1/24 Race 3: 6hours of FIA GT, Warning lots and lots of pics! Options

[tDI_Fahrer]

Gentlemen,

This weekend we had our first endurance race on 1/24! The race was ment to be six hours: from 15.00h - 21.00h. Due to some guys who came late because his 1:1 mini that would't start (and their 1/24 lights weren't ready) and to some others that was on time, but had to change their groundclearance, we raced more than a hour later.

Everybody put together their favorite FIA GT car for this big race! Some detail pictures:

Bram's Williams Corvette:




Jo's Ferrari 575:


Slim's Goodwrench Corvette:






Watch the helmet and the mousse on the rollcage!


Ben's Chereau GT2:


My Ferrari 575:


Group picture before the start:


The cars were controlled very strictly:


The grid: 1 Gunther, 2 Jo, 3 Ben, 4 Slim, 5 Koen and 6 Bram (very surprised to see him there): We were ready to start a six hour race in manches of 12 minutes each. The only light we head was the sunlight outside... later that day the track would become dark!




Eagerly awaiting the start: a few minutes after taking this picture it was clear that the start of the race was rough. Everybody tried to get in his postition to start their race well. Some guys pushed to hard in those first laps... there were lots of crashes and that demotivated the Porsche driver... he immediately abandonned the race after 43 laps... not due to technical problems though! Hi missed his mirrors and exhausts due to a black Ferrari and he decided to avoid having no Porsche at all anymore.

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[tDI_Fahrer]

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After the first manche everything became calmer... the pilots did their laps without crashing very hard. "Some" in-race pictures:

Koen’s Panoz attacking:


Bram throug "Le Bruneau":


The Giesse Ferrari leading the race from the first Manche:


Jo in second place attacking me hard!


Slim’s Vette through the Sses:


Everything went allright until the sixth manche… in that manche both of the Vettes went in the pits to adjust their suspension. They both stood too hard on the chassis and didn’t have enough traction in the corners. That explained why the rest of the field had to overtake every few laps a Corvette. These adjustments took Slim out for two hole manches! Apart from those suspension adjustments they had to reglue some windows and venturi’s.

Positions after ¼ race:
1: Gunther: 425 laps
2: Jo: 407 laps
3: Koen: 371 laps
4: Bram: 263 laps
5: Slim: 174 laps
6: Ben: 43 laps


Bram’s Vette attacking in the second part of the race: He immediately did 12 laps more in a manche with the improved suspension:


Slim’s Vette went faster too: good improvements guys!


Meanwhile jo and me were competing each other very hard: Flatout through the last corner before start/finish:


Bram went past Koen in the ranking! Not only was Bram a lot faster on the track…


...Koen started to have troubles too! His motor-pinion came loose!


Jo kept attacking… here he passes Brams Corvette very fast,
Bram’s lights were still working here… due to a collision with Koen the front lights fell out, a short piststop for Bram in the last manche:


At about half the race the night fell in… Slim’s Vette at dusk:


Positions after ½ race:
1: Gunther: 852 laps
2: Jo: 799 laps
3: Bram: 648 laps
4: Koen: 642 laps
5: Slim: 445 laps
6: Ben: 43 laps

[tDI_Fahrer]

...

A few minutes later we raced in these conditions:




With the flashlight on… it doesn’t seem so dark, Brams Vette attacking even more now… All lights on!


The Giesse 575 continuing his lead:


The two Vettes are back in the game… (for now):


What do we see here? The Porsche back in the game! We convinced Ben to race on… in stead of just marshalling…


The battle between the Panoz and the Giesse 575 in the dark: The Panoz kept having problems with the motor pinion


Slims Vette at full speed now…until the last manche of the third quarter of the race… his motor came loose then. Vette # 64 had to pit again:


Jo and Ben were back on the track together again but everything was fair now…


Ben passing Brams Vette here: the Porsche was flying, a few laps later Bram had to pit again: electrical problems all over… the car had no current anymore:


