finish in VERL history - the closest was just under 1 second and was also between the same drivers (2017 round 2). The winner of previous round Unite qualified just 9th,but advanced through the field well to finish 3rd.
After 2 2nd place finishes table leader Botsi scored a win,which means he pulls away from the followers in championship standings - his advantage is now 11 points over Unite,13 points over P.Butcher and 14 over A.Wiśniewski. These 4 are considered as only realistic candidates for this year's title,allthough a total of 13 drivers are still mathematically eligible. After 3 races series has 3 different round winners,4th would make things even more interesting. To win the title in any scenario,Botsi now needs to finish 2nd in both remaining rounds without caring about others. In Rookie of the Year competition there's a leader,who just needs to score 8 points in remaining 2 rounds to take the award even if the closest rookie suddenly dominates next 2 rounds - P.Butcher realistically has secured the award already.
If in Drivers Championship things start to turn in favour of one driver,in Teams Championship the competition starts to warm up - TC-R sees the gap reduced to just 3 points by Vires,but also GenR and RGA closed in during previous round,with the latter of mentioned teams scoring most points in 3rd round. But there is no competition for the defending Nations Cup champions Finland,without huge surprises the nordic country should take the 4th consecutive title as they're 42 points ahead with 70 possible. Best of the rest currently is UK,who has 11 points gap over Poland.
As always numbers are dropping towards later half of the season,but this had also something to do with S3 licence requirement and tough track. It won't get easier in next round either - the South City's streets for many sections are wider than Rockingham's permanent infield road course,but there are no runoff areas anymore like in last round,so every bigger mistake will result in damage to car,but some drivers would surely gladly exchange the gravel traps to half minute pitstop after previous race. On the menu is the longest official configuration City Long. Having bad experience with clashes with some FIA hosted botraces,we decided to avoid them this year,that's why between 3rd and 4th round there is a 3 weeks break. More time to get ready for a fast ride in the cloudy South City.
Anyway - it's obviously my mistake when I assumed that everyone will understand that the time must be set in the official qualifying session. This will be updated in main info.
