Post-race comments...

Stacey Greensall
I havn't done any e21 drivng since before Christmas, so was happy to
secure 2nd in qualifying
At the start, We both hristo and I had poor starts and there was a
slight bunch up behind up, but soon hristo and i broke away from the
pack and started to fight it out good and proper

we traded places many times and by the time the pit stop cycle came we
were still under 1s apart. I was so involved in the race though, I
though i had thrown it away when i totally forgot to set my pit
strategy.
Rather than change tires though and loose 30s, i stopped in pit lane
b4 my box to set a no tire change stop. i easily lost 5 or 6s doing is
but minimised the damage at least. :(
To make matters worse though, that mistake made me come out just
behind Uwe, and no offense m8, but with different gear ratios and more
fuel weight, i just couldn't get by, even though i was clearly
faster.
Uwe prolly even saw me trying some pretty unlikely pass attempts as i
got more frustrated with hristo gettin away... heheh :)
i deffo nearly drove it off the road a couple of times. :)

Then i saw on the radar hristo was getting into traffic (which was why
i pitted early), so i started to push again.
when hristo came out of the pits, i was just in front, but he soon got
by me and we started to fight it out again, trading places and going
2wide in places you couldn't imagine. :)

Because i had no chance of passing and leaving hristo behind, i
decided the best bet for the win was to be 2nd with 2 to go and use
the draft on the back straight to get away, so i just kept the
pressure on.
then with 3 to go and my utter surprise, hristo pitted again, and i
was able to just cruise to the finish.
Its a shame really, it would of been interesting to see who wanted it
most on the final lap, cos we made our intentions pretty clear earlier
in the race with some very tough side by side racing.
unlucky hristo m8, thats twice you should of had me, but have fallen
short.... great racing though :)
congrats to Joachim too for his podium finish, he kept with us for a
long time, but suddenly disappeared and then re-appeared at the end...

Hristo Itchov
What a race that was! Great dicing with Stacey, drama in the pits, nail-biting moments on the track and what not.

Starting with practice though, I ran some full fuel tests and the fuel consumption appeared extremely low so I decided to put on maximum fuel and pit in for a splash near the end. My prediction was 15 liters would be enough for 28-29 laps and then put 3 liters more for the next 4 laps, but there was one big flaw in this as it would become clear later - I didn't account for how slipstream increases consumption.
Qualifying went as planned and I even had a funny slipstream battle with Jo (I think) in our first laps (thanks for the draft :P ). I managed to better that time in my 2nd run and pole position was secured.

I can safely say my starts suck totally and practice would have to be put into sorting that out. Revved up too high, got too much wheelspin for too long and lost all the momentum. Apology to whoever had to lift up to avoid me. Stacey had a better start and managed to go ahead on the left. Suddenly out of nowhere Andrew appeared between us and pushed through as we went for the braking zone, so I opted to go right and lift up as it was a totally unnecessary risk. He ran wide as I expected so I regained 2nd place on the inside and kept it until the exit of T2. By that time Stacey has managed to open up a decent gap which grew up to 2 seconds at the end of the 1st lap.
It didn't bother me much because my car felt good, so I just focused on preserving the tyres a bit (no tyre change planned) and keep the momentum going. It took quite a number of laps to close up the gap and then it became apparent that he had much more downforce dialed in so he was pulling away into the twisty bits in the 2nd half of the lap. I think if it wasn't for the huge slipstream those cars produce I'd have stood no chance in passing him.

Luckily for me that wasn't the case so we had a great battle, almost like an oval race, passing each other back and forth many times. It was a fascinating clash of much different downforce setups: he had the advantage of late braking, higher speed through middle speed corners and faster acceleration, I had better top speed and more momentum preservation through the fast corners.
So for many laps neither of us could break away from the other and just before the 20th lap Stacey went into the pits. Around this point I was surprised to find out my fuel was going low too quick, but couldn't understand why until a few laps later.

To make things more complicated I couldn't switch properly through the HUD display as it was set on my right paddle which I normally use for shifting up, but it would click 2-3 times or not at all, so I changed the mapping as shifting up safely became impossible. The button I was using for up gear shift wasn't very comfortable either. I was also approaching a group of backmarkers.

