TORA 24 Heures du Mans, Drivers of the Day

Driver of the Day award



After the dust has settled from the battles of the weekend. Now would be a good time for us to celebrate some of the individual performances to which deserve some recognition among the community.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
Did another team impress you?

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?

General notes you would like to add

Here is the thread to celebrate those achievements!


(The above copied from Crediblewizard)

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
That's a tough one, both Paul and Steven did great work but I think this one goes to Paul as he drove 3 phenomenal stints so praise goes to him

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
Jamie (iTeknix). When VAMR Wilson thought he couldn't race we were looking for a fourth driver for our team and iTeknix stood up to the challenge (although scaring us a bit when we didn't have his stjnts till the day before the deadline ) and although he lagged out in his first stint which was beyond his control, he had two awesome drives!

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
Dragonsyoung had a few incidents with the twinkies so got damage in a few stints but he continued to drive the car and get milage for CRA, which in an LMP car with aero damage isn't easy, was very commendable on his end

Did another team impress you?
I think a lot of people will agree me. There was two, in LMP it would have to be Fail Race Endurance. Before the race, jgroves tipped them to be the dark Horse in the event and they were, drove 11 great stints (I say 11 because I don't know what happened in the last one) so bit congrats to them. Secondly, Folstak Racing in GTE did a fantastic job and were in second leading up to the final stint so props to them

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
All LMP drivers were fantastic in lobby A, taking their time to pass the GTE cars even with 3 of us within 300 ft of each other. It reminds me why I love these events

General notes you would like to add
Thanks to everyone who I raced with in lobby A stint 6/7/11 . Was a great event. Apologies to Motorhead who copped some unfriendly words after an accident in stint 6, was an in the moment thing so I am sorry. Also to those in stint 7 who heard my rage then as well.
Also, all the Allied Forces guys, it was a great run and congrats to the #88 for 5th place. And Hayden, Collin and Brandon, fantastic work hosting, organizing hosts, and doing the docs. Is not an easy assignment but you all rose to the challenge.
Final thing, I think because of how he's performed over the last few weeks and especially this week; I vote Brandon for the next spot on CT, if anyone deserves it, it's him!

Great event guys

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
- Everyone did so great, it's hard to choose one. Between managing his car, driving in the race, and helping Hayden with the Live Timing, LMR Bandit for Mushroom Kingdom never missed a beat! That, by anyone's standards is impressive!

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
- LMR COCO joined Chanpion Racing Team LMR late last week with no prior organized racing experience. After hitting the wall at Tertre Rouge in qualifying, and acquiring 40+% rear aero damage, he pushed on and managed a 3:59.5 which put them 4th. An epic time for a car with that kind of damage! They opted to retire after an early laggout, which was too bad because he was only going to increase his speed throughout the race.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
- I think at a certain point, just about everyone weathered a hurt car. It was great to see it not stop the guys from trying their hardest in pursuit of the bigger picture!

Did another team impress you?
- HCR Scuderia was awesome in LMP1 and I was very happy to see their success in the end! HCR Yamagura was also awesome, and it was a major upset to see them fall due to laggout. Folstak Racing was good too. Smooth, consistent, and always there!

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
- After XPR ChicanE lagged out, XPR Soundwave opted to start at the back of the LMP1 field to let those still in the fight have at it. Very thoughtful.

General notes you would like to add
- Stint 9, the battle between The Bulin Wall5 and aTasteyNip was excellent and was captured by the live stream. Definitely worth seeing!

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations? IBlueIJaBBRexI. After getting damage in the first corner of the first stint, he drove the car the whole entire stint with a good 50% rear aero for important mileage.

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you? aTasteyNip opted to take over one of my stints to ensure we stay ahead of the Yamagura car (by the way, cracking battle with you guys) and so that I could get some well needed rest.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference? As mentioned before, IBlueIJaBBRexI. If he didn't continue, we probably wouldn't of finished third.
Did another team impress you? Fail Race Endurance. I haven't heard of half of the guys on the team before Le Mans and they were able to finish third in LMP and they were four tenths of a lap behind the Barry Scott car. Quite impressive if you ask me.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise? Everyone for just being awesome.   

