My Manu race was an interesting one. Wild, lucky finish!
Found myself in what I'm pretty sure was the top B/S lobby for the first time since my DR meltdown at the start of the official Nations season. Qualy was okay, got an 1:18.006. I could have gotten well into the 17's but I also could have done worse. My hot lap was really slowed down by a horrible exit on the last turn to start the lap. It got me a P7 start.
For the race I went with a hards to mediums strategy. Being in the VW I had a tough time doing meds both stints in practice. So I ran 7 laps on the hard then the last 5 on the mediums so I could get the most out of them with the lighter car.
I lost a position early, then, at the end of lap 3 I noticed a few guys ahead start dropping into the pits. So I imagined a lot of drivers were 2 stopping, my confidence went up a lot at that point since I knew I'd be 1 stopping, I didn't think there was anyway a 2 stop would work. First stint I had a good battle with a Mercedes, I defended well enough until either he made a mistake or his tires died. Got up to P2, but one of the 2 stoppers or possibly a 1 stopper fresh out of the pits started bearing down on me. Instead of fighting I let him pass before the last turn then I turned off into the pits.
2nd stint was fairly uneventful, I overtook 2 drivers on worn tires with my fresh mediums, then found myself in P5, 2.5 seconds behind a 3way battle for P2 and 2.5 seconds ahead of P6 for most of the stint.
The last lap got interesting though. My mediums were starting to fall off, and P6 was closing the gap a little. I was still 1.5 seconds up and 2 second behind on the straight heading to the final turn. I told myself, "K, you got P5, just bring it in, just don't fly off the last turn". Then the miracle happened. Going in the the last big right hander I saw a big cloud of dust. As I got closer I see two cars spiraling off into the desert. My eyes probably tripled in size, then I noticed the red penalty flag go up above the lone survivor of that 3-way battle for P2. I figured, "If he got a penalty for whatever happened there it going to be a big one, LET'S GOOO!" So I put the throttle through my pedal box and probably had my best exit out of the last turn all race. Sure enough he got a 5 second and I manage to steal P2!
Good enough for 1080 points, which for me is awesome. My goal is at least a 1000 points a race, 3000 championship points would be enough to be in the fight for top overall DR:B driver. It might be enough for P10 with VW but I think that ship has sailed.
).
