Division 5 Season 2

Same on my replay. Only shows me using RM. Must be a glitch as I'm sure everyone used RM once in div 6.

Well what can I say. This has been a cracker season guys! Well done to each and every one of you for committing to racing and showing up every week. It's been a pleasure banging wheels with all of you and you have all definitely given me some great battles to remember!
Congrats again to BJ for taking out the Div5 title!
Congrats to Peter Wise/Copper for sealing 2nd place! If only I managed to grab fastest lap tonight, according to my calculations, I would have gotten that 1 point I needed to take 2nd by count back.
Congrats also to VARDZ for rounding out the podium. You easily had the pace to take the win tonight, but I guess it wasn't to be.

I came into tonight's race with a bit of apprehension.
My pace was terrible during practice, only managing a PB of 2.09 once and more often than not, running in the 11's and 12's.
I kind of resigned myself to being lapped especially after hearing from Vardz the other night that he was able to hit 2.07's!
So I was very surprised that I was able to steal Pole on the very last lap (again!) with a 2.10.554

The start went well. I held 1st until the 1st corner, but held the outside line as I knew some of the guys would try and dive inside.
Quite a few of the guys actually passed me but seemed to get caught up with each other on the exit, I managed to avoid everyone and continued on with Jako taking the lead. Halfway through the lap, copper managed to pass me, which didn't really bother me at this stage as I knew it was going to be a very long race and there was no point chewing the tyres up this early on.
So I settled in behind Jako and copper and we started pulling a gap on 4th place.
Jako was able to hold onto the lead until the last corner of lap 6, where he lost the front and spun, ending up right in front of me.
Having nowhere to go, I swung my Macca to the right, slamming into the rear of his car. Fortunately for me, it was a fairly low speed crash and I didn't receive any damage. Whilst all this was happening, Vardz managed to sneak up on all of us and take advantage of the situation, taking 2nd after copper, with me trailing a few seconds behind.
Vardz then took the lead on lap 8 and held position until the first round of pit stops on lap 11 with me following him in. Copper inherited the lead as he decided to pit the following lap. As I came into the pits, I was going to put on RM's but right as the menu came up I was stepping on the accelerator and pressed ok! This put me on RS for the next stint but it wasn't too much of an issue as I had another 2 stops to readjust my strategy.
With the first rounds of stops taken, the positions were as follows: VARDZ, ranok3n, copper, JAKO, Castro, homebrew.
Vardz relinquished P1 on lap 15 when he spun, letting me take the reins for a couple of laps until I also lost my cool, swapping positions again in a duel that would continue on throughout the entire 41 laps. Copper was a distant 3rd after his 1st pitstop but managed to string together an impressive number of laps to slowly reel me and Vardz in.

Our second pitstop would have been quite comical any other day, but was a real OMGWTFBBQ moment I would say for both me and Vardz. As he entered the pits, Vards ended up spinning into the entry, getting his car wedged and blocking the already narrow road!
As I was right on his bumper coming in, I smashed right into him! I put the car in reverse thinking I will reverse back onto track and continue on another lap to wait for the entry to clear up again, but then thought better of it and chucked in back in 1st and aimed for the nose of Vardz's car. Thankfully there was enough force to unwedge his car and allow him to continue on.
This little blunder allowed copper to come right back onto our tails after his stop on lap 23.
Our 3rd stint was very much like our 2nd, with myself (RM), Vardz (RM?) and copper (RS?) all sticking to one another.
A few mistakes from Vardz saw him lost a bit of time after his last stop and as me and copper came in on the same lap, I ended up doing the exact same thing and pressed the accelerator as the menu came up again! This time it screwed me over as it meant I was running 2 stints on RM!
As we both left the pits, it soon become very obvious that this little mistake had just cost me a very good chance of another race win. Considering the appalling effort from my side at Tokyo, I was absolutely gutted!
I resigned myself to 2nd as I slowly watched copper pull away at around 1s a lap and short of a spin from him, there was nothing I could do about it.
On lap 35 fortune seemed to come my way as copper managed to spin! I think it was on the straight after Eau Rouge?
I gladly took the lead but knew I had to hold my nerves and put down as fast a lap as I dared to as I could see both copper and Vardz slowly catching up. I was hoping both of them would waste those precious seconds fighting with each other, but Vardz managed to get by cleanly and fast enough not to lose any time and on lap 39 and 40, was right up my arse with copper right there hoping for easy pickings.
Knowing their tyres would be losing their grip, I started hugging the racing line even tighter and driving very defensively and almost slowing to a halt at the last chicane to try and wash off as much of their speed as I could.
Thankfully, whatever I was doing worked and on the last lap, I believe their tyres got the best of them as it gifted me a much needed breather to bring the car home safely and take my 2nd win of the season.

