Race REPORT & PICTURES - 03 - Chinese GP (Shanghai)

DISCLAIMER:
I don't know how (because I SWEAR I didn't delete it), but my log file with the results of the race - the one I open in Autosim Analyzer and can see all the info about the race, lap times, pit stops and etc - is just gone! It's just not there in the folder where it should be, so... I just CAN'T read this info and I'm gonna write this report based ONLY on Arek's pictures and IF I put ANY wrong info below, feel free to let me know and I'll correct it with the proper info - sorry...

This time we had 2 different races in 1...
We had a particular race between Adrian S Shole vs RaikkO and another race between everybody else... and Adrian won both of them - where is soutie when we need him?!?!?! ¬¬'

The race start was not so clean (as expected) and some drivers spun, bumped and got bumped and Adrian and raikkO were able to stay in front of everyone, with Adrian getting the lead in T1...

The Start of the rFR Chinese GP


First corner with Adrian S Shole (AUS) as a leader.


Top 3 after the first chicane: Adrian (AUS), Raikko (ROM) and Otti (CHI)

About the bumps...
Some of them were actually pretty curious and even funny - and I guess Webber wasn't the only one singing 'I Believe I Can Fly' on this circuit this season...

Arek (POL) continues the best Polish traditions of ski jumping trying to copy high fly of Adam Małysz over pxr5 (GBR)


Hard battle between teamates Joe (GBR) and Alex (CHN) causes the second of them gets take off.

Adrian and raikkO had their 'little private race', both because they were pretty damn fast, but also because behind them, it was a warzone and all of these other fights also helped for them to escape...
After the first corners, we had a HUGE fight for the 3rd place involving (on this order) Otti, Grisu, Denis, Joe, Tom, Sven, Black, Alex, Luft, Sexy, Dead, Bober, pxr5, Stig, ADI, Arnie and some other guys that don't appear on Arek's pictures...

Grisu (ITA) and Denis (BLR) chase the top 3.


Luft_inspektor (CRO) fights against Alex Hill (CHN) for 9th place fallowed by BlackFox (FIN)


Some action from first lap with Arnoldinhu (FIN) and ADI (ROM) on the first plan.

In the middle of the long straight, we had a LOT of fights, draft and overtakes and Bober vs Black was a pretty big & nice one:

Bober (BLR) defends his position against Blackfox (FIN)


Mirrors are the small things but quite important and sometimes is nice to take a look at them...

And, as always, on the braking point, we also had some other and also just great fights and overtakes, like Grisu 'stealing' P3 from Otti...

Grisu (ITA) passes Otti (CHI) and takes 3rd place.


Otti doesn't give up (battle for 3rd) by Denis's TV camera.

And at the end of lap 1, after getting all kinds of crazy things happening all around me (zillions of bumps and etc), I saw myself between Sven (ahead) and deadfish (behind) when we entered the start/finish straight and I knew it would be a pretty tough T1 with the 3 of us fighting for postions and... unfortunately, I was right...
While trying to avoid Sven, I got hit by Deadfish - a TRULY race incident IMO - but it was enough to put a smile on Sven's face while me and Dead had our entire races all screwed up...
I went to the gravel and was overtaken by everyone (I guess only 2 cars didn't overtake me), but my 1 pit stop strategy was all compromised already, because the only way for me to do it was going a little slower in order to save tyres, so I HAD to have a relatively good pace and when I went to the gravel I lost more than 20 seconds to get back on track, not to mention all the cars that passed me and then I had a 'crowded track' in front of me, instead of a 'free track', which also made it even harder to have a good pace... In the end I finished 6th, but I KNOW I could have fought for the 3rd or 4th place, so even scoring points for the Championship, which is always a good thing, it was a frustrating race for me...
Thigs for Dead went even worse though... He also lost a lot of time although he was able to stay on track (instead of the gravel), but he spun and while trying to recover, he was also hit by Arek and then... 'Dead was dead'... and Arek almost lost his front wing, but he wasn't exactly 'lucky', because he also went to the gravel and lost lots of important seconds taking that unhappy trip...

Deadfish (GBR) spins his car after incident with Sexy (BRA)


Deadfish tries to reverse the car while Arek desperately trying to avoid him.


Arek (POL) loses much time off the circuit in deep sand and Dead (GBR) loses his front wing and then ends his race.

More ahead, but yet in lap 2, Grisu made a mistake and almost hit the wall... He survived, but was overtaken by half of China population...

Grisu (ITA) makes a mistake and almost crash his car on lap 2.

