As there were a few who were unable to attend this round, I am sure it should only get better moving forward.
Having really only turned up to 'observe' and to take pics and write a race report etc, I was somewhat surprised to be offered a chance to race, using Wayne B's car, (seems James simply entered My name into the Computer when I arrived, thinking that I too was intending to race).
Whilst I was I guess pleasantly surprised (and thankful) for the opportunity, I had not brought My controller and had also Not done ANY practice whatsoever (and has in fact actually been a while since even doing Any laps around HSC's Small road course track), so My First 'laps' with the car, were during the actual race, which certainly made for an 'Interesting' experience, to say the least
Seems 'Benno', had an early onset of a 'Senior's Moment', when Only realizing (on arrival at the track), that he had somehow managed to Leave His CARS at Home !!,.. DOH !!!
So, with both Benno and myself Now 'lined-up' with 'Loaner' cars, we had a total of 13 starters.
Qualifying
As can be see from the Qualifying sheet, there were 8 drivers who did times Below the 6.00 Sec' mark, with 5.7's and 5.8's and all rather close apart from AND 'bested' by Cody, who very promptly almost scorched around doing a 'Brace' of 5.6 sec' times to realtively easily TQ. Congrats and well done !!
It was decided to divide the Qualifiers into a group of 6 and 7 with the fastest 7 in heat 2 and the slower 6 in Heat 1.
- Qualifying
- HSC Porsche Cup Rnd 1.jpg (176.19 KiB) Viewed 11521 times
So with an unknown car and strange controller I lined up at the Start hoping for the Best.
Well, what an Amazing and unbelievably Close race this turned out to be !!
Throughout the Whole race, there were 4 of us Swapping positions from 1st thru 4th, with NEVER more than 3 laps across us all !!
I managed to get a great start, only for 4 or 5 of us to all get 'cleaned-up' in a first corner 'bingle', (which probably accounts for our 'collective bracket totals being slightly down compared to our totals for the rest of the race).
At the end of the 2nd bracket, Gregg was in the lead, but with John who had moved from 4th to 2nd and on the same lap, I dropped from 2nd to 3rd, Benno from 3rd to 4th, a lap down on the leaders, with Rodney in 5th and Newcomer Peter J in 6th.
I managed to make my way into 1st by the 4th bracket, but Only Just, with Benno and John both moving past Gregg at the end of the 5th bracket.
I had a mere 3 laps on the following 3 prior to me moving onto Purple and Black, so maintaining any semblance of a Lead was going to be a Hard task at the best of times and I really didn't have a great run
so at the end of the 6th bracket I had a Slender 1 lap lead with 233 laps over Gregg, Benno and John, who were All on 232 !!The four of us managing to Pull away from Rodney and Newcomer Peter, who was really doing a very good job considering he was new to Both these cars AND the track !!
I had a less than fantastic bracket on Black, which eventually allowed the following three to get past me and after the last bracket 'Pacing' my way around for almost the Whole bracket with Gregg, ended up 4 laps behind the eventual Podium Placers, who Amazingly ALL finished the race ON the Same LAP as each other !!
Fantastic stuff !!
A somewhat surprising and enjoyable performance/experience for myself with borrowed car and controller and a really close and exciting race throughout, aided by the very enjoyable race long Race calling by 'Brooksy' Great Stuff !!
My thanks to Wayne for the car, Fox for his controller and the other entrants for the Great fun, fast and enjoyable Super Close race.
I must admit, I am also Quite Happy with the Times I managed to turn during the race, (setting Fastest Laps on All lanes !!
) and managing to set the High totals in Our Heat on Yellow 
and was also rather happy being able to Do quicker times than Wayne in His heat although as can be seen from the race sheet we Both Managed to do Exactly the same time on Green !! If I had only managed to have Less 'unforced' De-Slots the outcome May have been different / better for myself
Oh well,.. sigh,.. (Note to Self,.. More Practice on Purple and Black !!
)- Heat 1 Drivers
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- Heat 1 Start Line
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- Heat 1
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Much like with Our SRC and Retro reports, the Yellow blocks show the Fastest times/totals in the Heat, with (as can be seen below) the Pink blocks showing the BEST Times and Totals Overall.
Heat 2
Well what can be said about This race, other than it being a Truly superb performance by Cody, with it being an All the way Win for Him finishing 9 Laps in front of a consistent and always fast charging Jason.
Cody managed to turn NO Less than 40 laps for Any bracket and set fastest times on All lanes !!
It was overall a very good and fast race, but perhaps Not as clean and crash free (at times) as ours and really kind of 'settled' down quite early, with the eventual Top 3 of Cody, Wayne and Jason managing to assert their collective supremacy on the rest of the field by the end of the 3rd bracket by being 5 laps Up and the gap only growing as he race progressed.
With Cody 'Colouring Himself GONE' up front, Wayne was doing a fine job of holding down second but was being constantly 'shadowed' by Jason, who was slowly catching him bracket by bracket and with Wayne yet to run on Purple and Black, the outcome was to end as one would expect, with Jason eventually getting in front of Wayne by the 6th bracket and never looking back.
Jake both Qualified and drove very well especially as he had never driven His OR these cars until this evening.
My good buddy and FAT racing team mate Mark Fox was somewhat untypically NOT having a great evening, seeming to be ever so slightly Down on Pace and occasionally being caught up in some of the On Track carnage, as was My Other fat racing team mate Darryl, who's car seemed quite Quick but got caught up in a few 'bingles' and a rather bad 'Rider' Crash in the Triangle that seemed to Put things Slightly 'Out of Shape'.
Whilst doing OK times in Qual', JJ just Never seemed to manage to Really Get Going in the race compared to the rest of the field and along with Mark and Darryl, was a race he might Easily prefer to 'Forget' !!
This was another rather impressive and Very fast race, especially by Cody and the other 2 x Podium Placer's, with 3rd being 7 laps up on the rest.
- Heat 2 Drivers
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- Heat 2 Start Line
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- Heat 2
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- Overall Winners
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- Cody's car
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- Wayne & Stoo's car
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- Jason & Benno's car
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- John V's car
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- Gregg's car
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- Jake's car
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- Mark (Foxy's) bcar
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- JJ's car
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- Darryl's car
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- Peter J's car
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I can only imagine the next round to be as enjoyable, with perhaps even More entrants.
Thanks to all for such great racing and see you all at the Next round.
