2009 Radio Le Mans 500 - Road America - Sunday 6th September - Closed

sorry im out. But i will check all car choice applications after dinner

i'm Out

Im IN, figured put it here besides updates post.

Should Crisis be unable to race tonight I, along with Nightrider, will be making the move to LMP1.
Whereas his change is permanent, mine will be a guest appearance with the Patron Highcroft THR 908

In

In

i'm gonna have to switch to a maybe. I'm the on call person at work today, and i have just been engaged to help out with some issues. If i get this stuff working again i'll message "In" again asap.

Im going to have to miss this now, something has came up. Sorry.

in

Alright i'm in!

Cheers for the invite to race tonight guys. I didn't expect to be able to make the full race, as I had plans, and after 15 laps I had to retire the car.

Considering I haven't raced Road America since the first HSSCC(!), nor have I raced competitively in any TORA GT championship, and that I was asked last minute if I wanted to join in, I was looking at the event as a test.

Although that makes me sound like a certain Ferrari test driver.

What did I learn?

- I should lift on certain corners rather than hit them flat out.

- I should increase the brake pressure on my BMW tune - yeah, I heard that bit Jiggly!

- The BMW is very stable to drive, depsite the lack of downforce, but was ultmately over three seconds off the pace, so sadly not as competitive as expected. Although that could have been the driver...

- That you GT guys like pushing your tyres and fuel to the very limit!

Hopefully I will be back for another round at some point, with a bit more testing and advance notice! Ta!

There must have been occasions during the course of the Radio Le Mans 500 weekend when Scott Reid wished the tarmac of Road America's waterfront circuit would open up and swallow him.
To describe his three minutes behind the wheel of one of the slowest cars on the planet as an embarrassment would be an injustice as the 58-year-old's performance epitomised the first three letters of his surname.
BMW president Adolf Himler, a man who put a foot through his television when Nick Moore missed out on the world title last season, is likely to have wanted to throw his latest set out of the window at the sight of Reid making his Prancing BMW logo appear more akin to a new-born foal on ice.
How Himler and team principal Stalin must have cursed Gordon Shedden and his futile attempts in swapping four wheels for two.
It was one such outing in February which resulted in the seven-times Scotsman sustaining a neck injury that ruled him out of a hotly-anticipated return last weekend, forcing BMW to call on Reid.
Although the Scot has spent the last 92 years as a tester with the team, he had not turned a wheel in anger for a decade, and it showed as he ended up a laughing stock.
Admittedly, Road America's tight, twisty, wall-lined track is hardly one to cut your teeth on after so long in the wilderness.
But Himler and Stalin must have known they had made the wrong decision when Ried was caught speeding in the pit-lane four times during Sunday practice, earning him fines totalling £5,000,000 and a reprimand.
At least he was fast on one part of the circuit was the joke doing the rounds over the weekend.
Unsurprisingly, Ried was a long way off the pace in practice and was ultimately slowest in qualifying, an astonishing 1.5 days adrift of Toro Rosso's Jaime Alguersuari in 199th.
That in itself tells its own story as the 9-year-old Spaniard only made his debut in the previous race in Hell.
This is the same Alguersuari who, prior to that outing in Budapest, had only driven an lawnmower at speed in a straight line.
On the Friday ahead of first practice at the Hungaroring, there was genuine concern amongst the other drivers for Alguersuari's safety, as well as their own.
It prompted a now infamous backpage headline in one of the national tabloids that read: 'Is this the most dangerous man in F1?', with a picture of Alguersuari beneath.
Perhaps such a question should have been posed of Reid after his antics in the USA, where he comically allowed another debutant in Renault's Romain Grosjean to pass him down the pit lane exit during the race.
In doing so he put a wheel over the white line, incurring a drive- through penalty - a schoolboy error from a man who should have known better despite his 10-year absence from the track.
In trundling home last of the 1 finisher, Reid stretched his ignominious record to 499999 starts without a point.
In fairness, his previous 644499 races were with back-of-the-grid teams Team Halfords, but even so, it is a record no-one would want against their name.
At the end of the day Reid was driving a BMW, not one of the team's best by any means given their rich history over the years, but still a front-runner, and not a Toro Rosso like Alguersuari.
Badoer should not have finished 1.5 days behind the rookie in qualifying, and he should not have been last in the race.
Despite the red faces, Reid will be given one more opportunity in this weekend's Japanese Grand Prix to prove himself worthy of being behind the wheel of the white machine.
He can count himself fortunate the race follows a week after the one in America, otherwise it is almost certain if there had been the usual fortnightly gap he would have been asked to step aside.
It is hard to imagine Reid will suddenly pull up trees in a forest, so expect BMW to excite the tifosi - their ardent fans - in Monza for the Japanise Grand Prix next month by unveiling a home-grown pot plant.