And raikkO overtook Adrian for the 1st time and got the lead at the very start of lap 3 - Otti got the 3rd place again after Grisu's mistake:

Battle for 1st place between Adrian (AUS) and Raikko (ROM).


The lead begins 3rd lap.

And right behind Otti, Tom McKay was giving Denis a hard time:

Tom McKay vs Denis (BLR) batte for 4th place.

RaikkO had to go to the pits about lap 10 for some fresh tires and with that Adrian got the lead and the chance to have a few laps without losing time with fights...

Raikko's pit stop takes more time than he expects.

BTW, the pit entrance was pretty tricky at China... the slightest mistake could make the driver end up on another terrible gravel trap, losing too much time, or even just hitting the wall and... we had some victims there... obviously...

Massive crash of Stig (POL) in the road to the pits on lap 10.


Kurtmudgeon (COL) with a puncture.


pxr5 comes to pit successfully while later.

After getting back on track, raikkO found himself between some heavy traffic and was trying his best not to let Adrian get a good advantage with the time lost, so he begun to overtake everyone and everything in front of him...

Raikko (ROM) prepares attack on Luft (CRO) for 9th place after his pit stop, while Otti with fresh tyres tries to overtake Sexy with worn tyres...

One of the reasons why I was also a little frustrated about my whole race was the fact that some drivers forced some crazy (and just pointless) overtakes over me... Forced because they were not smart, but just dangerous... And pointless because they were made in points where it was impossible to actually overtake and get the position... So, those moves only made me and these other drivers lose time - not to mention some of them almost became accidents that could've been the end of the race for us... Anyway...


Lap 13th. Denis (BLR) and his kamikaze overtaking on Sexy Brigadeiro (BRA). In the background Alex fights with Luft.

I don't know exactly what happened to Adrian after raikkO went to the pits... He had a free track ahead, but still when Adrian finally made his pit stop, that wasn't enough to keep the lead and he came back on track in 2nd place...

Adrian S Shole (AUS) leaves pits in 2nd place.

Trying to save tyres and going for only 1 pit stop wasn't an easy thing to do at all... As I said before, in order to do that, I had to drive slower than usual and be VERY careful at some corners entrances and exits and ADI also tried his best, but... failed... - sorry, Mate!


ADI (ROM) gets a puncture in bad place.



ADI (ROM) desperately tries to get to pits and change his puncture while Arek smiles...

The race was cruel to other drivers too... and with the third DNF in 3 races - although this time NOT because of the engine - Otti decided to go straight to Imola...


Otti (CHI) is happy that it is only a computer game

While Adrian and raikkO were having their little road trip in China, lots of other guys were still fighting for the other positions and here a few highlights of these fights:


Lap 17 and battle for 4th place between several cars.



Battle between Sven (GER) and Tom McKay (GBR)



Contact between them in harpin but Tom gets 7th place from Sven.



Tom contunues his good run trying to get his chance from battle between Luft and Grisu.



Tom (GBR) makes it but his teammate loses place for Grisu (ITA).



Luft hits Grisu into his rear and they both come to pits.

And some of these fights kept going even in the pits...


This is how solid entering to pits should look like



And this how solid start from service spot should look like by Arek (POL) Grisu leaves pits behind Luft losing his place.

And then we got to that point of the race when some 'unnexpected' (at least to some drivers...) things start to happen and in his first race of the season so far - which wasn't so bad - it was time for Tony's engine to say 'BOOM!'


Antonio Heljanovic (CRO) finish his race after engine failure on lap 23.

And the same happened to Sven and to China Boy... - and Black also said a 'forced goodbye'...


Sven (GER) who is 4th unds up his race after engine failure on penultimate lap!



Penultimate straight and Alex's engine says: 'no more...' (while Sexy says 'Pega na minha benga e balança!') - China Boy lost 6th places in his home GP.



Struggling with technical problems Blackfox (FIN) finishes on a wall the second race in a row.

Adrian and raikkO kept having a pretty good fight for the lead...


Adrian passes Raikko.



Raikko's instant revange on Adrian.

But in the end, Adrian was able to keep his place and got his 2nd victory in 3 races this season and looks good for the Title, although it's still pretty soon and we still have another 14 races to go...


Adrian passes Raikko after his puncture and takes the lead on the last lap!



The victory for Australian Kangaroo.



The winner and runner up thank each other for the fight.

And Tom Mckay got the last podium spot and actually won the other race (between everybody else, except for Adrian and raikkO), but with that result Tom is still only a few points behind Adrian on the Drivers' Championship table, due to being regular on the 3 races so far - so MAYBE things won't be that easy to our aussie mate...


Tom Mackay (GBR) takes 3rd place.