F1 1979 - Round 7 - Montecarlo REPORTS

[Harri Mac]

I was watching the race start from LiveRacers and well, reports please, from the outside it looked like there was some sort of freeze and carmageddon.

[Dmitry Terekhov]

I finished that bloody mess 5 laps behind. Want to say sorry to Marwin for bump on 1st lap. You closed the line, so I sent the car into the wall, but this was not enough to avoid contact.
After the impact my front left wheel stuck behind the wall and i spent 50 second to get out.
No matter how hard I tried, I could not even come close to my lap time. Perhaps this is due to processor latency due to the large number of other cars. Don't know... Or maybe because of the excitement I just could not go faster...
Glad that its over now. Congratulations to all who finished the race and to the podium. That was tough.

   

[bullwinkle]

Great to have you here Dmitry . Bad luck.
The start of the race was a total mess but I survived and plodded on I am not sure how I made it thru my body guys have a lot to clean up and with a few laps to go I ran over someones parts on track but managed to keep going. Lots of bumps and bruises but I finished.
Sorry Bruce during the one pass we touched my fault I think I will look at it.

[Fergy]

My race report... Alarm set for 6.15 am. I woke at 7.04 am. Scream expletive!!!! Disappointing. On the other hand very pleasing to see 20 drivers on track. Well done to all those that finished.

Any issues with server quality bet it lag or similar please let me know.

[Tygernoot]

I'll post my race report this evening. Did the server record the replay in normal speed? I have this silly slomo problem on my own replay...

[Bruce]

Fortunately missed the carnage at the start (starting near the back helps here). Had pitstop planned for lap 19. First half of race completed without incidents and only minor aero damage. Second half of race wasn't so good, was pushing (for me still way slower than most others) and had a couple of heavy hits, needing pit stops for repair. BUT I did finish and get points so a win for me

[macwoj]

Quali was very tight i probably had a bit more but could not put a perfect lap together but it was good enough for pole.
Manage to do a good start and i was able to build a gap driving very safe so was feeling very comfortable .
Then about lap 15 there was a car parked across the track on Massenet corner . It took me by surprise. I hit it straight . I thought the race was over or at least the chance to win .
I lost the front wing and the car was not turning in fast corners but it was ok in slow corners . Surprisingly i manage the gap on Jp and even it was increasing . I adjust the brake bias more to the back of the car to help turning in fast corners and manage to drive the car to the finish . Very happy to get that one after some bad results.
cheers

[lamer of fortune]

The parked car in Massenet was most likely me. I tried a bit to hard and went into a spin. I saw that a car must be close and took the option to not move on the inside of the track rather than trying to get out of the way. Well did not work out so well. Glas that you coud continue after that. I lost my front wing around lap 30 and thought I would have to park n the pit forever due to all the damage but then driving was not impacted much at all.
The race felt ok to me considering that I could only start with practice on Saturday (too tired most of the time). At the start it felt like the carnage was all around me and I consider myself lucky to not be catapulted over the fence on which I was sliding for a little eternity. As I had a substantial speed gap to the front I tried to focus and drive it home assuming that the number f finishers would be overseeable. This somehow worked out and this feels ok. I enjoyed the close laps I did with Ricky until some obstacle got into his way. Hope the arm was ok with all those turns, to me it felt like hard work.

Btw do you love that feeling too, when you sit in the car waiting for the lights to go green with all of you there, hours spend on preparation and the chance of not making it through turn one.
cheers

[Tygernoot]

Some really put in a lot of practice laps for this race. I saw some with 300 laps upwards! Wow. Then again, this is really the track where it's essential to get enough laps done and come in prepared for anything.

Around 20 cars on track during qualifying. Maybe we should opt for private qual for certain races..?
I had a total of 3 clean laps, where luckily each time I managed to improve my laptime. Unfortunately after J-P pushed me down to 3rd position I didn't get another chance of a clean lap, and that was it. The top 3 within 0.1s though, very close!

Starting position is (nearly) everything at Monaco, so I had to come up with something to potentially gain positions starting from 3rd... I went for the 2-stopper!

   

I kept 3rd position on the run to the narrow St Devote. For the first stint I kept pressure on J-P. Even though I was a little bit quicker in my lighter car, there was just no way of even thinking about overtaking. Without a mistake of the other driver, there's just no chance, and J-P managed to keep it together very well. I was also eating my tyres, but then with a 2-stop that's less of an issue. I actually needed J-P to wear out his own tyres for him to be slower up to his pitstop

   

After my first stop, I came out right behind ramon bauer taking my 3rd position. Crap! I started pushing to overtake as I had no time to lose! Unfortunately one lap later when lapping Ricky in T1, disaster struck. With ramon and Ricky heading together for T1, I braked early as I could already see this going horribly wrong and I know fully well that you need a lot of care overtaking backmarkers - even more so at Monaco. I stayed out of trouble but was hit by the car behind and pushed into the barriers! This cost me more positions, more time and resulted in a damaged car. Argh, the 2-stop strategy became a race back to 3rd instead...

