Round 8 Results - Misano Pro Sprint

Results are posted

Congrats Tom on the win.

Was happy to Qualy 2nd again. Was able to hang with and try to pressure Tom from the beginning but as the race progressed and tire wear strarted to effect my right front Tom was pulling away. At the half way mark I checked tires and only had 25% on the R Frt. so knew I was going to have to pit. I came in with about 15 minutes to go. I was really shocked that Tom and Mike in 3rd did not pit for tires. I came out and was able to pound out laps with the fresh tires but not making time up on Mike fast enough as we got closer to the end. Until Mike ran out of gas gifting me 2nd place back again.

Again no idea how they managed to make their tires last the whole race. I had experimented with a whole bunch of setup changes to make the R frt. tire last and every time I thought I had found something a couple of corners of a little too fast and I was right back to where I started. So knowing that I really concentrated on not sliding the tires, especially in the two highest wear corners.

I came into this weekend knowing that unless I changed something from the 14 lap Twin Sprints Misano weekend, there was no way that the tires (especially the right front) were going go the 60 minute+ distance AND I bewilderingly lost an engine at the last Pro Sprint so I was feeling pressure more akin to an endurance race than a real world distance sprint.

Not much I could do different with the engine other than have adequate cooling and be careful on downshifts unless I was in position to short shift or run a gear high in some spots. With almost everyone DNF or pitting, I was able to short-shift near the end of the race hopefully more serving caution than necessity.

Watching my replay from Misano Twin Sprint, I noticed that I was often locking the lightly loaded RF tire at T12 and/or T13. Between T11 and T12 is the fastest part of the track, then slows for T12 and even more for T13 so we have to scrub speed before more normal braking for T14. The basic ways I know to help the inside front stay on the ground are less front bar, more rear bar or more rear spring. None of those are a super happy option with the tail heavy 991 so I softened up both the front and rear bars hoping to maintain a similar balance but reduce the front bar's tendency to compress the inside front spring and keep it from drooping. It seemed to help but moreover once I did 40-50 laps with it during Official Practice, I couldn't go back. I did qualify quicker than the weekend before but also had about 70 more laps under my belt.

The way that I saw it, pitting simply takes too long even with a perfect execution and there is too much risk of mistakes, too much to have to do right. Go as fast as you can and brake as late as possible to get down to the pit speed limit then do the same at your pit stall. I think that rF2 might be helping us with damage repair defaulted to NOT and it is best practice to set fuel (to zero if that is the plan) in the setup for multiple stops and set tires to the most likely scenario on the grid.

Anyway, the setup possibly helped but it was more driving to avoid locking the right front and also avoiding braking too late a running wide. Early in the race, I allowed myself 2% per lap on the tire wear display and when I saw that I saw that I had some reserve, I pushed a little. In future races, I'll probably tape a cheat sheet to the bottom of my monitor with increments better than 45, 30 and 15 minute to go.

KJ applied good pressure but it felt like as long as I didn't make a mistake, there wasn't much opportunity to pass but, of course, slow through a corner saving tires means slow on exit and the next straight so never a relaxed feeling. I concentrated on focusing forward, just braking, turn in, apex, exit and away from the mirrors. Eventually, KJ dropped off and I diverted some attention to being even gentler on the tires and eventually shifting sooner, much sooner on the final lap or two and even checked the gap to P2 to calculate whether I could slow down to cross the finish line just after the time expired to shorten the race by one lap in consideration of the engine but Mike Campbell was too close, more time left than the gap back to him.

Like I said post-race, not sure how much fun it was but I certainly wasn't thinking about anything else and it was immersive and the win rewarding.

With Pat Sweeney's (#36 Red Bull TUM Ferrari 488 GT3) dreadful weekend, Kevin Juliot (#77 Nikon TUM Ferrari 488 GT3) leads all three championships!