Hit most my goals yesterday, though didn’t touch Monza cuz Tokyo and Nurburgring have been too much fun.
Not only did I break a sub-2min quali lap after examining top times, my best time of the day (which is still my current quali time) was set to be safely in the 1:58s but I made a mess of my line in the corner leading into the final chicane, tapped the wall on the exit and lost what was easily five tenths. There was more time in the hairpin and the chicane as well, but neither were terrible, so now I’m sitting on a 1:59:094.
Racing quality in Tokyo went down on day two which caught me by surprise, a lot more barging around which made finishing consistency a bit more tricky. My new quali times and analysis of top times pushed me forwards on starts and helped improve my race pace. Finally got to stand on the top of the podium a few times
A couple races later I was matched with an A+ driver, figured I could only hope for 2nd at best:
Race starts and the A+ driver shifts poorly, we go two-wide into T1, I manage a clean pass with no contact, and I’m pulling away by the time we’re through the first complex of corners. Two others on his tail and all of a sudden this has turned into an exciting race.
...Until the hairpin:
Someone’s dive resulted in a five-car pileup on the exit that shoved me to the outer wall. I will say I had one of the luckier outcomes, but it still cost me a few spots (including the lead) and a lot of speed. I clawed back up to 3rd at the start of the next lap with help from the slipstream and other’s mistakes, but then both me and and P2 made an identical error leaving the first complex that lands us with a 5s penalty. Poor girl (I assume with her username) got punted by the white car on the straight right after serving and then got handed another 2s for some reason.
I entered the chicane right behind the white car, but he took it excessively slow (I’m able to enter in the 70s, he kept braking to around 60mph), so with nowhere to go I shunted him. I felt bad but I don’t know what I could have done to avoid it, proximity was very close for any sort of reaction and he went far slower than what I understand the corner should be taken at (I can upload the replay later if people want to analyze it). Not much else of note happened till the final run if the chicane, where I cut a little too far on the sausage and launched the car wide, the slower exit speed costing me 4th in the drag race to the line.
Went to SR B in one race, where I haven’t been for at least a year.
All races since then have had me stuck in the SR B-A range, it looks like people that sit there are largely clean but tend to defend excessively, and try to bump draft rather than go around. I usually rear end or get rear ended once or twice and it’s just enough to prevent my SR to climb back steadily, a bit frustrating. My DR has almost climbed back to where it was before last week’s tank, so I’m still looking forward to the next few days.