   

I kept on pushing and first up was Dan Bayford. Again, it's so tricky to follow another car, but after a good exit of T1 we went side by side up Beau Rivage, both being careful to give each other enough room, but I couldn't make the move stick.
After several laps I made it past thanks to a small mistake by Dan on the exit leading into the tunnel, outbraking him in the chicane. I think that was the highlight of the race for me, managing to overtake someone at Monaco lol

   

Next I was racing ramon bauer, who went into the pits lap 23 after defending very well for numerous laps.

   

I drove onto the end of lap 27 to stop for tyres and fuel (just leaving the damage as-is), and had a short last stint of 11 laps to give it my all. At that point I started making up ~3s per lap on J-P. Despite being 30+ seconds or so behind and not enough laps to make it, I was up into 3rd again and determined to catch J-P for the sake of it.

Lap 34 disaster struck again. When exiting the chicane I took the right side to lap Bruce, but he hit the barriers losing a wheel, tangling his spinning car with my rear wheel in the process. I got spun around and had a car damaged beyond driveability now with a flat tyre to boot.

   

Luckily I made it back to the pits for a change of tyres and despite the heavy damage was able to bring the car home in 3rd.

Considering the accidents I am glad to have held onto my 3rd position, but it wasn't an easy nor really fun race. On the bright side, still in the lead of the championship and 3rd being my worst finishing position so far (not counting the race I couldn't attend). Can't really complain too much about this championship

Next up is France. Hoping to do well there again for maximum points, as I'll have to give the race at Silverstone a miss.

[DJCruicky]

Did the server record the replay in normal speed? I have this silly slowmo problem on my own replay...

Same slow-motion replay for me too after lap 10. Server file the same.

My race...
I was one of the drivers that got caught up in the crash at the start. Starting behind Daniel, lights turn to GO, but he did not move at all. I tried serving around him but I tag Ramon to my right. Ramon then spins into Daniel. Daniel is stuck in the fence. I'm facing the wrong way with the whole field of cars overtaking me. Me, now dead last with dark blue damage on my damage Hud.

Managed to overtake drivers one by one, some just let me passed which was nice of them. I did find a backmarker doing a 3 point turn and tagged me and had me spun facing the wrong way, more damage and time lost :/.
Hardest guy to overtake was Ron, took a number of laps to overtake but got him . I did my pit, says it would take 45 seconds to repair car, but I cancelled that. Then found Ron again, how is he back in front of me?, never knew he was on a zero pit strategy. Overtook him again.

I gave myself more damage with 5 laps to go hitting a tyre wall. Wonky steering wheel. Got it to the finish.
From last to 6th place.
CU in next race.

DJC

[J-P SImard]

Me too I have problems with my replay and it is a shame the races in Monaco are the most beautiful to watch.

Too bad too because I don't remember the whole race anymore but like the others I had difficulty placing myself in qualifying, but it is part of the race and I like this dimension of Monaco, this hazardous side. I managed to get out a good time at the right time but a little surprised to be so close, i felt like I was running out of speed...

The start of the race was fun with Ed putting pressure on me but MB was very fast. I tried to push a little to follow it but it was faster and then I had a small touch with the wall at the first corner and even later I almost tore off my front left suspension which had turned dark blue in my dashboard, the car was starting to be damaged. I calmed down and decided to ease off all the more since Ed was far behind on a 2 stop strategy, finishing was already a victory.

Quite happy with this result which puts me back a bit to the championship and congratulations to the drivers who finished and to this beautiful grid of 20 drivers.

[gorgias1976]

Great to read from you people enjoying the racing.

[deecee52]

Qually went OK , i got baulked on my hotlap so came in got fresh tyres and managed to find a gap which got me a time to be happy with .

Race

Unsettled start for me , i couldnt see the start lights or flagman so watched Mac and went when he did , settled down behind ED and was comfortable for a few laps but kept catching the backmarkers in all the wrong places so kept dropping back then catching up , around lap 12 came into Massenet to find Cookie across the track in front of me , i was going too fast to avoid and went over his front end and sustained damage , car was drivable so kept going to my pitstop which went ok but long due to repairs , came out 6th and chased down Andi , stayed with him for a few laps then made a cockup of my braking going into st Devote and drove into the Back of him and pushed him into the barriers , i pulled over to give the place back but following him i could see i must have damaged his car and he pitted , Mega sorry Andi that was my bad driving . Everything was ok but around lap 33-4 car was sliding and on turn in at the last corner i clipped the inside barrier which launched me across the track into the tyre wall and removed a front wheel , no choice but to pull off and retire BUGGER

[DJCruicky]

I crashed on the very same corner 30 seconds later. I did see bits of your car over the start-finish straight. I was lucky I could continue.

[argl]

My first Monaco finish, could not be more happy. Sorry Tigernoot for pushing you at St. Devote, no problem Deecee, I lost the front wing when you pushed me (at St. Devote), but it would not have made a big difference in the end, maybe one position.

I finished!

[Keeper]

Not only did I go for zero pit stops, but put hard tyres on which was a mistake; even at the end of the race there hadn't even been one square taken off the wear indicator. Could have used softs and been a bit quicker. Made a few mistakes toward the end that banged it up pretty badly but I had enough of a gap that I could just take it easy and lose four to five seconds per lap without losing my position. Another race, another 8th place. I've finished 8th in all four races I've contested this season.