Danjama was brilliant with the car, I - on the contrary - was in almost every race too far back (somehow in Montreal I kept close to you guys until the finish line).
But, after all those races I still feel I don't understand the way eutechnyx modelled this car's physics. I can understand difficult cars, like the 250's, I can understand basic road-going Ferraris like the 348 TB. I understand and addapt to them. But I really couldn't with the 550.
Besides, I don't want to seem cocky or something (I know very well my skill's limits), but I actually drove a 575 a few times and I just know that I can downshift without getting this odd "kick forward". Quite the opposite, in fact. About the car stabilty and brakes I can't be sure, because I guess the real car I drove had driving aids available (ABS for sure, but probably TCS and ASM also), so the comparison isn't possible.
One other thing I noticed is that this car is definitely easier to drive with the pad. I never drove it - offline - in this "G25 2nd FC career" I'm now doing, but I remember to be able to win the 550 and 575 trophies in the first FC career I did (with the pad) without major problems. At least I don't recall being at a loss with this car back then (even if I remember these trophies to be among the hardest of them all).
Apart from that, I really think I'm getting slower each week that goes by. My playtime is greatly reduced now because of workload and family duties, usually I only get to do a few races very very late and no offline at all.
That became also very evident last night, when I and Energiya, after the 550 races, still had a few 1 vs 1 races with the F40 (very easy and well-balanced car in this game). I race with Energiya ever since I own a PS3 and started playing GT5P (I think we met in my first PS3 online-night ever) and we have been very evenly matched ever since. Sometimes he was faster, sometimes I was. But never by a great margin. Now, I'm completely off his pace. Great credit to him, of course, but at the same time it really shows that for some reason I'm just not as competitive as I should be.
Anyway, at the front or at the back, it's always a pleasure to race you guys. More than from the races, my fun last night came from all the in-lobby talk. We all have a few laughs and the friendliness we share, whatever everyone's personal results are, makes racing enjoyable.
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