Most racing series, real life or simulation, are about the individual driver. The SSCA Team Challenge on the other hand emphasizes the importance of teams and the importance of finishing well with both cars. After 300 action-packed miles of online racing at Daytona International Speedway, Team nfinity did just that. Darryn Lobb brought home the car in third while Anton Stratiev took fifth, together scoring 240 points to take the championship lead over Team Narval who also, as a team, finished well with drivers Tony LeGrene and Daniel Graulty.
While Team nfinity did not have the fastest drivers on the grid, Anton qualifying 9th and Darryn Lobb a few spots back in 12th, just went out with the idea to finish the race. “Before the start of the race I tried to get myself as calm as possible,” said Anton, “thinking that the most important thing is to bring the car to the checkered flag safe and in one piece, not taking any unnecessary risks and leaving some distance to the cars ahead from start and restarts.”
This strategy proved to be the winning formula as other teams made costly mistakes.
The fastest driver in qualifying and in the race was SK Gaming’s Danny Engels, who easily started from pole position. “I luckily found my rhythm during the first laps of the race and slowly started to pull away,” he said.
Danny never once looked back leading the race flag to flag. As an individual, Danny scored the most points possible. Teammate Dennis May of Pedal to the Metal Racing, who together with Dennis form SK&PM racing, spun on Lap One entering the hairpin placing him well back in the field after starting third. Danny, trying to make up as many spots as possible, maybe pushed too hard as he ended-up in more trouble.
“Back on track and behind Emmanuel Blako(Simcraft/GMT) I misjudged his line and braking point and crashed in his rear,” said Danny, who later made the same mistake. “After that I managed to get back to 10th position. Driving directly behind Darryn Lobb (nfinity) for some laps I misjudged Darryn’s braking point, avoided hitting his car, but ended up in the wall, race over.”
With heavy damage Dennis was able to limp back to the pits to avoid bringing out a caution.
Rookie Emmanuel Baako racing for SimCraft/GMT seemed to find himself in the wrong place at the wrong time, getting evolved in all the early incidents - first with Dennis May, who rear-ended him, and then with Marc Haymann(SF-Motorsport) who struck Emmanuel after he had spun into Turn One with the damage received from his contact with May. Marc severely crushed the bodywork into his radiator, which lost all fluid in the next two corners, seizing the engine. The stalled car out on track brought-out the first caution.
While this should have also been the end of Emmanuel’s race, he still had a part in the out come. “I attempted to limp the car back into the pits,” he said. “Terrible judgment, since I had no steering and I think my rear wheels were probably hanging on by a thread.
Coming out of T6, I couldn’t really accelerate. I should have ended it right there.”
Emmanuel spun while trying to accelerate and got in the way of Marc Haymann’s teammate Rene Raulin who pulled hard left striking Howard McMillion’s vApex entry, ending both racers’ races. Emmanuel was very apologetic after the incident, which took out SF-Motorsport and one of four vApex cars. It wasn’t all bad news for SimCraft/GMT as Sean A Yoder smartly and patiently brought home the car in 10th place after starting in 24th.
On the restart, on Lap 27, coming into the front infield hairpin Daniel Graulty(Narval) in sixth who was having brake pedal issues throughout the race started a chain reaction which directly involved three other cars and sent the following pack scrabbling for the grass.
“On the restart, Ricardo Michalewski(ART simracing) got a run inside me at Turn One and took the spot from me,” he explained. “However, once again at the first hairpin, my brakes caught me out after a bias adjustment with a bit of rear lockup. Unfortunately, I touched the back of Ricardo, costing him a few positions and a bit of damage to the rear of his car.”
When the smoke dissipated, Alexandro Fior(T1RT) and Jim Shedlick(Carbon Racing) had taken the most damage. Jim had to retire a few laps later with his bent suspension causing unsafe wear to his right front. Alexandro also tried to continue but while getting on the binders into Turn One his car went sideways, clipped the inside grass and shot into an innocent Tim Holgate, the Podium Assault team manager. Tim’s subsequent retirement this left his teammate Bryan Heitkotter in third place fighting with Marcus Saari(My3id) for second.
Saari’s red and white My3id Riley qualified only .205 seconds off Engels (SK&PM) and never let him get to far up the road. Nearing the halfway point of the race My3id were looking on pace for victory with Saari in second and David Williams in 4th. On Lap 33, while closely battling with Heikotter, Saari suddenly experienced lag issues.
“A few laps after the restart my computer started stuttering,” he revealed. “Something I have never had in iRacing. At one point it went so bad that my computer froze for a second or two. Luckily Bryan managed to avoid hitting me hard. Not long from that, it froze again and this time I spun. I dropped from second to fifth and started catching Tony LaGrene. I still had some stuttering but not as bad. I was afraid to get behind him because of the lag, but it wasn’t game-breaking anymore.
I got once inside for Turn One but went wide…on the next lap my engine blew.”
This brought out a caution with Marcus’ car stalled just outside the bus stop on Lap 43. On the ensuing restart the order was Engels, Heikotter, Williams, Lobb and Straviev. In sixth was Tony LeGrene(Narval) who lost a few spots as he was on pit road as the Saari caution came out. The nfinity cars had already stopped, which gained them some track position and placed them in the top five. It didn’t take long for LeGrene to pass Straviev for fifth and begun running down Lobb.
Up front the battle for first was intense. Heitkotter and Williams would not allow Engels to get away and were all glued to each other’s bumper. The final caution flew when Chad Peterson stuffed his Riley into the tires exiting the infield. This gave the tired drivers one last breather for the run to the checkered. On the restart Heikotter was all over Engels, looking to make the pass. He got on the inside of Engels SK gaming Riley and looked like the pass was going to stick but inexplicably spun. Trying to continue it was evident something was wrong with the car.
“I battled the car through the apex, thinking I had been bumped a bit on entry, then my car spun on the exit,” said a disappointed Heitkotter. “After I got going again it was clear the car would not finish the race. It couldn’t drive straight. I reviewed the replay and David didn’t touch me. My left rear suspension just threw in the towel and folded. It’s very upsetting to be racing for hours and to have something like that happen that relegates you to a mid-pack non-finish. Not a good result for the Podium Assault Inside Sim Racing team.”
While Podium Assault and many other teams were packing the trailers for the next race in Road Atlanta, the battle for the overall team win was still raging. It was in the hands of Darryn Lobb and Tony LeGrene who were fighting over third place. On the previous restart Tony had gotten past Darryn who had gone wide in Turn One. For the rest of the race Darryn was doing all he could to catch Tony. He eventually got a good run coming out of the Bus Stop that placed him right on Tony’s bumper. Tony went defensive and braked a little early and Darryn didn’t react in time as he slammed into the back of the Narval Riley sending both cars spinning. Both recovered, but Darryn was off first and clamed the last podium spot.
1st: nfinity Racing – Darryn Lobb(3rd) and Anton Stratiev(5th)
2nd:Narval Racing – Tony LeGrene(4th) and Daniel Graulty(7th)
3rd:My3id Racing – David Williams(2nd) and Marcus Saari(15th)
4th:SK&PM – Danny Engels(1st) and Dennis May(21st)
5th:ART simracing – Tim Claessens(6th) and Ricardo Michalewski(8th)
Written by Alex Ulleri
Source: http://www.inracingnews.com/iracing-news/team-nfinity-wins-ssca-daytona-...
