Happy Easter

Hey everyone, happy easter Monday to you all.

This week's blog is a little quieter due to ongoing health issues. I only had two evenings racing, first being the More Female Racers opening round on Monday and RPM round three on Wednesday.

First up we have MFR at Zolder. Seeding Qualifying done last week meant that I was in the pro class this season, a step up from being in the silver class since I joined three seasons ago. Moving on to Qualifying I know it’s going to be difficult this season as I just don't have the one-lap hot pace that everyone else does, despite that Qualifying finished okay once I actually put a valid lap in, I think I may have only got two or three valid laps in out of eight or nine possible laps. I managed to be in the top ten which I was happy with, I was only two-tenths off my optimal for that session so there wasn't much more to gain and even with that time, I would only have made it up to fifth. Race one start was going to be difficult as I had a few new unknown drivers around me and my teammate Esmeralda, rule one of Racing is don't take out your teammate so I had to play it extremely carefully. The start went well as usual but I got boxed in a little behind one of the faster drivers which allowed Esmeralda to get far enough ahead that I didn't have the overlap so going into turn two I conceded the position to her and slotted in behind. This is where I would stay as we had a quick conversation over the team radio that it would be best not to fight so we could try and keep up with those in front and gap the drivers behind. The gap to Esmeralda ebbed and flowed a little but most of the time I was sitting under her rear wing, I might have been a little faster but nowhere near enough to make a solid move so I stayed put. Unfortunately about a quarter of the way into the race Esmeralda made a mistake which allowed me to pass and then the corner after she was ungraciously spun around, thus ending her chances of a top ten result. After that incident, the race was pretty quiet for me as I couldn't catch the cars in front but slowly pulled away from the cars behind. During the rest of the race, I capitalized on others’ misfortune from fighting too hard and gained a spot every now and then, on the penultimate lap one of my other teammates Sara lost the car in turn one and tapped the wall. So by the end of the race I finished fourth, a result I'm more than happy with as I know I can't challenge the top four on pace. The race two grid I decided on your race one results in class with the Pro and Am drivers separate so as to not cause any speed overlap at the start. With this format in place I meant I would be starting on the second row of the grid, a bit high up but hey I need to make the most of it. Again having a teammate alongside me (this time Sara) means that I need to be careful, a quick chat on the radio with Sara I told her to take the position at the start as I know she is on average a few tenths quicker than me and I didn't want to hold her up in her fight for the podium. Race two went pretty much the same as race one once I let Sara go, just driving around putting the laps in and slowly pulling away from the group behind but also not quick enough to keep up with the front four, the main aim was to bring the car home safe and not take any risks, I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a few moments as it's me we're talking about here and I have a habit of getting sideways sometimes but in the end, there were no real problems. A fourth and a fifth is a great start to the season and I hope to continue the good results at Silverstone in two weeks.

Next, we have the RPM league and this round was at Red Bull Ring in Austria. This season I have been struggling with the Ferrari, I just don't feel as confident in it as I did last season. I thought Qualifying would be okay but as I got faster everyone else got faster too and I qualified somewhere in the mid-thirties and around tenth in class. That poor Qualifying was probably the only highlight of the race as it was pretty much Iver before it began. On the formation lap going into the last corner, there was a check-up in our row which cascaded down the field until it got to us near the back we couldn't avoid each other, so before I even had the chance to cross the start line I had damage front and rear of the car, this made an unstable car even more twitchy during weight transfer. Despite this, I was able to have a little pace and start to move up through the field, mostly due to a few crashes and staying clear of them. It wasn't long before I caught Yvonne up near the front of our class and as I was settling in behind her disaster struck at turn one, taking the exact same line I always take the car got loose on the sausage kerb on the outside and I exited stage right into the wall which resulted in a tow to the pitlane. Six minutes later and five laps down after getting the required repairs fixed I was back out on track. I still had six minutes of optional repairs I in hindsight should have taken but I thought I could manage the car still a little broken. It was going okay but the pace was capped and I couldn't seem to go much faster, fast forward sometime later and the car got loose in the second toast corner which resulted in an unscheduled pit entry, luckily it was within the window so I decided I would pit anyway, due to the unforced pit entry I had to serve a penalty as well for an unsafe entry. Once the pitstop and penalty were complete I went back out again with much the same problem, the car was twitchy and unstable, and now I had the problem of blue flags every few minutes. Despite that I kept going but about half an hour from the end I had another tap on a wall a decided I should just fully fix the car, I was several laps down and even a lap down on the next position so had nothing to lose. The best part of ten minutes later and with a fully fixed car I was back out again as I never want to give up. Now I could really drive the car and managed to hold pace between eighth and ninth overall so it showed the pace was there. I finished last of the runners and eleventh in class which still meant points but it was a difficult one and I hope to do better at Donington next week.

Hope you all have a good Easter holiday and I shall see you all next week.