General notes you would like to add Silverstone better happen on Forza 4.

And cheers, Brad and Collin!   

A massive big praise to THO shooter for possibly driving all the stints for his team....wish I could of done the same...another impressive drive by myself for actually getting in front of people and staying there but in  whole well done to everyine who tooknpart.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
- Everybody was superb, Bellmond was amazing, manged 5 stints without even taking a scratch of damage, something I didn't manage myself so it has to be admired! All of the Yamagura team were brilliant never even put a foot wrong in 24 hours of racing that was just unbelievable. TJ was unbelievable, when he started practicing for this he was doing 4:02's when it came to race day he was consistant 3:59's & knocking on the door of 58's completely. He also done a double stint without taking a single bit of damage and racked up 440 miles. As For Hamish & Mystic they didn't really exceed my expectations as I expected them to do great anyway

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
- After Music Man's unfortunate connection issues me & Bellmond had to take an extra 3 stints racing from 4pm-2pm the next day with only a 1 stint break, only difference being was Chris managed his 10 hours without even taking any damage top job buddy!

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
- MSNNINJA took a lot of damage in the first 2 stints but kept his team within touching distance, Erebus had a horrific amount of damage in one stint. Dragonsyoung had a couple of fights with the twinkies but was always there to give it another go. BTW fighting you with 100% on both cars was probably one of the most fun moments of the race.

Did another team impress you?
- All of the LMR cars were there or thereabouts was really enjoying keeping track of the MKR car with the Yamagura, that battle was immense. Red Dragon were so consistantly fast, that was impressive. The pace TopSecret had was just unreal.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
- ShrinkingSteven for getting me into stint 5 when Music Man lagged out on the parade lap, if he didn't do that we would have lost a whole stint.

General notes you would like to add
- Bandit & Mikey managing B lobby took a lot of stress out of running an event like this, managed to keep relatively close to being on schedule after losing a little bit of time at the beginning.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
Keonigsegg R was superb, gave us a good start with a clean fast stint, he did exactly the same in his 2nd stint. Mad Dog did the business for us in the pace department, his pace meant there was only 3 of my stints that required me to push. I could just cruise the final 2 stints which realistically that was all I could do.

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
Both Mad Dog and me jumped in for extra stints to cover Music Man who had some connection issues. It was sad really coz he had put so much effort into testing etc, sure ull see him in a HCR car soon.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
Surprisingly this one goes to Hayden after a very uncharacteristic accident, starting behind the GTs after Music Man lagged out of parade lap Hayden was pushing hard driving like a man possessed to get the time back until a date with the twinkies ended his charge, he literally dragged the car round to land a nice distance that kept us in the game very well done mate

Did another team impress you?
XPR's pace in LMP was pretty strong but Top Secret was dynamite. Every stint I had with him I only saw him for a lap or so and he was gone. LMR as always impressed. Their driver line up in the Red Dragon car showed they clearly meant business and to win by that margin is epic, well done fellas.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
XPR Soundwave knowing he was out of the running let the leaders start in front of him knowing how close it was for the lead at that time was admirable.

General notes you would like to add
Just a big thanks to all my team mates, the organisers, all competitors especially those in my lobbies, we where behind but kept it to a minimum after the first major delay. We really do need to look at the no double stints between mid-race as that would have got us right back on track. Lastly well done to all podium finishers and all finishers this was an epic race that was a little spoiled by lag outs etc but most kept going to keep the race alive so well done

Driver of the Day: THO Shooter

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
MRN3Drifter, an Aussie friend of Erebus whom I had never met before, that just wanted a ride in a Maranello Ferrari. He was the quickest of our lot, and brought home the highest mileage for any of our stints... and I still have yet to meet the guy even in a chat.

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
XB6 Broomzke did that with a solid triple stint in the second half of the race. We had one of our drivers bail on us midway through stint 2, so the rest of us had to scramble and put in extra hours to cover his remaining stints. I may have done an unplanned double, but that was easily topped by our elder statesman pulling off a triple.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
For us that was also Broom. In the middle of stint 10, a wounded LMP car had spun, and made an unsafe re-entry onto the track directly in front of Broom. I am not sure how much damage was inflicted, but am pretty sure it was substantial, yet he plugged along and kept us from losing more than a lap or two.
For other teams in the B Lobby, it seems that there was a few drivers who logged mileage in tehir stints after being hobbled with damage, and for the most part they seemed to do their job, and do it well by not making a nuisence of tehmselves by causing any issues for anyone else.