After mounting a Porsche motor piece Slim’s vette was at full speed: Here you see how dark it was at some pieces of the track:



Positions after ¾ race:
Gunther: 1268 laps
Jo: 1215 laps
Koen: 993 laps
Bram: 907 laps
Slim: 804 laps
Ben: 319

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[tDI_Fahrer]

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In the start of the last quarter Jo decided to let me go, securing the second place. But a few minutes later, his motorpinion came loose.
Were the Ferrari’s going to show signs of weakness too? A manche later the Giesse Ferrari had to pit too… motorpinion loose as well! We both didn’t loose a lot of laps with this (10 each). But there were some hectic moments for the Italian Stallions.


Some very close racing was seen:


Slim flatout too. He smelled the place of the Williams Vette, who kept having electrical problems:


Koen at full speed now… the pinion stayed in his place:


Nothing but sphere around the track:




Bram fixed the electricals and was going flat out again... but Slim took his fourth place allready:


The Porsche through the second part of “Le Bruneau”:


Final positions:
Gunther: 1676 laps
Jo: 1563 laps
Koen: 1316 laps
Slim: 1197 laps
Bram: 1123 laps
Ben: 679 laps



Last picture: The day after:
The only two cars that were still around the track who had won something:


Before the start of the race everybody had to give points to the others pilots’ cars.
Ben’s Porsche had most points of all… followed by Slim’s Vette and then the other Vette of Bram.

Place 2 and 3 had a sign too… but sign and cars weren’t there anymore to take pictures.
The Giesse 575 didn’t had a scratch… it did in fact a very fast but calm race…

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We had a great time, but I regret having not seen the Porsche for half the race... A quick calculation shows us that if Ben would have continued his race that he would have 1453 laps and third place (the averige of the manches he fully raced multiplied by the 16 manches) because the car didn't show any signs of weakness when it raced. It would be nicer race if the Vette's were prepared better... they lost lots of laps due to their bad suspension.

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Please feel free to comment!


Greetings from Petit Spa!

Gunther

[slot king]

Very nice cars,pics and just another excellent report!

[taxi]

Looks like you had a good weekend Gunther

Great pics as always, and the cars look awesome. The Porsche and your Giesse Ferrari look stunning, especially with the lights fitted.

Congrats on winning too!

cheers,

Rob

[Ian B]

Gunther,
Brilliant really interesting, great photos as usual

[Slotrace.dk]

Great report and awesome pictures!
Keep them coming!

[LMP]

Lovely pictures Gunther, thanks for sharing

[vee8]

Hi there everyone,

Though I lost a lot of time due to friction problems and body to chassis set-up, my Vette ran better and better and I really had a great time and lots of pleasure racing with the fellows.

This is fabulous racing on a superb track and our friend Gunnie made this all possible.
Model car racing just is a part of our lives now and our interest in prototypes grows day by day.

Thanks again Gunther, and keep up posting all those nice reports.

Keep our hobby alive everybody !!!

Bye,
Slim.

[tadream]

Hi Gunther,


Do you realise how close this kind of racing is to a real race ????
Electrical problems, suspension problems, traction problems,.... and the best keep going !


Cheers,


Yves

PS Must come over and join you guys one of these days !

[tDI_Fahrer]

Thanks for the positive words guys!

@ Yves: You know you are always welcome here. I just thought the 1/24 wouldn't say you that much. I invitation for the next big race will come your way. We can always work something out for a chassis of a car (I have spares).

Greetz

Gunther

[tDI_Fahrer]

@ Petit Spa Club Members:

Thursday evening we have the second FIA GT Race!

Doors 19.00h, Qualif 20.00h, Race 20.15h.

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@ Yves: Thrusday we choose our next class. I'll let you know what it is. Normally in a month or two we have a race with these cars then. It is possible that the class is Seventies Le Mans Prototypes (917, 512, T70...)


G.

[slot king]

cool cant wait for the report.
(more like the pics)

[scaleymatt]

Great report, great pics and best of all great cars!!

Matt