GimmeSL.com Grand Prix at PSU Raceway Round 4 of FormulaSL season 2 brings us back to PSU Raceway for a reverse layout run at this speedway. 27 drivers put there names in the virtual hat for what promised to be a strongly contested round . With Epic studios film crew filming away and our beloved VJ Shojo prattling as he does best , drivers climbed aboard for a sometimes laggy round of qualifying.
Holden Saunders made the best of the rookie que sitting on top before Jafo came up with a 21.5 to sit himself on the pole , but qualify has still just begun , 15 more riders had to take their turn . The 8th round proved one of more exciting ones featuring Kandy Tommorow and Gros Decuir , 2 heavy favorites to capture Pole position for the day.
Kandy pulled out a great 20.2 to gasps from the crowd and sitting her up top with room to spare. Round 10 , was my turn , with Vinnie Niangao qualifying with me . the first laps werent so great , i think i got a 20.8 maybe in there, but with alot of luck , i hit many turns on my 5th and final qualify lap just right and got a 20.0 and Pole position for first time this season.
Next up in usual order was the Group 4 race lasting 10 laps , winner moving on , Caz Freschi a up and coming new driver impressed all with a nice win , moving on to the Group 3 race which he also won , beating out Yuriko Nishi who led solidly for the first 8 laps of 15 . Yuriko got 2nd and new KC Motorsports racer JoThor Theas grabbed 3rd or 13th overall , in the points his first race.
Caz now moves on to the Group 2 race, 20 laps , with YumYum on pole , Jafo 2nd , Just Catteneo 3rd, Suzy Cuddihy 4th on grid , Yamaha Harley 5th and Caz 6th position..yes thats a Group 2 grid , reads like group 1 class drivers , which is how tight the competition is this season , even the best drivers better not blink wrong or can be looking at Group 2 or Group 3 starts .
Just Catteneo ran a great race, leading entire time, except the lap he pitted, this race was much closer than that though, for the lower positions . Jafo , Yum , Yamaha , and even Caz battled it out for a good while . Jafo was able to hold 2nd place for most of race, passing Yum lap 5 , but lost it to a hard charging Yum last lap , Yum 2nd place, Jafo 3rd, Caz 4th , Yamaha 5th, Suzy 6th.
Just moves on to the Group 1 race, myself for MAS/Archer racing on pole position, Kandy of KC Motorsports 2nd, Grosmanteau DeCuir of IDK racing 3rd , Rammesses Pharoah of the Pure team 4th , Neko Carter for MoR racing 5th and Just Catteneo of IDK racing 6th .
To be honest , you will prolly get better account of this race from our video by Epic Studios or Les White's account on http://racesl.com/ hehe , but i will tell what i remember .
To start with i was using a long distance strategy and setup , medium tires lots of wing and downforce, i didnt know who on the grid behind me was using the faster soft tires , maybe no one , maybe everyone , i knew i had to get away quick at the start or be ran over by drivers with faster setups.
Off we went and all i could hear was engines whining loud right on my butt into first turn , some pushing and shoving , key was not to touch the grass or it would slow me down, turn 2 i took as clean as i could , turn after turn the engines got fainter , i relaxed some and tried to race as smooth as could , although i knew even a small mistake would be all Kandy or Gros or any of them needed to catch up .
Behind me the reports are there was quite some hard position fighting and contact , Kandy took it bad , having to pit for damage or risk losing her car . i pitted lap 15, allowing Gros to pass me into 1st after he took a earlier pit . Gros led around with me in 2nd for 5 laps , before the soft tire strategy forced him to take a 2nd pit .
I didnt hit alot of traffic in the race, Neko Carter was a gentleman and let me by, when i came up on him to lap him. At one point i was close behind Ramses and Kandy who were battling it out , i kept my distance, finaly around the sharp left to the pit straight they collided , one bounced right into the fence , the other left towards the pits , i had enough momentum to drive inbetween and move into clear, this was closest incident for me.
In the end , Grosmanteau got 2nd , Just was 3rd after just barely edging out Kandy who charged all the way from 6th to take 4th place , just missing 3rd by .200 of a second , Ram got 5th place continuing his overall solid performance this season, Neko came in 6th.
Once again the points race tightens up , the Pole and Win gives me a 1 point lead over Kandy Tommorow , Grosmanteau moves up impressively to 3rd, Jafo Tendaze 4th and Rammses Pharoah in 5th . http://www.bikersites.com/SL/raceSL/standings.fsl.cfm
Next race will be in 2 weeks with location and layout To Be Announced. Will post info for link to this race's video , done by Jessicaan Wrigglesworth and Epic Studios.
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