Did another team impress you?
The SCRL BMW of AMG Pr3d and CossyMan95. Brand new to TORA, they were consistently the rabbit that I seemed to be chasing, and in the end they finished one spot higher than us in P5. Also, the CRA Lucozade Corvette of teddygt, CRA Dodge Mr D and newcomer AMPERSANDLeggz, as I had some rather epic battles with them throughout my stints. Had they not missed a stint or two, they surely would have finished ahead of our Ferrari as well.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
The "team" of THO Shooter, THO Shooter. Foz21, and THO Shooter. Shooter running 13.5 hours staright, are you kidding me? And up until the last few minutes before he could no longer hold a controller, the whole time he was the car to beat in the lobby. I saw nothing more than his rear bumper all day, and that was usually just up to the first chicane, after that he was just a green dot disappearing off into the distance on my map.

General notes you would like to add
As this was a CT run event, as was the TEC 12H of Road America last year, as TORA Staff I was a little skeptical of just how it would go off. The TORA Community Team not only exceeded expectations, but IMO raised the bar on efficiency through diligent work on Live Timing and Scoring and stint organization. Yes we were an hour+ behhind at the end, but that was with no no-double stint rule, and last year ended even further behind with the no double stint rule in play.

And most of all, everyone had a good time. There seems to be less post-race moans than usual, which also reinforces the notion tthat great fun was had by all.

And in my lobby anyway, there were lots of new-to-TORA racers. I got to meet lots of people for the first time, and all of them were not just good racers, but were great fun to chat with as well. Made my six hours of LM most enjoyable, and they all left the event wanting for more TORA.

I just want to say that after Shooters efforts this weekend we (Team HARD Online) have promised not to call him abusive names for the rest of the week. He did that good a job!

Personally I feel we as a team let him and FOZ down. Unfortunately neither myself nor Jordan were able to join him, and the person we did put alongside him and FOZ never showed. Hasnt made any contact since. Too late to find a replacement too.

Its a real shame as I feel with a full compliment of stints we couldve been pushing top 5. But kudos to the two lads on our team. And a massive well done to ou partners at FailRace on their epic 3rd!

MichaelJGroves wrote:I just want to say that after Shooters efforts this weekend we (Team HARD Online) have promised not to call him abusive names for the rest of the week. He did that good a job!

Personally I feel we as a team let him and FOZ down. Unfortunately neither myself nor Jordan were able to join him, and the person we did put alongside him and FOZ never showed. Hasnt made any contact since. Too late to find a replacement too.

Its a real shame as I feel with a full compliment of stints we couldve been pushing top 5. But kudos to the two lads on our team. And a massive well done to ou partners at FailRace on their epic 3rd!

One more driver, at Shooter's pace, and you guys would have been on the podium. He was in a word: Brilliant.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
F1K13RAN596JB drove the last stint with a rather knackered Acura and still managed to finish on the lead lap (just!). Well done to him for fighting till the end!

Did another team impress you?
The one man's army of THO Shooter Driving for over 12 hours... Hats off to that guy!

Somebody in your lobby did something that earned your praise?
FMS TopSecret had the best pace I've ever seen pulling incredible distances with no mistakes. It's a real shame his teammate disconnected...

General notes you would like to add

1) Massive thank you to all the people that stood behind this event. It was incredible fun and well organized for such a long race!

2) I want Silverstone

Here is the thread to celebrate those achievements!

After the dust has settled from the battles of the weekend. Now would be a good time for us to celebrate some of the individual performances to which deserve some recognition among the community.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?

Ninja did. I told him not to crash but he did! So he exceeded there On the other hand he worked amazingly to not lose that much. If he lost any more ground we wouldn't have been able to reclaim 2nd so his effort was critical.

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?

LMR JadedRaver, he came in as the perfect candidate to do the 2-6am stints that we needed and he did the job. Without him we wouldn't have made the 24 hours.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?

