David O'Reilly
A bad quali means I can go forwards in the race.
Photo Pashalis Gergis
Round Three of the Thrustmaster World Drivers Championship.
Brides-maid no more but not quite all the way to the altar
Brides-maid no more but not quite all the way to the altar
There were three races. One about driving, one about steering clear of the stewards, one about looking after the engine.
Qualifying was incredibly close and the level of competition and pressure led several drivers into the stewards office for extending after the tricky final turn onto pit straight.
Pole was claimed by Jim Parisis of Twister Racing Team. 1m34.396
Accompanying him on the the front row was Muhammed Patel.1m34.409 + 0.013
The Italian driver Marco Conti rounded out the qualifying top three. 1m34.411 +0.015.
So there were 15 thousandths separating the three of them and only two thousandths between second and third. That ladies and gentlemen is tight!
The Race
The story of the race was one of a virtuoso drive by Muhammed Patel, an FSR driver since 2009 and the 2014 Ace runner up. Patel seems to have found a lot of form since the league transferred to the Rfactor2 simulation as in 2014 he was only just out-pointed by Jiri Toman in a very close final result. As one of the top three in Ace, he was required for 2015 as stipulated by the FSR rules to move up to the top category.
In the China preview by this publication we asked a question of Patel....
"Third in the standings is Muhammed Patel (27 points) who is proving to be Mr Consistent. He has driven fast and clean for a fourth and a third. He has seen the podium and seems to like it. Muhammed is proving where consistent good results can get you. But is that enough for him?"
He answered that question with a personal best qualifying of the season in second. Looking at earlier qualifying performances; In Melbourne he was fourth in qualifying, in Sepang he was third and here in China he was second. That might tell a story.
Then Patel put in a stunning drive building a gap lap by lap that was simply unassailable. Parisis drove well but had no answer to the pace of Patel. He was imperious here.
The race was his, only to be cruelly denied in the final lap with a blown engine.
So Patel was denied a certain 25 points and we imagine that temps inside the helmet of the promising British driver were probably not much shy of the engine oil temp. He did however establish himself as a potential race winning driver.
We spoke to Martin O'Brundle for some insight into why it might have let go.
O'Brundle: “All the teams will push cooling levels to the limit and insiders have told me off the record that many teams were running the radiator at level 1, the smallest available. They do this as the larger the radiator the more drag. So the car is faster with a smaller one. However in a race its a risk as the oil temp will run at above the maximum safe level recommended by the engine manufacturer which is 115 deg. It will get especially hot sitting on the grid at the start after the warm-up lap and during a pit stop. You will have seen several cars smoking on the grid.
The two factors which will shorten the engines life span are temperature and revs. The car will rev to 18,000 but its safe rev limit is below 17,000. It's often in a braking zone with aggressive down-shifts that an over-rev will occur.
If you run it hot and you over rev it the engine will break, its just a matter of when. The engine has a planned life of 2 hrs 15 mins. With enough temp and RPM stress it appears that it's life span can be shortened to below 90 minutes. The Ace and Pro drivers have a shorter race so its unlikely with normal temperatures to cause difficulties for them”.
So it would seem that with the possible implementation of real world temperatures in the future, teams will have to manage this parameter more actively.
After Patels engine fail the next three were separated at race end by only 6 seconds.
Jim Parisis thus inherited the win. Few would deny him some good fortune after his Melbourne travails.
Petar Brjak took second and showed his current lead in the standings is no fluke when he recorded the fastest race lap of 1m35.581
Marco Conti the first of two Italians took the final podium spot.
He was followed 25 seconds back by fellow Italian Francesco Bigazzi for fourth.
For fifth place, Carlos Martin 6 seconds back and completing the race with a broken arm in a cast!
In sixth Daniel Brewer managed a “3 stopper” and managed to hold off attackers to help his team mate 4-stopping Kuba Brzezinski. The stewards turned the tables and after a 30 sec penalty was imposed on Brzezinski, Brewer was left on top in this inter team rivalry by a mere 6/10ths. Rumours that when Brewer heard the news he burst out laughing and texted “you plonker” to his Polish team mate have been denied in official team channels.
Eigth was sealed by Marek Godek who was hot on Brewers tail at race end.
In a tight finish for Ninth and tenth and sealing the final points were John-Eric Saxén and Blair Disley.
Jonny Simon had a frustrating race. He made Q2 and felt his race pace was better than qualifying pace. However contact in the opening laps led to damage strategy change and frustration for the Australian.
Race results (Top 10)
1.Jim Parisis Twister Racing Team
2. Petar Brljak Twister 2Fast4You
3. Marco Conti BBR Life4Racing
4. Francesco Bigazzi Eventa Simracing
5. Carlos Martín Trines NetRex GP
6. Daniel Brewer Origin Front Row Racing
7. Kuba Brzezinski Origin Front Row Racing (30 sec pen)
8. Marek Godek GS Engineering
9. John-Eric Saxén Avid Chronic Racing Team
10. Blair Disley GS Engineering
11. Jonny Simon GhostSpeed Racing Team
Seasons Standings
If only Patel's engine had held on we would be looking at 3 drivers separated by 3 points. But what happened has happened.So it leaves the Drivers World Championship looking like this.
1. Petar Brljak 51
2. Jim Parisis 50
3. Kuba Brzezinski 36
4. Muhammed Patel 27
5. Daniel Kiss 25
6. Marco Conti 15
7. Francesco Bigazzi 12
. David Greco 12
9. John-Eric Saxén 11
10. Carlos Martín 10
. Morgan Morand 10
Full Race Results HERE
China Livestreams
World Championship HERE
Ace HERE
Pro HERE
Back issues of this publication.
Melb Review HERE
Sepang Review HERE
China Preview HERE
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