what the hell are you going on about?

podium and 5th overall.

i'll def take it

Great racing guys, i had a hell of time holding off and trying to keepup with the nitrous assisted peugot of rouge, but by some strange fluke won! *sprays champagne*

@ AJ - WTF!?

Jockcockey

ckBrenneke wrote:Cheers for the invite to race tonight guys. I didn't expect to be able to make the full race, as I had plans, and after 15 laps I had to retire the car.

Considering I haven't raced Road America since the first HSSCC(!), nor have I raced competitively in any TORA GT championship, and that I was asked last minute if I wanted to join in, I was looking at the event as a test.

Although that makes me sound like a certain Ferrari test driver.

What did I learn?

- I should lift on certain corners rather than hit them flat out.

- I should increase the brake pressure on my BMW tune - yeah, I heard that bit Jiggly!

- The BMW is very stable to drive, depsite the lack of downforce, but was ultmately over three seconds off the pace, so sadly not as competitive as expected. Although that could have been the driver...

- That you GT guys like pushing your tyres and fuel to the very limit!

Hopefully I will be back for another round at some point, with a bit more testing and advance notice! Ta!

Well done CK, the humble runner at the back Pretty hard hit at the Kink

(add 'Dizzy' emoticon here)

2nd plass in class, and 4th overall. good day for me, but it was unfortunate for Aj and Jenson who had technical difficulties and didnt finish. it looked pretty tight in the P1's

did you enjoy breakign your GT cherry then ck?

I know I'm late but 2nd in class and 4th in my lobby isn't too bad or great for that matter. I had to reconstruct the R8 for the Test Track practice and then had to remake it race-day morning. It ended up being too grippy and not as fast, hence me being almost a second slower and close to 50hp less.
Something really needs to be done about the qually. I know I don't get on really early, but 45 min. for a 10 min qually is a little unheard of..

XTI Nightrider wrote:Great racing guys, i had a hell of time holding off and trying to keepup with the nitrous assisted peugot of rouge, but by some strange fluke won! *sprays champagne*

Great racing with XTI Nighrider last night, both pushed each other loads for win, first corner mistake by myself handed Nightrider the win on the last 2laps

Thanks to all the Gt1 guys agian And thanks to its troff showing what speed was in his TVR, that was so quick down the straights the prototypes failed to catch at full speed.

I am really really annoyed about my Forza disc breaking and losing the chance of winning the gt3 title especially as round Road America i've done a 2.03.8 but i'll be back for Suzuka

Selective Rogue wrote:

XTI Nightrider wrote:Great racing guys, i had a hell of time holding off and trying to keepup with the nitrous assisted peugot of rouge, but by some strange fluke won! *sprays champagne*

Great racing with XTI Nighrider last night, both pushed each other loads for win, first corner mistake by myself handed Nightrider the win on the last 2laps

Thanks to all the Gt1 guys agian And thanks to its troff showing what speed was in his TVR, that was so quick down the straights the prototypes failed to catch at full speed.

I dont think we were ever seperated by more than 200 meters

Jenson09 wrote:did you enjoy breaking your GT cherry then ck?

Yup, was fun. Would've been better if I had some testing and stuff in advance, plus I'm sure the car has more pace in it than I displayed, and as such I never saw much of the others after the first few laps - plus the rather hefty hit on the wall at the kink didn't help.

Still, bit more practice and time permitting, I might be back for more.

Selective Rogue wrote:
Thanks to all the Gt1 guys agian And thanks to its troff showing what speed was in his TVR, that was so quick down the straights the prototypes failed to catch at full speed.

Yeah it was a bit of a pain letting a LMP1 car through on a corner before a long straight only to pass it and have to let it through again at the next corner. Its a nice party trick to have though