[Gareth]

A Final

If Terry didn’t have bad luck, he would have no luck at all.  We’ve seen some absolute howlers over the past couple of seasons with gears stripping for the A final, controller not plugged in properly and the odd bit of bad marshalling or tripping over other cars ruining what should have been a very competitive night.   But the absolute Achilles Heel of Terry’s racing is his bodyshells.  He has the same green Nascar as Matthew, the same F1 cars as several other drivers and in Mod, he is 1 of 4 drivers racing a Gulf liveried car along with Rob and perhaps more importantly, Isaac who was now lining his version up in blue lane right alongside Terry’s car in red.  

   

Gareth’s Goldie would be going from yellow and Oliver had chosen white lane, perhaps fearful of the electrical gremlins popping up again on blue lane.   

All 4 cars were locked together in the opening laps and were absolutely flying, straight down into the sub 5.5 second lap times, this is why these cars were in the A final.  Isaac crashed on lap 5 and the Gulf livery confusion immediately reared his head as Terry thought he had crashed meaning he lost a valuable 4 seconds.  His cry of agony at realising his mistake was genuinely gut wrenching!  3 laps later and he crashed properly before unleashing 6 blistering laps where the slowest was a 5.0 and the best was a 4.826.  No one else had anything close to this pace and it sadly ended with further crashes on laps 15 and 16 to completely ruin Terry’s race.  He and Isaac exchanged places several times but that big lap 15 crash meant it was the youngster in 3rd and Terry who finished 4th. 

   

Out front Gareth was in control but Oliver was shadowing him just a few tenths behind, the difference almost entirely down to the relative difficulty of white versus yellow.  As the seconds ticked down, Oliver sensed Gareth was easing up and piled on the pressure only to have a late off on the final lap to seal the win for Gareth. 

   

So a win for me (I find it easier to write in the third person for narrative!) and my first in 8 years apparently!  Feels good.  Isaac picked up the junior win and John the Tuners victory.

   

Congratulations to all three, commiserations to Terry and thanks as always to the setup crew, race control and the strike down team.  

   

See you at Watkins Glen for Nascar.