Charlottetown, Canada, November 7 – As the HyperX GT Sprint Series grid heads into their third round at Oulton Park, the top three teams are separated by a mere 11 points, and the top five by 63. With 100 points on the line in each race, and as we hit the half-way point of the season, a lot is on the line on the tight and weaving Oulton Park Circuit.
In the PRO/AM class positions are spread out slightly more with Project Dynamic holding a commanding 97-point lead in first place. Quasar Sim Racing will look to chew a bit out of that lead and to increase their gap (currently 32 points) to VEC-Simracing in third. The AM class sees newcomer WestWood Racing eSports in the lead by 28 points from World of SimRacing Team with BSTV eSports in third and 53 points behind the AM leader.
As qualifying wrapped up, No Nonsense Racing and Aidan Shadbolt locked in pole position, with Oscar Kopar’s RSR by G-Performance joining him on the front row and Maniti Racing’s Andreas Thiel finishing third – only 0.075s off of pole!
Disaster struck early for several teams. Impulse racing would have a poor start, and then find themselves off on the exit of Turn 2 along with Team RSO by 5Star following slight contact between the two teams. Torque Freak Racing also found themselves spun in Turn 1 after seeming contact with Olympus racing. Torque Freak would suffer another spin through the chicane as Impulse Racing were contesting for position. It was difficult to determine whether this was contact or a self spin, but Torque Freak had their work cut out for them during the remaining 55 minutes of the first race.
Once things settled down following a couple of intense opening laps, the race was on and the top three teams in the Championship found themselves scattered throughout the top 10 and under great pressure from several other teams. 5Star Motorsport found themselves in 7th with 50 minutes remaining and were hounding the Olympus eSports Porsche. Adam Isakkson would finally be able to make a move through the chicane to move up to 6th and would look to create a gap right away. The RSR by G-Performance (#69) team were also looking to strike as soon as possible on the Olympus team, as they sit 5th in the Championship and would be looking to follow 5Star through to gain crucial points. Shortly after, their sister car (#68) piloted by Oscar Kopar had a huge off in the kink leading into the carousel and would make contact with the tire barriers. The current 4th-place car in the Championship would head into pits and miss out on valuable points in the first race.
Further down the pack, Team Oblivion were doing their best to keep WestWood Racing Esports at bay, but Benjamin Oppenkowski would finally make their way by with a great move around the outside in Turn 1 to take the lead in the AM class.
Meanwhile, Adam was on a tear and had tracked down Maniti Racing. With the pit window open, the 5Star driver ducked into the pits earlier than the Maniti car and would look to get the undercut completed as Max Fritz took over the 5Star machine. After Maniti exited the pits they were about 3 seconds ahead of 5Star – a very important gap as Max Fritz was now battling Puresims Esports and Team RSO. This battling slowed all teams involved down – so much so that the #69 RSR by G-Performance would rejoin the track following their pitstop ahead of the two with Olympus eSports directly in tow. The four-way battle would continue for many laps, until Fritz was able to make the move on the RSR car which would lead to 2-by-2 action through the kink. With room left for all, we’d see the second RSR car touch the grass on the outside of the kink and spin off. Fortunately, no cars made contact with each other and RSR would be able to continue. As this battle continued to rage, Max Fritz was certainly trying to make his car as wide as possible throughout the track with several small bumps ensuing. Michael Evdoka was showing great patience to simultaneously pressure the 5Star car and not make an unnecessary or over aggressive move. This meant this battle would continue on at max-intensity for several laps until Evdoka would try to make his move on the exit of the chicane by dipping their nose into the second portion. Unfortunately contact was made and a slow spin resulted for 5Star dropping them back to 8th position. As the same battle continued with Olympus eSports and Puresims Esports, Project Dynamic and Team RSO by 5STar looked to join with the potential to pick up more places.
Rusty Spatulas were having a solid race, and found themselves in a fight for 10th with Full Send Racing. Eventually, Full Send were able to get a move done and take over 10th position. A few seconds back, Impulse Racing (#256) and Vector by RSR (#171) were both looking to catch the pack in front and not give an inch to one another. While the two were going side-by-side through the kink there was ultimately space that ran out between the two and they made slight contact, but it was just enough to send the two careening into the barriers and finishing both of their races. While this was all happening, Rusty Spatulas were making some heads-up calls in traffic for their current race and the upcoming Race 2; knowing that approaching cars were not racing them for class positions, they let them through to keep their pace up and potentially follow them to gain on the cars in front, but it would also help them with grid position for the next race if they ended up holding their current position.
