Slot 1: Rain was torrential in qualifying. I tried to qualify on Inters but had to abandon that after struggling for grip due to the random hydroplaning. I ended up qualifying on full Wets, even though the track was dry enough for Inters by the final lap. I qualified 7th, I think 6s off pole IIRC. I stuck to the Full Wets for the start of the race, and for some reason 6th place started on Mediums, so I was immediately past him before we even got to Eau Rouge the first time. Everyone else from 11th on back were also on slicks of varying grades, so they quickly dropped well behind the rest of us (still, props to
@Geauxgreddy for sticking it out to the end). I picked off several other people in front who were struggling for grip in the Inters until I was up to 2nd briefly before screwing up Eau Rouge and handing it back to the car I had just passed after they'd screwed up La Source. From there, I held 3rd until Lap 5 when the track dried out too much for the Full Wets and the cars on Inters started catching me. A BMW passed me to put me down to 4th before the other car ahead on Wets pitted at the end of the lap, promoting me to 3rd once again. I decided to go 1 more lap to let the track dry out a bit more. I lost another spot to another car on inters, dropping me to 4th yet again.
Pitting on Lap 6, I elected to go for Softs, and surprisingly came out of the pits still in 4th. From there, I slowly started catching 3rd...until I ran off at Les Combes a couple laps later by allowing myself to drift off of the dry line. Beaching it cost me 6s and halved a comfortable 11+ second gap to 5th. I managed to avoid that mistake again until near the closing laps, where I proceeded to run off 3 more times (including Les Combes, again...). Running wide at La Source to start the final lap dropped me back to 6th, then I picked up a penalty from running wide at Eau Rouge/Radillion. Fortunately, up ahead the GT-R GT500 I'd given a free spot to a few laps prior had run wide at Pouhon, then got shoved of at Stavelot by a Z4 that caught him because of it. Somehow the Z4 didn't get a penalty though. At the same time,
@Dezcom in another Corvette that had done the entire race on Inters was struggling. I passed the recovering GT-R, then
@Dezcom out of Stavelot, served my half-second penalty, then caught and re-passed Dez at the chicane to grab 4th, as well as first of the 3 Corvettes and first American, and 40s behind the winner. Everyone from 8th back finished at least 1 lap down.
I could've had a relatively easy 3rd place were it not for all of my stupid mistakes (seems to be a theme for me in this game so far...), but it was worth 274 points, which would be silly to risk by going again.
but a few laps later when it was me on his heels and I managed to spin at that awkward camber right hander, he surely had a chuckle looking in his rear view.