MSNNINJA and Raver both had totalled cars at one point and they held on for the team which is noble and in the end it paid off. As we see throughout the years, it happens to the best of us!

Did another team impress you?

FailRace were phenomenally quick, definitely the dark horse in the race. However they may not be dark horses for much longer as we all know what they're capable of! Kieran was pushing really hard in the last stint and even after his accident which basically conceded 2nd, he still drive amazingly. Hayden and Chris' 10 hours each were incredible. Not only are they nutters for doing it but they're quick as hell nutters!

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?

Collin talking random stuff in the night/early morning stints to keep himself, and others, awake! It worked a treat and it killed a lot of time and made waking up (for me) and not passing out (for him) so enjoyable.

General notes you would like to add

Considering the no double stinting at half time rule wasn't in place, we did very well to only lose the hour early on, and even better to not lose much more time if any thereafter.

Driving standards were very good, and the spirit of the race felt a lot better. It goes to show that those still here are among the best drivers, and importantly, people, the integral members of TORA and those that keep it going strong.

There was one incident that Cerberus took damage from which left him very displeased however given what unfolded in the race after the incident, we're not going to add any insults to injuries and move on from it.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
HAHA yeah okay.

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
Not for my team. THO Shooter for his team definitely stepped in and delivered!

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
galeforce (Matt) for Advanced Racing, and warspite as well. Also witnessed Sebastian (can't remember surname) driving the most tail-happy LMP car I've ever seen!

Did another team impress you?
Pretty much all the teams that had a full turn out impressed me, and the TORA team running the race REALLY impressed me.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
THO Shooter - you all know why.

General notes you would like to add
Lobby B was amazing. Everyone was really friendly, the driving was really fair and there were no silly aggressive moves by people and plenty of room given along the Mulsanne. Also was impressed with the way the LMP drivers didn't barge the GTE cars off the track when coming past, they gave us plenty of time which made this such a great race to be involved in.

Driver of the Day award
HMR Motorhead
A VERY close second being THO Shooter.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
xxJiMbObJ0nEsxx
Drove consistently and didn't lag out or crash, and was very quick

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
xxJiMbObJ0nEsxx
Covered for me in the early morning because I was too tired did a triple stint to save the team.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
Can't think off someone.

Did another team impress you?
Barry Scott Racing - Turbo Power
By the name you'd think they was a joke, but they drove amazing giving us an amazing 24 hour long battle for 2nd

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
HMR Motorhead
Carried his team to the finish doing a triple stint I believe to finish to snatch the 2nd place from us

General notes you would like to add
Everyone drove amazing, CreamyTastey had great dedication pulling out a fair amount of stints. AdamWatson99 gave me a good run for my money in Stint 3 and HMR Motorhead again with a great race, and THO Shooter for is amazing dedication and effort pulling out nearly 14 hours for the team.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
SebastianDoyle. He has been worrying for the past week that he is not quick enough around the track, but during his stints he did very, very well and put in the miles for our team!

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
During stint 6 I think every car in B lobby had taken at least some damage, so a big well done to everyone in that stint for sticking through with the frustration of having reduced or no aero.

Did another team impress you?
RGL Racing. Completely dominated the lobby in the LMP class, and their consistency was what led them to a solid finishing position.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
Darylthecrude, doing his stints despite his team having issues previously.

General notes you would like to add
Fantastic racing in B lobby, and congrats to HCR. I am very happy with 5th place overall! And well done to Shooter for having the endurance to drive as long as he did.

Driver of the Day award
aTasteyNip

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
All of the Red Dragon drivers ran a great race. I couldn't ask for a better team! Even in the face of adversity they still pulled through and kept the car strong.

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
LMR Deftone MX picked up rainonef1's last stint after he couldn't make it, so thank you for doing that on such short notice!

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
Dragonsyoung handled his severe damage and avoided the pits to gain a bit more mileage for CRA towards the end of his last stint. It's extremely difficult to handle an LMP car with any sort of damage, so props to him!

Did another team impress you?
HCR Yamagura had impressive pace in every stint I ran. I admit I was a bit nervous when the gaps between us hardly changed! They set a blistering qualifying time, as well.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
Both FMS TopSecret and aTasteyNip set new distance records for a stint (266 for LMP and about 225.5 for GTE) so congratulations on that accomplishment!

