TSA F1 Championship: Round 9 Results

Welcome to Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium. A traditionally unpredictable race, thanks to the completely unpredictable weather, and thanks to it being the penultimate race before we head to the finals, it had an added layer of tension and intrigue to proceedings!

This weeks results follow below:

Championship A

Around the first corner, Teflon from 6th stupidly tapped his brakes again and instead of making it round the very tight inside, his wheels locked up, he hit Spooferbarnabas’ car and chaos ensued. Camdaz and Manorhowze were streaking off in the lead whilst the middle sector caused havoc within the mid-field and several racers got into trouble.

At the end of the first lap, at the bus stop chicane, Camdaz erred, looking back to check on Manorhowze, missing his braking point and letting him and several others through. His woes didn’t end there, as after his pit stop on the 4th lap, he ran wide through turns 14 and 15, scraped the barrier and brought his race to an early end.

That wasn’t the only pit stop excitement, as Manorhowze forgot to slow down and hit the limiter, getting himself a 10 second penalty, and a whole lot of work if he was to take the win. Spoof had been right at the front with Matty at one point, but an accident saw him wingless, having to traipse back to the pits, losing a lot of time in the process, but came back out in 4th. Further back in the pack, Heedbaw and Teflon were having a scrap as Heedbaw had much fresher tyres after his late stop, and twice SpikeyMikey’s mild misadventures distracted Teflon enough to cause more time consuming mistakes, letting Heebaw sneak through on the last lap.

Back at the front, though, Matty tailed Manorhowze closely enough that he inherited the win, whilst Beelzie came home in 3rd, after recovering from a poor first lap. All of which leaves the competition in a tantalising position. Manor and Camdaz are equal on 133 points and now safely qualified (see below), whilst Beelzie, Spoof and Matty are now tangled in a remarkable battle for 3rd and 4th, as Matty’s two wins put him right back in the action, but needing to beat both his opponent if he’s to have any chance.

Results

1. Matty1209 – 25
2. Manorhowze – 18
3. Beelzie14 – 15
4. Spooferbarnabas – 12
5. Heedbaw – 10
6. Teflon – 8
7. SpikeyMikey23 – 6
8. Aerobes – 4
9. Camdaz – 2 (DNF)
10. Daywalker – 1 (DNF)
11. Reck46 – 0 (DNS)
12. Gazo69 – 0 (DNS)

Championship B

Well, after the adrenaline rush of the last race, things were quite the opposite at Spa. Firstly, we were short of a few people. Djkaty had fallen into a light coma, leaving her PS3 on, and absolutely no attempt at digitally waking her up worked so she unfortunately missed this week’s race. Michi was still out of the country, presumably on “business” in Russia to do with some sort of voting fix the naughty devil, so Teflon was drafted in (yes, again) and Yersal was kept locked up at work late so TheCardinal turned up for duty and stepped in for him.

Qualifying was pretty quiet, despite being fairly wet. Jambo was struggling to get a clean lap and in the end only managed to get the one. Ash was keeping his head down and getting the job done. For those that don’t know, Ash and Jambo have a friendly rivalry in Championship B; both have qualified for the finals already and are now battling it out to see who can win Championship B. Anyway, qualifying was coming to an end and AG2297 was currently in 8th and only had time for just one or two more laps. Coming out of Eau Rouge AG was on the long straight and was catching up to Josh653 who was on his flying lap. At full speed there was little time to think, so AG decided to overtake on the right as there was not enough room on the left and Josh may not have noticed him. Instead, Josh had noticed him and moved to the right to let him pass on the racing line which was on the left but as AG had also moved to the right it resulted in an almighty crash which left AG needing a new wing and a 5 grid penalty and gave Josh an almighty poke up the bum that he wouldn’t forget any time soon. Ash secured pole position with Jambo in second and Ro6 in third.

The race was dry, so strategies were changed and everyone went to the grid. Unfortunately for AG, GT5 syndrome had set in and he made the silly mistake of pressing the X button to accelerate instead of R2 resulting in, well, nothing. By the time he had worked out what he was doing wrong, Ash had span from a slight nudge on the first corner and had gone from first to last. TheCardinal wasn’t having much luck either, as he was hit with a puncture after Eau Rouge. What is this, September!?

Ro6 and Teflon had a battle once again, with positions swapping early on and towards the end. Ash went on a charge and managed to get up to 4th, only for Ro6 to spin on the last corner of the last lap (again) and promote Ash to 3rd and demote Ro6 to 4th. In the meantime Jambo had been cruising along in 1st feeling pretty lonely and bored in comparison to the last race.

