I think I'm going to have to accept this season's likely not going to be a good one. I think I'm capable of a decent result here, but it feels like there's some luck involved and my tendency for caution does not stack up well.
On one hand, I got through in one piece in slot 1 - CRB and all. On the other, the aggression on display was crazy. The Corvette's straight line speed definitely helped, but only after everything had started to spread out.
I thought my free practice time meant I was in with a good shot, but either it wasn't as strong as I had hoped or I got a lobby of Tokyo Expressway specialists. I set a 1:55.353 in qualifying and still ended up just over a second off pole in P9.
Turn 2 went much cleaner than I had anticipated, but I lost a position from a green Porsche aggressively throwing himself up the inside at the right hander leading onto the tunnel straight. Barely registered that one coming in VR.
I then lost out heavily because of the Porsche at the hairpin. I moved off the racing line to brake in clean air, only for the Porsche to stray significantly right whilst braking, forcing me to do the same. I ended up taking the hairpin as tight as you can possibly go and dropped back to P13 for it.
Lap 2 was scary. I had been closely following another Corvette and a Lamborghini who were 2-wide through the docks. The Corvette hit the left wall on the exit chicane, bounced off, hit the Lamborghini into the right and then started going sideways. I had to lift to avoid ramming the Corvette, but got hit from the side by the bouncing Lamborghini which pinballed him into the wall again. I was expecting to get a heavy penalty for simply existing, but it seems the game correctly recognised I was not to blame.
The green Porsche had all but vanished from my view after screwing me on lap 1. I caught back up and passed him on the run down to docks on lap 3 as he'd caused some chaos at turn 1 and picked up damage for it.
I got alongside the other Corvette at the docks and we took the sequence 2-wide. I had the inside on the right hander onto the back straight... and then the green Porsche tries to repeat the move he did to me on lap 1 and pushes the other Corvette into the wall.
He almost took me out on lap 6, tapping me from behind at turn 1 as he came in whilst practically touching my rear bumper, causing me to brush the wall on the exit. It's moments like this were I'll admit I get frustrated. I'm not in a Porsche, I'm in a big heavy FR. I need to brake slightly earlier to get the car to turn in. People do try to consider the characteristics of the cars they're racing against, right? Or is that just me?
The Lamborghini had a big run down to the docks and shot up the inside, only to get it wrong and go deep. The Porsche then comes charging in to the apex, so I have to stay wide and barely avoid the Lambo. The Porsche then pushes me into the Lambo, almost spinning himself in the process, then almost spinning the Lambo straight afterwards. Can you tell who my primary focus was throughout this race yet? 😅
Lap 7 saw unbridled murder as the polesitter got punted hard into the back wall next to the the pit entry by a Supra. He ended up pulling over and driving
backwards for a while at the end of the race as it caused him to fall a long way back, so I imagine he was absolutely fuming. And I don't blame him from the replay; just absurd levels of aggression on show. The Supra tried braking after the 150 board whilst practically sniffing the polesitter's rear bumper and doing 176mph/284kph. There was no way he was ever stopping it safely. The game didn't even award a penalty for it, nor give him any damage.
I pit on lap 8, took fresh tyres and then emerged to realise what the next challenge would be - dealing with people who can get away without changing them. And guess who that includes, who got past me as I was on the pit exit lane?
I ended up sending it into the hairpin on lap 9 in a manner I very rarely do. The green Porsche tried squeezing me right, but I managed to get it stopped, park it sufficiently close to the wall to stop him sneaking up my inside whilst I'm waiting for the Corvette to point the right way and then out traction him out of the turn. He sends it into turn 2 on lap 10, goes deep, I get on the inside as we go 2-wide and then squeeze ahead coming away from the docks... possibly by the skin of my teeth.
I'm not actually certain if the game counts the kerb or line as the track limit on this bend. If it's the line, I pushed it to the absolute limit:
From there I finally managed to drop him out of my tow and escape on the fresh tyres, running P10. This is where the polesitter quit, so I moved up to P9 for free.
I was gradually reeling in another Porsche who'd pit on lap 2. I got slightly in front heading down to the docks on the final lap, held it around the outside as his tyres were heavily worn and then brought it home for P8 and 187 points.
) I am now P9 and can see those ahead so have recovered well. Then up to P8 with another car pitting. I hold the position and gap for the next few laps. Then the car starts to order some understeer and I go deep in a few corners putting me at risk to those behind. And I do indeed loose places before the race is done. Add in a 0.5 second cutting penalty and the last third of the race was a disaster. I drop to P10 for the end. I get 44 points and a little below the 50 I was targetting. I felt I did have some pace and with a little luck another go could be better for me.
