So I went into tonight cautiously optimistic. I had a good amount of practice, got good practice races in, had coaching from
@Jwptexas , and was in one of the OP cars.
Slot 3: Door #15 @51.6k, 260 points for the win.
Following Tex's advice, I waiting until everyone had cleared T1 before I left the pits to qualify. I wanted nothing to do with the slip stream train. T1 seems to be the make or break point for me, and I got a pretty good run through. Rest of the lap was going well, and as I came around the hair pin, someone was leaving the pits. No good. Fortunately, they got a good run through the esses and I grabbed their slip on the straight to come in with a 55.2xx. This was about as fast as my laps in practice. Good. I was catching the guy who came out of the pits so I just exited and waited. Provisional pole, and then one of NA's finest streamer got a good two to nip me by a tenth on the second set of laps.
P2 start. P1-P4 gave each other the wink and the nod to work together. I got a good start and could've tried to take P1 on the first turn, but backed off and took his slip. The shipyard that first lap was ugly. I managed to avoid it, but some of the rowdy folks from south the equator bowling balled through the field taking out my draft buddies, and they were hot on me coming out of the shipyard. I was the streamer's slip, and got a great run coming off of him heading into the hairpin. I went inside mostly to make sure I didn't make contact in the braking zone, and then the opponents from the Southern hemisphere sent it again, and there was lots of contact. I went way wide to avoid most of it, and popped out in P3. One of the guys who passed me had a 3 second penalty. I followed them through the shipyard, passed P1 as he served the penalty, and then the new leader missed his braking point and went way wide at the hairpin. I took P1 and with a slowly rising gap each lap (and each time they swapped places behind me) I finished that way with a 9ish second gap.
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260 flipping points! I'm still a little bit in shock after taking 78 points (combined) from the last two manu rounds and feeling the struggle hard this season. I beat my previous best (from DTS this season) by 15 points, and will finish with 505 points with my two keepers. I should finish in the top 100 in the Americas and P4 for Ford (my bud
@Jwptexas nipped me by 3 points for P3, lol).
Before this season, 203 points was the most I'd ever taken. I'm pretty happy to say the least, and hope that I can find the time to put the practice in and get results when the new season kicks up.