It has been several years since Austria has held an F1 event, this is a new circuit for all of our drivers and it was going to be a rough ride. This was set to be a punishing race as the circuit is certainly the bumpiest of the series making Monza seems as smooth as silk.
Qualify:
The session got underway and Scott Daniels was at the pointy end of the time board as expected, closely followed by the Matt’s Sofi and DeGroot. Chris Nesci, Stef Versluis and Murray Conallin were only a few seconds off the pace.
Race:
Everyone got away cleanly and Sofi started applying pressure to DeGroot keeping him honest in 2nd place. The tussle allowed Scott to get out to a nice lead. DeGroot made a small error and Sofi moved past into 2nd.
Chris was having a better performance than his last round staying more consistent in 4th place Stef and Conallin were improving lap after lap. DeGroot had a moment and hit the pits early dropping off the back of Sofi but retaining 3rd position. Scott was dominating the race out the front. On lap 10 he had stretched his lead to 21 secs. Followed by Sofi, DeGroot, Versluis, Vesci and Conallin.
Lap 13 saw the first pit stops, Sofi stayed out and pushed his tyres for an extra lap and lost some time and this allowed DeGroot to sneak past into 2nd place. It looked like pit stop strategy will play its part in this race for 2rd and 3rd. Lap 14 saw Sofi closing in on DeGroot as his tyres got up to temperature. Lap 16 saw him close up on the back DeGroot and started applying the pressure again. Making the clean pass on Turn 4 , not only content with 2nd Sofi kept the hammer on to try and pull away from DeGroot however DeGroot was ready and shadowed his every move until the final corner on lap 17 where he ran a little wide letting Sofi off the hook for the time being.
Midway through the race Scott was dominating with a 52 sec lead over Sofi in send followed by DeGroot in 3rd, Stef was performing well in 4th Chris held down 5th and Murray rounded out the field in 6th. Daniels continued to dominate and by Lap 35 have put the rest of the field 1 Lap down. He was determined and focused and clean and consistent as we have come to expect.
Murray tried pushing his tyres 1 too many laps and lost both the rears and tried his best to limp back to the pits. The pits stop strategy started to play its part in the closing laps between the 2 Matt’s, Degroot conserving tyres opting for 1 less stop was able to get the job done and take 2nd place.
The final results were Scott with a start to finish win, followed by DeGroot, Sofi, Stef, Chris and Murray was not able to recover from his blown tyres and rounded out the field in 6th.
By Sam Owen
Race Results:
Finish | Start | Diff -/+ | Driver | Laps | Race time | Fastest lap | Qual. time | |
1 | 1 | - | Scott Daniels | 50 | 61:46.796 | 1:11.551 | 1:11.083 | |
2 | 3 | +1 | Matt DeGroot | 49 | +1 lap | 1:13.253 | 1:12.694 | |
3 | 2 | -1 | Matt Sofi | 48 | +2 laps | 1:12.914 | 1:12.360 | |
4 | 5 | +1 | Stef Versluis | 45 | +5 laps | 1:13.904 | 1:15.711 | |
5 | 4 | -1 | Chris Nesci | 42 | +8 laps | 1:15.338 | 1:15.399 | |
6 | 6 | - | Murray Conallin | 34 | +16 laps | 1:15.351 | 1:17.114 |
Drivers Championship:
2014 F1 League | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Drivers | Race 1 | Race 2 | Race 3 | Race 4 | Race 5 | Race 6 | Race 7 | Race 8 | Race 9 | Race 10 | Race 11 | Race 12 | Race 13 | Race 14 | Race 15 | Race 16 | Race 17 | Race 18 | Race 19 | Total Points | Current Place | ||
Scott Daniels | 13 | 12 | 15 | 17 | 20 | 17 | 20 | 20 | 134 | 1st | |||||||||||||
Jason Brooks | 0 | 20 | 17 | 20 | 17 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 83 | 2nd | |||||||||||||
Scott McDonald | 20 | 17 | 20 | 12 | 0 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 77 | 3rd | |||||||||||||
Matthew Sofi | 0 | 0 | 13 | 11 | 0 | 13 | 17 | 15 | 69 | 4th | |||||||||||||
Matt De Groot | 0 | 10 | 12 | 0 | 0 | 12 | 0 | 17 | 51 | 5th | |||||||||||||
Evan Golbach | 15 | 15 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 40 | 6th | |||||||||||||
Duran Nikora | 17 | 13 | 0 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 39 | 7th | |||||||||||||
Jesse Dunn | 0 | 0 | 0 | 15 | 0 | 15 | 0 | 0 | 30 | 8th | |||||||||||||
Brad Aiken | 0 | 0 | 0 | 13 | 0 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 24 | 9th | |||||||||||||
Chris Nesci | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 12 | 12 | 24 | 10th | |||||||||||||
Iain Salteri | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 20 | 0 | 0 | 20 | 11th | |||||||||||||
Murray Conallin | 0 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 11 | 19 | 12th | |||||||||||||
Allen Marks | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 15 | 0 | 15 | 13th | |||||||||||||
Adam Gill | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 13 | 0 | 13 | 14th | |||||||||||||
Stef Versluis | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 13 | 13 | 15th | |||||||||||||
Iain McIntosh | 12 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 12 | 16th | |||||||||||||
Nick Lowther | 11 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 11 | 17th | |||||||||||||
Peter Hughes | 0 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 11 | 18th | |||||||||||||
David Lord | 0 | 0 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 11 | 19th | |||||||||||||
Christopher Romeo | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 10 | 20th | |||||||||||||
Andy Lardner | 0 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 9 | 21st |
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