I was going to do a proper writeup of my race, but as things went from interesting to odd, a small note shall suffice.
I've long been looking to get back to the track with a good, fun car that would be a challenge to myself (I'm still trying to find my own sweet spot), but due to work and other commitments, it's sadly taken far too long.
However, on a slightly hungover Sunday I finally got to do my race. I'd been testing 500PP Sports Soft setups for the Lotus Evora, Honda NSX Type R '02 and the BMW M3 CSL, and eventually settled on the M3 CSL, which is stock with drivetrain upgrades, a new suspension and SS tires.
During offline practice it did 9:09 with a few mistakes here and there, so I was pretty confident I could win - if I drove properly. Sadly, being slightly hungover doesn't do a world of good for driving ability, so I had some messy early couple of laps, clocking in the 9:30 range. This was also partially due to the car feeling different compared to offline practice.
I assume this is due to me not enabling tire/fuel wear in practice, but it really felt a lot heavier and very understeery, which caught me out too many times.
But after 5 laps going into the pits, I was called up to do some work, so I saved progress and went away.
Came back yesterday afternoon, now with a clear head, did my pit duties and trundled along. I'd spent part of monday trying to figure out what was wrong with the understeery bit and came to the conclusion it didn't actually feel like I was lacking grip, so I decided to cure the understeer with violence!
Yanking the wheel hard seemed to do the trick, and properly picking the right battles with corners seemed to save the tires too.
Along with keeping on the actual track, that meant I got 3 really quick laps and the last 2 slightly slower. Clocking around 9:10 on the fast laps and 9:20 on the slow ones. Seemed ok, even if I'd lost a bit of time on the first stint.
But some things started to make little sense to me. I'd already noticed I hadn't gotten my normal first reset lineup - but it doesn't actually seem to conform to the ones C-Zeta posted. I had the HPA FT565, which I'd counted on as being the fastest, but it was far surpassed by a Mine's Skyline (didn't make a note of the exact model, but it was blue!). It was very, very fast and on 5 lap stints it just kept pulling away.
Regardless, I went on to my third stint which was overall quite uneventful, although I went from being 2:25 down to 2:45 down. Apart from that Skyline, I felt I kept up well.
But then things turned very odd.
Coming in on lap 15 for my third pitstop, I didn't get a fuel/tire confirmation box up, autopilot drove straight through the pits, and continued on to the track. It seems Mr. Spectre Bob had decided to take over and did a lap, losing a minute in the process. A third of the way through lap 16, I suddenly got a prompt asking me for fuel and tires, which I accepted.
Fortunately he came into the pits at the end of lap 16, prompt came up again and I once again accepted - and it continued to drive straight through.
But only this time, it left me in control. This car was not meant to go 7 laps on those tires, but I managed quite well. Not a single mistake, while still pushing as much as you can on shot tires, so I was well pleased despite the obvious setback. I was at least still in the running for 3rd.
But well, you don't just drive on tires. You drive on fuel too, and given my 5 stop strategy, I'd only filled for 6 laps + change, so I ran out of fuel going into Karussel.
Then it was just a matter of limping back to the pits, clocking a 13:18 lap and knowing I was now over 9 minutes behind. Everything from then went fine, and I eventually finished 7th (and got classified 2nd as the leading car was too far behind me to get classified).
But I have a question:
I consider myself a reasonably good driver, quite stable and able to clock nearly similar times (I was doing 9:08.5 - 9:13.2 on the hot laps on good tires every time after adjusting to the car).
But at 500PP on SS, surely this should be doable? Even without the bug, I would've been about 3 minutes down.
I realise the M3 CSL doesn't exactly sport a fantastic top speed, but that goes for so many cars.
So the question from me is: Did I just pick the wrong car or am I really 10 seconds slower per lap than the others who've done it with SS?
Then again, re-reading the list it dawns on me that not many have done it on SS, and I have no idea how good those few other cars are. So maybe I am doing alright afterall.
- 60kg, my actual weight to the T. 