The results are:

1. JamboGT – 25
2. Michi – 18 (Teflon racing)
3. AshGraham99 – 15
4. Ro6afc11 – 12
5. CubsMug – 10
6. Josh653- 8
7. Yersal – 6 (TheCardinal Racing)
8. Duncanuaz – 4
9. AG2297 – 2
10. Gernboes – 1
11. Freezebug – 0 (DNF)
12. DJ-Katy – 0 (DNS)

Championship C

Colin was the driver who came out on top in a competitive qualifying session, taking pole position in front of Baxteros and SuperJag. When the race started the weather had turned and the track was wet, meaning intermediate tyres were put on the cars.  Bax got a good start and positioned himself on the inside for turn 1 with Jag close behind Colin, meaning it would be very tight into the hairpin. Lfc-Gaz stopped any collision between these three however as he misjudged his braking point (an extremely easy thing to do in these conditions), smashing into Jag and spinning Colin out, giving Bax the lead. Tony was also caught up in the accident at turn one dropping him to 7th. Gaz’s bad luck continued as Tom overtook him later in the lap, pushing him onto the gravel in the process, dropping him to 7th and leaving him facing the wrong way.

Then on lap 2 Gaz again ran onto the gravel, spinning himself out. Unfortunately this time someone else suffered as Tony ran right into him, removing both cars front wings and giving Gaz a puncture. For the next few laps Bax, Jag and Tom battled for the lead. Tom snatched 1st away from Bax as he ran wide through Rivage, before Jag stole the lead on lap 4. Baxteros was the first of the front runners to blink as he pitted for new tyres. Jag, Tom and Colin all pitted on lap 5 and a poor pit stop for SuperJag handed THL the lead. Ro6 (racing for Squaljie) took the risky decision of not pitting at all, meaning he was in 6th place behind Wick as the others pitted. Tony took a completely different approach and put on option tyres despite the volume of water still on track. This turned out to be a wise move as he was now lapping around 8 seconds quicker than he had been, while Ro6 struggled with his ruined tyres for the remainder of the race.

Towards the end of the race it all kicked off. On entry to the final chicane on the penultimate lap, Colin braked slightly later than Bax and tapped his back end, sending him wide through the first part. Colin backed off and allowed Bax past through the second part of the chicane but the championship leader was off line and spun on the exit. Then on the final lap Jag and Tom collided, dropping Tom down to 4th place and put Colin right behind the leader. SuperJag defended hard into the final chicane and took the win by 0.3 seconds. However, after the race was over, discussions were held regarding both incidents and the fairest solution regarding penalties was reached. Tom now took the win with SuperJag in 2nd place, Baxteros in 3rd and Colin finishing in 4th position, the likely finishing positions had neither incident taken place.

The final standing after the mayhem were as follows:

1. THLSixthAxis – 25
2. SuperJag86 – 18
3. Baxteros – 15
4. Colinbarr66 – 12
5. Squalje – 10 (Ro6afc11 racing)
6. Wick15 – 8
7. Baconsarnie – 6
8. Tonyyeb – 4
9. LFC-Gaz – 2
10. Icuyesido – 1 (DNS)
11. Sympozium_666 – 0 (DNS)
12. Stingraz – 0 (DNS)

So congratulations to Matty1209, JamboGT and THLSixthAxis for their wins, two of which also won last week. The F1 Championship thread is the place to head if you want the current standings. Driver’s own accounts of this week’s races begin here and continue for a few pages, whilst the repository for their own race videos can be located here.

Don’t forget that we travel to Suzuka next week for the final race of the Championship. The tracks for the finals will be announced in next week’s write up along with any changes to the rules, although the races won’t be until January. We will be contacting all of the finalists after next week’s races (possibly before if you have already qualified) to find some times where we are all available to race.

Finally, we have decided to extend the number of people who qualify for the finals from the top three of each championship to the top four, meaning more people will be in with a chance of winning. Everyone will start from zero points in the final and Colin will be the marshal for these races.

Sadly, we couldn’t cover everyone’s story in this post, so tell us, how was that Championship race for you? Are you in the thick of things in Suzuka? Any predictions on who’ll come out on top? Let us know in the comments below!

If you have any interest in the wonderful community events we organise here at TheSixthAxis, you’ll want to check the Community, Competitions and Meets sections of the site regularly. Also if you have a Twitter account, following @thesixthaxis and @TSACom will help you keep up to date with all the community news and announcements.

This post was written by AG2297, Colinbarr66 and Teflon.