You may well remember from a while ago that slightly to The Management’s surprise, simFlight found itself sponsoring a racing car a while ago… Not a real one, unfortunately(?!), but the simulated oval racer of Austrian reader Robert Graf, in the DOM-GNL (Deutsche Online Meisterschaft – German NASCAR League) of iRacing.
Well the season opener at Kentucky Motor Speedway went pretty well for Robert – his full race report can be read by clicking on “Read more” below.
“Gentleman, start your Engines! Yesterday, finally the new GNL (German Nascar League) season coughed to life at the Kentucky Motor Speedway. 3 weeks in advance of the real NASCAR, cause these guys don’t have summer holidays, but we do.
Kentucky is a new track in iRacing and to top that we went at it at night! Practice showed more drivers on the track then usual and many yellows. This eveing was gearing up to become a long one. At the beginning 40(!) Impala’s lined up in the pitlane. Then the green flag flew and this is my review of the Kentucky 180:
I missed out on qualify as a safety precaution and had the 38th spot on the grid. After 29 laps this came out to be a good decision, on the first yellow i weaved through the wreckage with no problems and restarted the race in 31st. Now there was a bunch of yellows coming up, 10 was the total count after the race. My setup was quite fast on the restarts and every time i gained 2 or 3 positions and held them till the next caution. With one eye in the mirror i carefully planned my stops and never lost more positions then i could gain. So after the yellows in lap 40, 46, 51, 61 and 76 i had reached the TOP15 and was still going strong. A contributing factor were early incidents by some of the top drivers, which had to race to the front again.
After a short green run of 20 laps the second string of yellows started, slowing down the field at lap 101, 109, 116 and 137. My last stop was on lap 138, which gave me enough fuel to finish, but i worried about my tires. Running 11th i prepared myself for the last 40 laps. On the restart i took 10th, but with “20 to go” it became clear that my tire preserving skills could need improvement and turns got more difficult to negotiate. The pros now were all over me and one after the other i had to let them pass. Better to loose a position then to end the race in the wall. After 180 laps i finally came across the line in 11th place. The best result in my still short GNL career and to be honest, like a victory to me.”
Keep it up, Robert!
