Haven't played for months, but JGTC at Suzuka is too cool to pass up! I chose to not qualify knowing I'd be rusty, and sure enough got a bunch of middling results and just couldn't find a car I really got along with. Tried the R34, Supra, both Mclarens, and the R32 which nearly made me give up entirely. The mix of race cars and road cars with race tyres pretending to be race cars which fly by on the straight and then get in the way for the corners did not feel cohesive at all and I was just getting frustrated. But I decided I'd try one more, this time in the NSX. Still with no qualy I started 14/15, quickly found myself in 10th after some chaos in the esses and got passed into Degner 1 by a Supra who got a monster run through the long left hander. Then there was a bit more chaos under the bridge as a Diablo had a 1000IQ rejoin and took out a Supra ahead and I'm up to 9th, Supra still infront of me and fellow part time GT player
@SVX infront of him in the short tail Mclaren F1 (who was right on the tail of another car) heading to Spoon curve. We get a really unfortunate lag spike in the braking zone and on my screen the Supra bumps slightly into SVX, spikes back into me and then launches forward and propels SVX sideways off the track. Watching the replay I think the car at front was a little slower than anyone expected and the lag spike just exaggerated everything. But in apology for sad internet, here he is passing an NSX in another one of the races.
After that the Supra gets 4 second penalty, which is quite harsh... He then outwits the Diablo from earlier and pauses approaching 130r so he can start typing an apology to SVX, I have to dive off track to not hit into him (no ghost mode when paused? Is that normal?) and SVX catches him in the chicane, and is severely held up by the derpy AI driving so now screws him over again while apologizing for the first incident which wasn't necessarily even his fault... Good effort but man, it's easier to save that till after the race.
I then spend a few laps catching up to the cars ahead and some guys must have pit or crashed, I can't remember but now I'm in 5th and chasing 3rd and 4th in the Calsonic and Pennzoil Skylines respectively. An absolutely botched dive into the chicane where I thankfully didn't hit either of them later and the Calsonic pits as I let them back by for an unfair overtake. So I stay behind the Pennzoil, give him a bump draft on the back straight hoping our pace can help us jump the Calsonic and even better the Pennzoil pits at the end of the lap. But the moment I get onto the start/finish straight to start lap 8 my wipers turn on... I hadn't even been looking at the weather radar! I know a podium is on the cards but I don't want to throw it away pushing too hard or being too cautious. He switches to intermediates and I'm left unsure how hard I can push slicks on a wetting track, I go a bit too slow and now there's a Porsche catching me. Approaching the end of the lap the cars in first and second stay out, so I trust their judgement and take a few more liberties with the grip levels but the rain is now starting to worsen, the Porsche loses ground in sector 1 (he gained last lap, crazy considering how much of a handful that car must be on slicks in the wet) and on the exit from the hairpin he completely loses all grip and becomes a passenger, spinning multiple times onto the motorcycle chicane.
I have to pit as it's lap 9/10, but it's the perfect time as the rain is getting very tricky. Both p1 and p2 (who are very far ahead) spin at 130R, but P2 is in a panic to recover onto the track and just can't get his power down and continues spinning and I pass him before heading into the pit for intermediates. Eyes on the track map as I see a blue arrow fast approaching while I'm getting tyres, and sure enough as I come back out the Pennzoil Skyline from before pips me to T1 for 2nd place, he's clearly through but he outbrakes himself into T1 and goes wide, I take the inside and we're through T2 side by side! But I lack the confidence to put the power down on cold intermediates and he out-accelerates me on the exit and reclaims 2nd with the inside line to T3. I follow him through the esses trying to figure out what tyres he's on (as I didn't see when he pit) but it wouldn't be long until it didn't matter, he loses the rear on the long left hander after the esses and has a brief tank slapper which is enough for me to get through for P2 and not look back and finish the race! As you can tell by my whole damn essay on it, I enjoyed that quite a bit. So glad I went for one more race, shows that sometimes even when it's not working out it's still worth giving it another go.
Meanwhile SVX had a miserable race despite having good pace, he was keeping up with me for a good while, infact I think he gained a bit but eventually outbraked himself into the chicane and lost time. Maybe we'll get redemption next time
****, I wore the wrong suit...