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
Thatcargeek stepped in to fill in in the last 3 stints because one driver didn't show up.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
I was impressed with Darylthecrude who drove 5 stints straight and then no one else on his team decided to show up which was a shame because he did a good job. Also Shooter for the sheer fact he drove 13 over half the race distance on his own.
Did another team impress you?
FailRace endurance were impressive getting 3rd in their first time in this race
Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
Again Shooter for the sheer amount of effort he put in

General notes you would like to add
NEVER race for a team run by xebot360 the lmp1 team were given a setup that felt like a drift tune. he then missed a stint and the driver that was supposed to run the last 3 stints didnt show up, the gt team was supposed to be 4 people but in the end Daryl was the only one that race and they had similar problems with setups.

The Bulin Wall5 wrote:Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
LMR Deftone MX picked up rainonef1's last stint after he couldn't make it, so thank you for doing that on such short notice!

+1, big thanks for Deftone.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
Nah, I think we all put in our best efforts, I think we all exceeded our own expectations, rather than each other.

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
This 1 would probably go to Automechanical, we only signed him up a few hours before our first stint, and he had pretty much no practice in the car and still put in some great performances during his stints.

Also in our team xVampirAx was signed a day before the race, he wasn't even intending on racing until he saw our post on the forums. He also put in some great perfomances in his stints. Even having to do 2 stints back to back in our early hours of the morning.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
I think well drove the car at some point which was damaged and we just kept driving to get the miles up. I know in my last stint, I crashed earlier on, and suffered a bit of suspension damage which made it an absolute pain in the ass to drive through the Porsche Curves. But like I said, I think every1 in the team at some point kept driving the car to get the miles up.

Did another team impress you?
All the teams which got damage, but continued to race just to get the mileage.

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
I thought all the GT drivers deserved our praise for getting out of the way of the fast moving LMP drivers. We were catching them at all the bad spots on the track and they moved out of the way as fast as they could.

General notes you would like to add
Full credit to all the lobby hosts for doing a great job of getting the lobbies together ASAP. Even full credit to the organisers, it became tough at the end with both lobbies running well over an hour behind the scheduled times. Id like to give credit to all the drivers, who all raced professionally.

Eycd wrote:Driver of the Day award
HMR Motorhead
A VERY close second being THO Shooter.

Did a driver among your team exceed your expectations?
xxJiMbObJ0nEsxx
Drove consistently and didn't lag out or crash, and was very quick

Did somebody step in last minute and deliver the goods for you?
xxJiMbObJ0nEsxx
Covered for me in the early morning because I was too tired did a triple stint to save the team.

Did somebody manage to drive a damaged car in order to get miles in for their team that made a difference?
Can't think off someone.

Did another team impress you?
Barry Scott Racing - Turbo Power
By the name you'd think they was a joke, but they drove amazing giving us an amazing 24 hour long battle for 2nd

Somebody in your lobby do something that earned your praise?
HMR Motorhead
Carried his team to the finish doing a triple stint I believe to finish to snatch the 2nd place from us

General notes you would like to add
Everyone drove amazing, CreamyTastey had great dedication pulling out a fair amount of stints. AdamWatson99 gave me a good run for my money in Stint 3 and HMR Motorhead again with a great race, and THO Shooter for is amazing dedication and effort pulling out nearly 14 hours for the team.

You're too kind mate!

I only did 2 at the end because I felt sick in the penultimate one but Cerberus did want to do it and let me do the final stint for the 2 hour 'powerplay.' Did 8 last year too, just last year was crap for us!

The joke names have been a tradition since the start of last year. The story goes that we had everything planned before sign up for Sebring (as you had to pick one car for Sebring AND Le Mans), just when the mad rush for sign up happened (back then it was a lot more popular AND there were individual car caps) we didn't have a name, so Team Jeremy Kyle was born

Afterwards my team mate Cerberus came to me and said "Motorhead, WTF is that name?" And I was thinking "Oh lordy," to which he continued "That's [f...lipping] brilliant I love it." I like the names as it gives us an identity rather than So and so team 2, etc