I must admit, I started very unprepared into this race. Usually I can put in at least one to two hours of practice before a race. I know, this isn’t a lot compared to others who manage multiple hours on track. But anyway, I was very happy with the result.
I qualified fourth and had a good start into the race. The little pre-race practice and qualifying showed that the racing-soft compound gets a lot of beating around this highly technical track. So my initial strategy called for three stops around the 15, 30 and 45 minute mark.
I was quite surprised that I was able to stay close to snail and donny at the start. I was certain they had switched to mediums to do a two stop, but when we got to the really tricky part of the track they started walking away. So that was that.
For the next couple laps I was able to run consistent lap times, while maintaining position. Ninja was close but not close enough to make a move on me. So I followed my strategy and pitted around 15 minutes into the race. To my surprise, Ninja did not. Did he run mediums? Was he able to run the softs smoother and make them last longer?
After my stop, back on track my mind started to go through the possibilities. If I kept my three stop strategy Ninja would probably beat me by pure pitstop times. There was just one chance – do only one more stop.
So I continued and tried to be as gentle as possible to the softs because now they had to last for more that 20 minutes instead of just 15.
I the end it worked out. Sadly – for him at least – Donny made a mistake and spun his car which put me into third position. He chose mediums for the last stint – which obviously I did not know by then.
So after my second stop, about 20 minutes before the flag, I found myself in 3rd place with Donny just 8 seconds behind. Snail and Chien were long gone into the distance.
You should know, Donny is a very strong driver. Amongst the best of our team. I was pretty sure he would catch me – or my softs would let me down. But neither happened. With Donny on mediums he managed to stay within 8 to 10 seconds, but could not catch up. And I did the best I could to keep this distance and look for my tires.
A really good race. And – sadly – the end of a good series. Thank you, snail, for creating it and thank you to everyone who participated!