1976 F1 Season - Round 12 Netherlands Zandvoort REPORTS

[Ricknau]

JFC!! I missed the start. A series of blunders! Did a couple warm up laps during 7min warmup. Sat in the garage not keeping track of the 150sec delay clock. (Was there a delay?) Heard the horn sound and revs go up and off everybody went! Whaa!!?? I thought OK, I'll just start from the pits. So I pull out behind the field but what do you know? There apparently is a red stop light I should have waited for! So I get a drive-thru. (I only see the red arrowheads in the upper corner so assume its a stop-and-go. Never seen a drive-thru before, seems like it's always a stop-and-go.) So I press my pit button signaling that I want to serve the stop-and-go. Mistake! It gives me a complete pit stop. So after waiting 25 seconds I'm on my second set of tires on lap 2 and have max fuel load. Plus ... I still haven't served the drive thru! (roll-eyes)

Esc

Hope your race was better!

[Keeper]

Yes, the game has different icons for stop-and-go or drive-through. And indeed it does have a red light at the end of pit lane until several seconds after the start. Live and learn, I guess.

I started sixth or seventh -- on the inside. Had good start; Ed played it safe and stayed wide which allowed me into fifth ever so briefly. I figured that wouldn't last long, and stayed well wide on the second lap when he got a run. Back to sixth. Antti had an issue at the chicane after a few laps and we both got past him. Then he and I shared mistakes, with a rubber-banding gap until ultimately he crashed in the final corner. I relaxed a little too much after that and spun, and later went off wide and smacked the Armco. That put Bryan within a couple seconds or so for a while. He seemed to have a slow pitstop as there was quite a gap after that, and he struggled to get bast Jon who I guess did not pit.

So then it was quite lonely, with 20+ seconds in front and behind. Ed crashed near the end so I inherited fourth place -- last car on the lead lap.

[Dan Bayford]

Well done racers. And big thanks to our admins see you at the next one

[Antti Hyytiainen]

Barely made it in time for the Quali, but it actually turned out better than I expected and managed to trade tenths for awhile with the leading duo David and J-P.

Start was interesting - while heading into T1 I noticed J-P's Macca diving on the inside, so backed off a bit and almost ran wide, but still came out 4th after the leaders.

Followed this three-car battle until the second lap when I hit a sausage kerb on the chicane, which allowed Ed (Pond) and Ron to get by. After that I was trying to keep up / overtake Ron, and at times it seemed like I might have had the pace for it, but on some laps he pulled a bit of a gap again. Then on lap 9-10-ish I went too wide on the final turn, got the rear wheel on the gravel and spun into the inside wall. Didn't try repairs at pits as the car was missing at least one wheel..

Developing a bit of a bad rep crashing all the time, but have to admit the car is a handful to drive during the race. Anyhow, thanks for the organizers once again, it was fun while it lasted!

[Tygernoot]

The qualifying was pretty tough. Everybody kept improving, track conditions providing different grip levels, lots of cars on track, etc. Amazing lap times from the guys in front, digging into the 1:31s wow! I had no answer to that and was happy with my 4th place on the grid.

My start was pretty good and I passed J-P on the inside. It was pretty tight and I thought he would block me using the pit wall, but luckily for me he didn't. With Antti stuck on the outside in the Tarzan corner I was up into 2nd position. A relentless battle ensued between DJ, me and J-P. We were so close to each other for the first 10 laps or so. I had to try and attack DJ while also having to defend from J-P, and sometimes we would nearly run into each other or run out of space on the narrow track. It was also fun to have the 3 different cars battling it out; Brabham vs March vs McLaren. When the tyres started to go we finally spread out a bit. I made a few small mistakes and had fallen 4s behind DJ by the time we came into the pits.

To my surprise I pipped DJ at the pitstop, as it turns out his engine switched off when he ran out of fuel in the pits. My first place was shorted lived though. On the outlap the bump in turn 4 nearly threw me into the barriers and in the next lap I got the car out of shape in the final bend, which gave DJ the opportunity to overtake. I took the inside line to defend, but I braked just a little bit too late on the dirty side. We battled it out through the first two corners, but I had to give up the position. I didn't give up the fight though. We continued to be within ~1s for most of the race. It wasn't easy, with the tyres wearing out and lots of backmarkers to overtake. We finished within 0.5s of each other, amazing. DJ totally deserved this win, being massively quick and keeping it together till the end. I think I gave him a good run for his money though.

I took a few screens while watching the replay

   

   
Brabham vs March vs McLaren

   
DJ getting the better of me

   
Close finish

I won't have time to practice for Monza in the week leading up the race. I hope to get some laps done this week already. No doubt the March is going to be the underdog there. Hopefully my team mate Antti can keep his car in one piece for once, otherwise it's coming out of his paycheck

[J-P SImard]

First bravo to DJ for your first win of the season and Edw for your 2nd, you have driven like champions.

On my side I was very satisfied with my qualification, I never thought I could go in the 1:31, I gave everything I could but David beat me all the same. Bravo.

I had a very average start and Edward passed me inside while I had Antti outside. I had to be very careful and I was able to come out 3rd. At the beginning of the race I was right behind DJ and Edw and I was waiting for an error but we are dealing with two top drivers, she did not come.
On the 10th lap I started having tire wear problems, and when the two leaders increased the pace I had no more rubber to answer and I took a step back. I then decided to focus on the championship first and control the gap with Ed who was 6 seconds behind taking care of my tires.
After my very long stop, I was definitely dropped by DJ and Edw and I brought the car to the finish, finally very happy with this important result.

Congratulations to the pilots present and thank you to the admins to make this possible.

[Edvvc]

I just didn't get confidence in the car at Zandvoort. Sometimes the lap times were good but I knew there was a chance the car would push wide at critical fast bends, and at Slotemaker (the fast blind flat uphill twisty bit) there is some kind of bump in the track that occasionally upsets the car, sometimes catastrophically as happened in the second stint where the car speared into the barriers, lost both wings and bent various bits. The March seems more sensitive to these track anomalies as, according to his report, Edward almost ended up in the same barriers and Antti appeared to clip an inside kerb which launched the car more violently than you would expect.

Ron took 5th from me at the start but I managed to get it back and was following the leading pack of three, and it felt like I was actually gaining for a bit but as they got faster I couldn't match their pace. Antti's incident gave me fourth place where I stayed until my own incident. After the second, damage repair, pitstop I emerged in 9th and managed to get up to sixth where I finished.

Well done to DJC for a dominant display and thank you to all the drivers and admins for making this such a fun series.

[Fergy]

Great turn out again. We had some away and I'm wondering if daylight savings cost a couple of participants as well.

For me my race went well albeit I received a shock as I was going to bed. I text Gorka to find out how things were going as I'd been away. He quickly informed me that I had to get up even earlier if I wanted to race as our time change happens this weekend. So... 4.45am set on the alarm... ouch...
Not much action this race but and nice little battle with [USER=17]@cookie[/USER]. I think he may have out foxed me and was not stopping or on hard tyres, would be interested to know. Either way after my pit stop he came out in front of me and I had real trouble trying to get past as his pace was good considering his strategy. I made a pretty poor move I have to say which saw us both spin with no damage. In the race I thought I may have been enough in front to turn in but on viewing the replay I clearly turned in front of him. Not happy with myself and very sorry for that Cookie.
Some how ended in 5th, my race pace was ok given the limited practice for this one, loved the track and the massive challenge it brings.

Deep into the season now. Awards to be handed out at the end of this one. Yet to be announced but I'll keep you posted.