Post-race comments...

Hristo Itchov
I decided to skip qualifying and start from the back of the grid to
make things more interesting. Usually my starts are very slow, but for
a change I had a great one this time and managed to pass a couple of
cars on the run to T1.

Settled in 5th position for some time and eventually moved up to 3rd
by the time we reached the middle of the lap, after passing Oliver and
Uwe, who I think didn't resist as much as they could have.

Stacey, Dom and myself were running at about half a second to one
second from each other and that's how we came onto the long straight
at the end of the lap. For some reason Dom moved outside of Stacey's
slipstream and I was able to get a tow and move into 2nd place before
the chicane.

Then I chased Stacey but there weren't really any safe places to make
a pass so I was waiting for a chance. Eventually Stacey had an off
near the end of the lap and at the same time Dom dropped further back,
so I was now in the lead. I realized Stacey had a 1/1 wing setup or
something as he was very fast on the straights so I had to make sure
to break away from his tow before we hit the long straight.

That worked well and I was now in clean air and just trying to find my
own pace and build a gap before the pitstop. My strategy was to run
with full tanks and pit on the last lap and normally it would have
worked well, but because of a few reasons I nearly retired from the
race. First, I didn't realize how much of a difference slipstreaming
for a lap and a half would make to fuel consumption. Second, I kept
pushing to the limit for a fast lap instead of going a bit slower and
saving fuel. Third, I thought that when the fuel gauge shows 0/0 it
means it still has a bit more fuel before it runs out.

So I entered the last lap just having done a very good time, but I had
2 liters of fuel left with a whole lap of the GP track still to do
before I could enter the pits. Just as I was tackling the chicane the
car lost power and I realized the fuel was gone. At the moment of
entering the pitlane at the righthander the engine turned off
completely and I was now rolling freely. The gap to Stacey was about
33 seconds from what I can recall and for my horror, my pit stall was
at the far end of the pitlane. Perhaps due to the car's weight, but
after it slowed down to about 14 km/h it kept cruising without losing
too much speed. I kept crawling like that and just as I reach my pit
stall at 10 km/h, Stacey caught up and passed me to make his pitstop
that was right ahead of mine.

He exited the pitlane first and I followed about 2 seconds behind. I
knew passing him would be difficult but there was no other chance but
attack. For some reason he lost a second or so in the first sector and
I was soon onto his tail, then made a pass going up after Fox Hole (I
think, can't remember clearly). I was surprised he let me by that
easy, but as it became known later Stacey had to save fuel to try and
make the finish. I realized I was in the same boat after half a lap
and dropped the revs as much as possible, eventually cruising over the
long straight at the end. Finished the race with less than 1 liter of
fuel, but Stacey was less unfortunate, so Chris and Oliver took over
the podium places - grats! Was about time!

Enjoy the break and see you next season!

Oliver Day
i always look forward to a run at the 'ring. in the race it looked like it would be decent until the race started. i couldn't see the lights and lost out to dave. then my mind switched off. i had no clue where i was and it was like i was on a sunday drive... and then i started falling off... and uwe got by. then i woke up a bit and caught up to uwe and took advantage of the draft on the long straight. still not driving well i was at least settled into 3rd and maintaining the gap to chris until my stop. the stop went fine, in fact my crew worked so efficiently that i didn't even notice they were done. i was just sitting in the pits, looking through the standings then... oh $#%@! i should get going! and go i did! i put in a good outlap and was closing in on chris on the final lap but i was watching the gap constantly and while watching it i left focus off the road, hit a curb and spun it... sigh... luckily stacey helped me feel better by stopping. so third by luck. fine by me after a season with little luck and some poor driving!

grats to stacey on the championship and grats to hrippo on setting a WR where ever we went!