As the final laps wound down, a few battles were still simmering and finalizing. Ronin – who joined the race with the wrong car number and would have to start their race from the back – were finishing a solid charge to make up as much as they could and managed a great move to the inside of the second Olympus Esports car (#64) into the chicane which moved them up to 15th place. Team RSO seemed to have short-fueled and would have to dip into the pits for a splash-and-dash, but were still able to finish in 8th overall.
Race 2
WestWood Racing led the reversed grid away and got a good start, however further down the grid there were several massive accidents. Olympus Esports (#64) and Cube Racing (#890) came together in Turn 2 which resulted in a huge impact for each in the tyre barriers. The Olympus Racing Porsche (#46) also touched grass on the exit of Turn 12 which turned them directly into the right-hand-side barrier and spun them back across the track at very high speed. Miraculously most cars would not make contact with them, although there may have been some small contact with the Puresims BMW.
With the Lap 1 shenanigans out of the way, several packs broke out and found themselves in bumper-to-bumper action. Rusty Spatulas were leading a 9-car train, with Impulse Racing, Project Dynamic, Team RSO by 5Star, No Nonsense Racing, 5Star Motorsport, a second Impulse Racing car, VEC Simracing, and Maniti Racing in tow! Slowly, the PRO cars would make their way past Rusty Spatulas as they all made their charge from further down the grid. This pack slowly began to stretch out the gaps between each car. However, they would end up bunching up again and the frantic pace would catch up with No Nonsense Racing as they tapped RSR heading into the carousel, who then ran out slightly wide into an unsuspecting 5Star Motorsports car who were pushed out into the tyre barriers.
With the pit window opening, Ronin Academy were holding first place with Team RSO only 0.3s behind. While both were in clear air together and clear of 3rd, it would be interesting to see who decided to jump into the pits for their mandatory pitstop first. With just over 31 minutes remaining, it would be Ronin Academy making the decision to pit first from the lead. Meanwhile, 5Star Motorsport were on the charge to make up positions from their earlier contact and were able to reel in Maniti Motorsport and move up into 6th place. Team RSO would look to create a gap on track before making their pitstop, and it worked out as the #197 RSO car exited the pits just slightly ahead of Ronin Academy. The pair maintained an approximate 6 second lead ahead of the third place car for the time, but Impulse Racing #63 were showing great pace to catch them. A few laps later Torque Freak Racing exited the pits directly in front of RSO which bunched up Ronin Academy and Team RSO enough to create room for a move to be in play. The two would end up going side-by-side into the knickerbrook chicane, and with a little too much of a squeeze by RSO the Ronin car made an evasive save and continued straight through the chicane to save the car. They would serve their slowdown and pick up again right behind RSO once they’d made their way through knickerbrook. This kept RSO in first and moved Impulse Racing (#63) up to second, while Ronin remained only 1 second back of the lead.
Further back, RSR by G-Performance, 5Star Motorsport, and Maniti Racing found themselves together again battling for 9th place. Full Send Racing were the next car in Race 2 to find the grass on the exit of Turn 12 and would end up in the middle of the track following their spin. MAG-Performance Junior Team (#111) were able to narrowly miss the stranded Full Send car, but on their rejoin they made slight contact with the evading Impulse Racing #256 which put their Lamborghini into a massive slide which ultimately spun them and dropped them down the order several positions.
At the end, Team RSO (#197) held on for the win with Ronin Academy (#78) holding off Impulse Racing (#63) into the final corner to see the two finish second and third respectively. Team RSO by 5Star (#198) came home in P4 with the #257 Impulse Racing rounding out the Top 5.
WestWood Racing eSports (#87) finished an impressive 8th overall to take home the win for the AM class, with World of Simracing (#151) in 16th overall and 2nd in AM and NIOBE by Awesome Motorport (#74) finishing 3rd in the AM class.
Project Dynamic (#21) wins the PRO/AM class, with MAG-Performance Junior Team (#111) taking second place in the class and VEC-Simracing (#724) finishing 3rd.
Overall, another intense round with great racing and some potential post-race penalties that may shake up the overall standings as we head to Belle Isle in two weeks for Round 4 and Races 7 & 8.
Final results and positions following Race Control review will be posted later today!
Photos courtesy VCO Esports