I decided to have a few more laps and try to come up with a solution before I run out of fuel, which was enough to about the 25th lap, but that would've meant losing time through the backmarkers. I checked the gap back to Stacey - 35 seconds, but as I haven't practiced pitstops before the race I wasn't aware if that meant he changed tyres or not. Just in case, I changed the pitstop instructions to no tyre change and a few more liters for the planned remaining 8 laps.

All of this disturbed my concentration and probably in a bit of panic I decided to pit earlier without preparation. While slowing down towards the pitlane I realized I'd have to add more fuel because I was pitting 3-4 laps earlier than planned. While switching through the HUD, I forgot to change to Neutral so the engine stalled just before my pit box. I pushed the button to restart it and it took around 5 seconds, but then I rushed into 1st gear too soon and it stalled again! Another 5 seconds or so, but this time I managed to shift properly and reached the box. In all that I totally forgot about adding more fuel! A 10 secs pitstop and I was back on the track just to see Stacey fly by into 1st place!

I had no choice but to push really hard and risk more, but the worn out tyres didn't help and it was sliding all over at some places. I managed to repass Stacey and even open a little gap, but it was then that I checked my fuel and @#%$^&! - it was not enough to reach the end! Mentally out of balance as I was at the time instead of using my new button to shift up on the s/f straight I pushed my paddle that is now the HUD and just stood there revving high in 4th gear and in panic kept pushing the paddle and going through HUDs, lol! That lost me alot of speed so Stacey caught up again. I tried to use less fuel for a few laps by using higher gears for some corners, but it became clear I'd need a splash with 2 laps to go.

The last nail to the coffin was that even though I set it so they put 3 liters in when I stopped it said "15 seconds" pistop and they were adding alot more fuel! I changed it on the fly to much less, but it still took 15 secs! Luckily Uwe was too far behind and I managed to keep my 3rd place.
Fun race, great fighting with Stacey, but it just shows that I have alot to learn regarding racing in rF.

Detailed Race Report courtesy of Matthias Bögel

	Event: Kyalami
Date: 2009/01/10 17:04:18
Laps: 33
Mod: BMW320_E21
Race Length: 47:23.121

PRACTISE RESULTS


 1 Hristo Itchov        Team John Player         22 01:22.341 0.000
 2 Stacey Greensall     Team Rothmans            17 01:23.084 0.743
 3 Jo Lueg              Team Martini Racing      10 01:23.145 0.804
 4 Uwe Schuerkamp       Team Rummel              13 01:23.661 1.320
 5 Matthias Boegel      Team Glysantin           15 01:23.672 1.331
 6 Dave Purdy           Team Neumann              9 01:23.855 1.514
 7 Michael Ward         Team Baier Motorsport     8 01:24.459 2.119
 8 Christoph Grimlowski Team Yellow Corn         27 01:25.107 2.767
 9 Richard Busch        Team Rothmans            10 01:25.159 2.819
10 Eldred Pickett       Team Buler               13 01:25.220 2.880
11 Andrew Ward          Team TRF NIL             18 01:25.282 2.942
12 David Goodwin        Team John Player          2 01:30.011 7.671


QUALIFYING RESULTS


 1 Hristo Itchov        Team John Player         11 01:22.344 0.000
 2 Stacey Greensall     Team Rothmans             7 01:23.058 0.713
 3 Jo Lueg              Team Martini Racing      12 01:23.069 0.725
 4 Uwe Schuerkamp       Team Rummel               8 01:23.430 1.086
 5 Matthias Boegel      Team Glysantin           12 01:23.627 1.283
 6 Andrew Ward          Team TRF NIL             13 01:23.872 1.528
 7 Dave Purdy           Team Neumann             12 01:24.070 1.726
 8 Michael Ward         Team Baier Motorsport    10 01:24.974 2.630
 9 Richard Busch        Team Rothmans             6 01:25.076 2.732
10 Christoph Grimlowski Team Yellow Corn          8 01:25.203 2.859
11 Eldred Pickett       Team Buler                4 01:26.091 3.747
12 David Goodwin        Team John Player          5 01:26.660 4.316
13 Oliver Day           Team Schnitzer Racing    no time