Detailed Race Report courtesy of Matthias Bögel

	Event: NOS_VLN
Date: 2009/05/02 17:06:40
Laps: 5
Mod: BMW320_E21
Race Length: 49:57.587


PRACTISE RESULTS


 1 Hristo Itchov        Team John Player          4 09:09.735 0.000
 2 Stacey Greensall     Team Rothmans             5 09:22.686 12.951
 3 Dom Leste            Team John Player          2 09:26.497 16.762
 4 Chris Turbert        Team Goesser Beer         3 09:29.158 19.423
 5 Oliver Day           Team Faltz                2 09:32.558 22.823
 6 Dave Purdy           Team Neumann              3 09:37.845 28.110
 7 Uwe Schuerkamp       Team Rummel               2 09:42.999 33.264
 8 Glenn White          Team Bavaria Motorsport   2 09:55.152 45.417
 9 Matthias Boegel      Team Glysantin           no time


QUALIFYING RESULTS


 1 Stacey Greensall     Team Rothmans             3 09:21.740 0.000
 2 Dom Leste            Team John Player          3 09:22.612 0.872
 3 Oliver Day           Team Faltz                2 09:26.880 5.140
 4 Dave Purdy           Team Neumann              3 09:35.729 13.989
 5 Glenn White          Team Bavaria Motorsport   2 09:50.167 28.427
 6 David Goodwin        Team John Player          2 09:52.028 30.288
 7 Uwe Schuerkamp       Team Rummel               2 10:10.786 49.046
 8 Matthias Boegel      Team Glysantin            2 10:17.944 56.204
 9 Hristo Itchov        Team John Player         no time
10 Chris Turbert        Team Goesser Beer        no time


RACE RESULT


 1 Hristo Itchov     Team John Player          5  9 Running 
 2 Chris Turbert     Team Goesser Beer         5 10 Running 
 3 Oliver Day        Team Faltz                5  3 Running 
 4 Uwe Schuerkamp    Team Rummel               5  7 Running 
 5 Glenn White       Team Bavaria Motorsport   5  5 Running 
 6 David Goodwin     Team John Player          5  6 Running 
 7 Stacey Greensall  Team Rothmans             4  1 DNF (Fuel)  1 Lap(s)
 8 Matthias Boegel   Team Glysantin            4  8 DNF (DNF)  1 Lap(s)
 9 Dom Leste         Team John Player          1  2 DNF (DNF)  4 Lap(s)
10 Dave Purdy        Team Neumann              2  4 DNF (N/A)  3 Lap(s)


FASTEST RACE LAPS


 1 Hristo Itchov     09:08.470 0.000
 2 Stacey Greensall  09:22.857 14.387
 3 Chris Turbert     09:25.161 16.691
 4 Oliver Day        09:25.697 17.227
 5 Dom Leste         09:32.813 24.342
 6 Uwe Schuerkamp    09:35.438 26.968
 7 Dave Purdy        09:42.267 33.797
 8 David Goodwin     09:48.154 39.684
 9 Glenn White       09:51.183 42.712
10 Matthias Boegel   10:12.687 64.217


HIGHEST CLIMBERS


 1 Hristo Itchov      8
 2 Chris Turbert      8
 3 Uwe Schuerkamp     3
 4 Oliver Day         0
 5 Matthias Boegel    0
 6 Glenn White        0
 7 David Goodwin      0
 8 Stacey Greensall  -6
 9 Dave Purdy        -6
10 Dom Leste         -7


PERFECT RACE LAPS*


 1 Hristo Itchov     09:08.470 0.000 [4, 4, 4]
 2 Stacey Greensall  09:19.632 11.162 [2, 2, 1]
 3 Chris Turbert     09:23.290 14.820 [3, 1, 4]
 4 Oliver Day        09:25.697 17.227 [3, 3, 3]
 5 Uwe Schuerkamp    09:30.718 22.248 [3, 1, 2]
 6 Dom Leste         09:32.813 24.342 [1, 1, 1]
 7 Dave Purdy        09:39.515 31.045 [2, 1, 2]
 8 David Goodwin     09:46.075 37.605 [3, 1, 2]
 9 Glenn White       09:50.389 41.918 [2, 1, 1]
10 Matthias Boegel   10:08.344 59.874 [2, 3, 1]

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

RACE INCIDENTS

 1 Hristo Itchov              3   5 0.600
 2 Chris Turbert             13   5 2.600
 3 David Goodwin             14   5 2.800
 4 Stacey Greensall          16   4 3.200
 5 Glenn White               20   5 4.000
 6 Uwe Schuerkamp            30   5 6.000
 7 Matthias Boegel           36   4 7.200
 8 Oliver Day                39   5 7.800
 3 Uwe Schuerkamp     3
 4 Oliver Day         0
 5 Matthias Boegel    0
 6 Glenn White        0
 7 David Goodwin      0
 8 Stacey Greensall  -6
 9 Dave Purdy        -6
10 Dom Leste         -7


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