This race is by far the best race I've had here at ROOZ.
My first race win with the pressure that BJ put on me was actually nothing when compared to this enduro.
From the get go it was all guns blazing with 1st, 2nd and 3rd all within 2 seconds of each other until the first rounds of stops.
The 2nd and 3rd stint was much the same, but the gap growing a little to 4 or 5 seconds.
The largest gap I remember was about 7 seconds, and even then that only last for a few corners and the gap was reduced back to 5 seconds or so.
This was literally a battle from start to finish and it couldn't have been a better way to sign off from Season 2.
Farewell Macca.... I hope to never have to drive you again! lol

Congrats to Bruce for taking out the championship, and Congrats to @SuiCid3 for Graduating to Division 4. Its been a pleasure Racing with all of you guys and Huge thanks to @stucar17 for making this Championship Event Possible! Cyas Next Season. Kind Regards
JAKO155

Will try and give my POV on last nights race later.
Hatfield (or anyone), could you explain the drop round thing to me please. I just don't understand it, if a thread is out there with an explanation, a link will suffice
Btw ranok3n, the lap by lap graph on the previous page has me finishing in 2nd place yeah that ain't right lol unless I'm reading it wrong.

congratz @SuiCid3 you must have forgotten about the drop round as i did

oh yeah makes perfect sense now. thanks guys

Yeah, wasn't checking that the names matched up when I was editing the graph.
All fixed now!

And woot! 2nd place in the championship! Feels good!
Sorry copper, stole it from under your nose haha

@JAKO155 hoping I don't get promoted! I don't think I'm anywhere near fast enough for the Div4 guys!

your getting good and stealing things at the last minute from me.. LOL

Well, What a cracker of a race. Thought I had pole but once again ranok stole it on the last lap. Didn't get off the line very well and allowed jako through on the inside into turn 1.

Bit of door banging with ranok through the first turn and he came out the victor in P2 with jako leading. I ran wide into turn 12 allowing vardz to slingshot past into 4th. Vardz lost it on the high speed turn 18 and went crashing into the wall and I gladly took 3rd back.

By lap 2 Jako was leading , ranok 2nd, myself in 3rd and vardz in 4th. We all seemed to be staying within 1 to 2 seconds of each other. I managed to get past ranok on lap 4 at the chicane with a dive up the inside, Jako spun himself on the exit of the chicane at the end of lap 6 and I took the lead on lap 7. Vardz managed to climb his way back to 2nd and got past me at 18 and took the lead going into lap 8. 1st pit stop was coming up and both vardz and ranok pitted on lap 11.

I went one extra lap and pitted on 12 for mediums. Came out of the pits in 3rd with ranok 2nd and Vardz in 1st. I assumed they both put softs on again as I was losing about 1-2 seconds a lap but I knew that had to put mediums on for there next stint. By the time they pitted on lap 21 they had about a 23 second gap on me, I pitted at lap 23 and put softs back on and had about 21 seconds to make up but I knew I had better grip .

By lap 31 I was back in the fight with only 4.3 seconds between me and 1st. Vardz pitted on lap 31 putting him back to 3rd while ranok charged on in 1st with me close behind, We both pitted on lap 32 and I managed to jump ranok in the pit stop by taking on a bit less fuel (What was I thinking after last week) and came out in 1st.

Then on lap 35 I ran wide coming out of turn 1 got on the grass and spun into the wall . I knew ranok was close so i waited until he cleared me so I didn't hit him as I re entered the track, this allowed Vardz to get a little bit closer than I wanted. Vardz got past me and took P2 on lap 37 with a dive under brakes into turn 7. I diced with him for a few corners but just couldn't get past, meanwhile ranok is increasing his lead ever so slightly.

By the last lap we had the gap to Ranok down to 1 second and closing. From 3rd I could see Vardz trying everything to get past ranok and I was waiting for the smallest mistake from them so I could slide on by. Vardz managed to overcook it into turn 16 and gifting me 2nd position. I did think I was going to run out of fuel on that last lap as the needle was on empty and I must of been sniffing fumes but I made it.

That was the most intense race of the season and the most enjoyable . Thanks to everyone for showing up each week and having a crack. Well done to BJ for taking the championship and to ranok on 2nd. I'm extremely happy where I finished as I did not expect to do this well in my debut season. So looking forward to Season 3 .

Thanks to Stu, Anon, Ad2mny, emmo. hatfield and all the other mods /testers that put these races together and also to the sponsors for awesome prizes.
Thanks to all that have offered advice and tips along the way