RACE RESULT


 1 Stacey Greensall      Team Rothmans          33  2 Running
 2 Jo Lueg               Team Martini Racing    33  3 Running
 3 Hristo Itchov         Team John Player       33  1 Running
 4 Uwe Schuerkamp        Team Rummel            33  4 Running
 5 Matthias Boegel       Team Glysantin         33  5 Running
 6 Andrew Ward           Team TRF NIL           33  6 Running
 7 Dave Purdy            Team Neumann           33  7 Running
 8 Eldred Pickett        Team Buler             32 11 Running  1 Lap(s)
 9 David Goodwin         Team John Player       32 12 Running  1 Lap(s)
10 Michael Ward          Team Baier Motorsport  31  8 Running  2 Lap(s)
11 Christoph Grimlowski  Team Yellow Corn       23 10 DNF (DNF) 10 Lap(s)
12 Oliver Day            Team Schnitzer Racing  19 13 DNF (DNF) 14 Lap(s)
13 Richard Busch         Team Rothmans           4  9 DNF (DNF) 29 Lap(s)
FASTEST RACE LAPS


 1 Hristo Itchov         01:22.665 0.000
 2 Stacey Greensall      01:22.842 0.177
 3 Jo Lueg               01:23.421 0.755
 4 Uwe Schuerkamp        01:23.744 1.078
 5 Matthias Boegel       01:23.776 1.111
 6 Andrew Ward           01:23.977 1.312
 7 Dave Purdy            01:24.290 1.625
 8 Oliver Day            01:24.411 1.745
 9 David Goodwin         01:25.143 2.478
10 Christoph Grimlowski  01:25.262 2.597
11 Richard Busch         01:25.573 2.908
12 Michael Ward          01:25.718 3.052
13 Eldred Pickett        01:26.129 3.464


HIGHEST CLIMBERS


 1 Eldred Pickett         3
 2 David Goodwin          3
 3 Stacey Greensall       1
 4 Oliver Day             1
 5 Jo Lueg                1
 6 Uwe Schuerkamp         0
 7 Matthias Boegel        0
 8 Dave Purdy             0
 9 Andrew Ward            0
10 Christoph Grimlowski  -1
11 Michael Ward          -2
12 Hristo Itchov         -2
13 Richard Busch         -4


PERFECT RACE LAPS*


 1 Hristo Itchov         01:22.418 0.000 [16, 26, 9]
 2 Stacey Greensall      01:22.713 0.295 [18, 9, 11]
3 Jo Lueg               01:23.367 0.949 [4, 8, 8]
 4 Uwe Schuerkamp        01:23.526 1.108 [4, 24, 3]
 5 Matthias Boegel       01:23.579 1.161 [3, 12, 3]
 6 Andrew Ward           01:23.778 1.360 [3, 3, 5]
 7 Dave Purdy            01:24.150 1.732 [25, 4, 33]
 8 Oliver Day            01:24.236 1.818 [11, 10, 15]
 9 David Goodwin         01:24.911 2.493 [13, 28, 11]
10 Christoph Grimlowski  01:25.014 2.595 [15, 3, 3]
11 Michael Ward          01:25.411 2.993 [30, 18, 10]
12 Eldred Pickett        01:25.713 3.295 [23, 23, 22]
13 Richard Busch         01:27.383 4.965 [3, 1, 1]

*: three best sector times are added [lap numbers]

RACE INCIDENTS

 1 Dave Purdy                 0  33 0.000
 2 Eldred Pickett             0  32 0.000
 3 Jo Lueg                    0  33 0.000
 4 Matthias Boegel            0  33 0.000
 5 Hristo Itchov              1  33 0.030
 6 Oliver Day                 1  19 0.030
 7 Stacey Greensall           1  33 0.030
 8 Uwe Schuerkamp             2  33 0.061
 9 Christoph Grimlowski       3  23 0.091
10 Andrew Ward               10  33 0.303
11 David Goodwin             10  32 0.303
12 Michael Ward              17  31 0.515

Not classified (less than 30% race distance completed):
Richard Busch

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