Well, I had a good weekend - I mean, it was pretty much as I was expecting and I reached my goal, with was the top 5 - 4th place, 12 points... Lots of 'hard times' during the race, so... jah, I can't complain - except that I could've been at the podium again and also in front of that damn lucky noob, AKA Arek, The Juvenil, who finished in 3rd...
My qualifying was pure shit. I had a PB of 34.4 and I could 'easily' get a 34.7 in the practice sessions, but... all I got was a damn 34.9 and it wasn't enough to go to Q2 among the top 10 - so I started in 12th place...
At the race, we had some messy T1, both in front and behind of me and I still have to watch the replay to figure out whattafak happened...
I had to brake heavily to 'dodge' and avoid guys spinning in front of me and, believe it or not, I did it - didn't get hit - YAY!!! And I also earned a few positions with that (going to 7th place or something), so... 'Double YAY'!!!
But a few metters later, while braking for the 1st chicane, I guess I stepped the grass a little bit - or it was just by braking actually - and my car half spun... While trying to 'control' it (although I actually didn't have ANY control of it - LOL), a Force India hit me and I guess it was Denis... Maybe Bober... (DUUUHHH!!!) Anyway... I'm sorry for whoever it was, but... I couldn't do anything...
A few laps later, I got 3 cars fighting heavily in front of me - Adrian, Tony and I don't remember the 3rd one... All I know is that I saw them going side by side right before the 3rd chicane - yes, 3 cars side by side at that damn narrow Hockenheim - and I was like 'WTF?!' and I KNEW 'something' was gonna happen and... I was right... Adrian spun after a fight with Tony - right in front of me (obviously - I'm a magnet to that kind of stuff) and... I couldn't avoid Adrian, so I hit him and got some damage on my car - so, I think that was some kind of Karma for the similar incident with the Force India on lap 1...
At a certain point, I catched Joe fighting with Cueball and I was a little faster than the both of them, so i decided to 'join the party'...
McLaren's team orders are a little different than Ferrari's (because we're smart... - just sayin'...) and then Joe tried to stay out of my way the best he could and I tried not to be a problem to him too and we both had a common target: Cueball!
I actually overtook him on the 1st chicane, on a very nice (and clean) move, but he got my slipstream and 1 or 2 laps later, he recovered his place, at the same 1st chicane, but... I was sqeezed and almost went to the grass (AKA, 'The McKay Move'
) and had to use the runoff area - I went through it on a very low speed, because I didn't want to get a penalty by the game - and so Cueball put a small (but good) gap on me and it took me about 5 laps to get to him again with a real chance to overtake him, but... then he got as scared as Arek is of my mighty racing powers and he made me a favor of spinning at the very last corner and gave me the place back - THANKS!!!
At lap 14, I went to the pits and changed my tyres from Hards to Softs for the last 9 laps (my softs only lasted well for 8 laps, so... it was a risky move, but also worthy, I think) and then I had Adrian and a few other guys on my ass (not 'Opa Otti Style'), but since I was on Softs, I was able to open a gap and they weren't a threat to me - uff!!!...
Then I tried to catch the guys in front of me, although they were more than 6 secs ahead...
First one was Otti and, again, he got scared when he saw me coming and made me the nice favor of spinning, crashing and just getting out of my fuckin' way - good job!!!
And now I was trying to catch Stefano (fight for the 5th place), 4 secs in front of me, with 4 laps to go, so... if you're good at maths... I had to be at about 1 sec. faster than him per lap to have a chance to catch him and... I was being something between 0.8 secs to 1.2 secs faster than him in average, so... I knew I had a chance!!!
I was expecting for some amazing overtake (by me) on the very last lap, but... with 3 laps to go, Stefano also got scared when he saw me on his mirror and just said MAMA MIA!!! and also spun at the Stadium Hairpin - GRAZIE, MOZARELLA PIZZA!!!
So, I was 5th, which was already inside my goal (top 5), but I also noticed I was pretty faster than Arnie, in 4th place, about 2 secs in front of me and then I thought to myself 'Why not?!'... and then kept the best pace I could to try, catch and overtake him, but... with 2 laps to go... Arnie ALSO got scared by me being faster than him and even his brakes got scared and ran away! He couldn't brake properly, hit the wall at the Stadium and lost his front wing! I tried to overtake him (obviously), but he was kinda 'blocking' the track (which is too narrow and he was right in the MIDDLE of it... - PICK A SIDE, PLISS?!...) but then I finally passed and I had Arek a few secs in front of me and decided to keep a good pace just to 'scare' him too - jah, that was just for fun!...
But that was it... Arek was LUCKY to get the 3rd place (podium) and for me not to overtake him - especially after all of the shit that happened to me - so... I'm happy with my result and race!
And yes, I still believe it could've been an even better weekend, but that's ok!
Moving on...