A Sensational Send-Off At Summit Point (Week 13)

Apologies for leaving this so late, I have no real excuse - Let's get on with the race report!

Monday 12th December, 2022

Midnight strikes again - as it does every 24 hours...

This would be my last Week 13 Midnight Session - and it went reasonably well, finishing 6th with a 1:04.005 (averaged 1:08) - only time would tell if I actually had pace.

Come race-day (or, the actual time for race-day), I would qualify 4th with a pretty unimpressive time of a 1:05.341.

2nd and 3rd would go off on the first lap, and I'd finish 2nd - a pretty solid day out - but I was curious - had I done the lap I did in the Midnight Session, I would have started 2nd - and might have been within a chance of staying with the leader.

So, I decided to give the race another shot.

To my upmost surprise, I beat my personal best at the Summit Point circuit (in an F3 at least) slapping it on pole with a 1:03.178 - 2nd being just shy of 0.6 seconds slower.

The Race

The race was....something else.

Admittedly, it didn't go as I planned for it to, but that's just the nature of life and racing - and it made the result at the end all the more rewarding.

As I turned into turn 1, I had already lost the lead - P2 braked later than me at swooped around the outside, shortly followed by P3, who passed me at the very next corner - I'm usually a little conservative on the opening lap, I just let the race settle and then plug away at consistent lap-times, after all, I was still 3rd which was still an incredib- THONK!

I'm given a large whack up the rear, and am greeted by this view

It had only been 41 seconds...

What in God's Green Earth is going on here??? Enough questions. I had a comeback to have. I re-joined the track and indeed re-joined the race!

Compared to some, I had it extremely easy - I had minimal damage - and I was already pointing in the right direction.

But then-P12 was having an absolute FIELD DAY! Going from 12th to 4th in the space of one corner!

As I crossed the start/finish line to start lap 2, I was in 8th/23rd - by lap 2, there were only 11 still running, 12 being taken out.

- 1 didn't show up for the race

- 2 took a pit-start

- 9 pitted for repairs (1 of whom from a seperate incident)

(12)

Lap by lap, I'd slowly crawl up the order - on Lap 2, an F3 ahead of me took to the grass, giving me a free position. At the end of that lap, I surprised myself by sending it down the inside of then-P7.

P5 & P4 are both Formula 4's, so once close enough, I make pretty easy work of both of them - they did a bloody INCREDIBLE job to last until Lap 3 in the inferior class.

The very next corner, P2 is wiped out by a re-joining backmarker spinning himself to face the right way, but instead spins into P2.

Depending how you look at it (by moment of retirement - or moment P2 reset to the pits), there was a Formula 4 car sitting in 3rd place in a race with Formula 3's for between 3 and 10 seconds!

No matter, we passed the incident, I inherited 3rd place, the two F4's behind me inherited 4th and 5th...Top Job!

Unfortunately - the second F4 would spin out from here, and a glitch would flip him, wrecking his car, and ultimately ruin his race.

P4 (in an F4) would eventually be overtaken by the F3 behind him - P6 who made up two positions from the pitting F3 in front of him - and the P4, (now P5) F4.

I would stay P3 for the next couple of laps until the then-leader would perish...at the hands of a backmarker.

To be fair to him, the backmarker himself did absolutely nothing wrong - he made a mistake - the (then) leader just couldn't crank enough steering on to avoid clipping the backmarker - severely damaging the (then) leader's steering and front wing.

The moment the leader "reset to pit-lane", I was headed around the penultimate corner - only about 14 seconds back or so - even a conventual pit-stop wouldn't have been enough to get back out in the lead.

From Lap 9 onwards though, I did have rather an exciting "battle".

After following a backmarker F4 off wide, I noticed a rather angry looking F3 behind me - this being a 15 minute race, I didn't have my relative on (to tell me who's in front and behind me) - so I though this was P4.

It was not in fact P4 - it was P10, a lap down, but was doing consistent low 1:04 lap-times (we were about matched on pace - but having seen the carnage on the first lap, I didn't think it could POSSIBLY be anyone a lap down.

On Lap 8, he made two positions - but was still a lap down, and still very interested in my track position.

For the next three laps, I defended for my life - and even if not for position - he too post-race admitted to enjoying the battle - not minding I didn't let him by to catch 5th.

I then heard over the radio that "The Leader Is Pitting Now" - and assumed I was second, and this gentleman was 1st - and I was battling for the lead, but fortunately (as he managed to stay ahead) - I finished 2nd by over 10 seconds - so just had a very enjoyable late battle.

It was an absolutely phenomenal race for many - to think that there was an F4 in the Top 5 for over half the race is quite weird - as on Lap 7, P4 (who had just overtaken the F4 previously in 4th pitted - giving P4 back to the F4. The F4 kept this position until Lap 12, when he'd be promoted to P3 (WTF...I know) - had the race been 14 minutes (chequered flag at the start of the 13th lap) the podium would have been:

1st - Winner//F3

2nd - Me//F3

3rd - M. Baffico//F4

but the race was 3 laps longer - in that time, our F4 hero spun at turn one - losing 3rd place - (saying this, he did have an F3 (P4) quickly catching him) - by the end of the lap, he lost P4 to the F3 I was "battling" at the very last corner.

In THEORY, I lapped everyone up to P5 as P2 - but it was an absolutely INCREDIBLE result for #10 (P4) - who ended lap 1 like this:

(Inverted Green Car)

The Top 7 were all full of massive names in the race.

1st: A little disappointingly, the driver who spun me at the start of the race won, the race (by 10 seconds) - and it's quite likely that had this been real life - he would have been given a penalty for causing a collision - promoting me to be the winner - but I'll take 2nd any day of the week.

2nd: I was the pole-man, and to be spun out and "out of luck" on the first lap, and to finish 2nd was certainly one hell of a well-earnt podium.

3rd: I thought I had a comeback, 3rd also had one hell of a race - pitting for repairs and coming from 13th to score a totally unexpected podium.

4th: As mentioned, from having his car written off at the end of Lap 1, to finishing 4th and having a great battle with me - he deserves to feel proud.

5th & 6th: Both Formula 4's - absolutely impeccable drive from both.

7th - former leader - must have been gut-wrenching - I know how it feels. Especially from 2nd on the grid.

Only 13/23 finished after 15 minutes. What a way to end Week 13 on a bang.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you've enjoyed the race reports.