2015 F1RWRS World 800Right, since the entire race was a massive crashfest, I'm only oing to cover the big smashes, and then do a quick team by team review.
The first one was on lap 2 in the midfield. It was largely caused by Jean-Luc Schiller getting mugged on the back straight by two of the Kingfishers and Tomo Kazama. When they got to turn 3, Martin van der Maeyede was on the putside, Schiller inside him and David Neuberg right down the bottom of the track. VDM had the edge over Schiller, so the Swiss slowed a bit and moved further down, but didn't see Neuberg and made contact. Neuberg launched off Schiller's rear wheel, over Schiller's car and into the catch fencing. Schiller had nowhere to go and got forced into the concrete, while Neuberg, upon landing, rolled 3 times and got clipped by Miko Fakkinen. In the resulting traffic jam, two of the Mechas hit each other, with Dave Anderson forcing Steven Mackintosh into the wall. Mackintosh was out on the spot, not that he would've gotten much further since his engine has caught fire. Up the road, Autodynamics got more bad luck when Damon Cannon caught sone debris and broke his front wing.
The next big one was on lap 4, although really it was two medium incidents at the same time. First it was Barii Mori moving down the track and hitting Aurelien Moll. While Moll was unaffected, Mori went straight back up into the fence, nearly taking out Rhys Davies in the process. Two cars managed to find debris, Daniel Martins losing a front wing and Jean-Vincent Albertini losing a wheel. Further behind, Terry Hawkin understeered wide, the only thing keeping him out of the fence being the Revolution of Shinobu Katayama. Hawkin kept going, Katayama retired, and her uncontrollable car hit Mori's car. She wasn't the only one, as on the next lap Sammy Jones barrelled straight into him putting himself out of the race.
Apart from a few more cars hitting the turn 3 wall, it was fairly quiet until about lap 30. Saeed al Faisal's engine had blown up, and he had been crawling along the back straight very slowly. A few cars, including Fredo Mestolio and Andrea Acuri, had almost had to come to a complete stop to avoid hitting him. Eventually, someone hit him, and that poor guy was Jari Kekkonen. He hit al Faisal at high speed, and that started a chain reaction, as Douglas Mann hit Kekkonen and Frank Zimmer hit Mann. All four retired, and on the next lap more cars got involved, with Pippa Mann, Daniel Melville, Andrea Battani, Marie Simon, Ben Fleet and Andrej Kremnicky all barrelling in. All of them did manage to slow enough to do no further damage, with the exception of Kremnicky, who came in at a fair speed. He didn't hit any cars, but he did hit a marshall, who was immediately airlifted to hospital.
Lap 62 was the next major one, once again because of someone being stupid after an engine failure. This was worse. As he was crawling along, Tomo Kazama, running well inside the top 10, went to the outside to pass Anderson, only for Anderson to turn left and slam Kazama into the fence, putting her out of the race. It also resulted in Damon Cannon's retirement when he hit one of Anderson's wheels.
From there the race calmed down, and it took until lap 126 for the next one. By this point, big wrecks, smaller accidents and mechanical failures had reduced the field from 58 cars to 9. Fredo Mestolio, running fourth, ran out of road at turn 3, hitting the fence and going out of the race. That in itself was a minor incident, but what made it worse was when he was hit by Jason Hamilton, who had been leading. They were then hit by Laurent Seron, then Marie Simon, then Justin Case as well. The five wrecked cars and the debris field blocked the entire track, and fearing for the safety of marshalls, the red flag was shown. Eventually, as by then the leader had completed lap 127, and only four cars remained. When all was sorted in race control, the results were taken from lap 125.
Team by teamMRT - Out of 125 laps, MRT led 120 of them, and 106 of those were led by Hamilton. Nicolas led the opening lap, and only led again when Hamilton pitted. When he threw his car into the turn 3 fence, Melrose took the lead until his engine expired. Hamilton led pretty much from there until the end, except for 5 laps in the 90s after an electrical issue forced him into the pits.
SUNSHINE - Justin Case would finish 7th when the results were backtracked in a very solid race, despite more than a few broken front wings. James Davies was the only driver who could hold a candle to the MRTs early on, quite easily keeping up where everyone else had fallen back. Martins' transmission was one of many to fail, after a early stop to replace a wing. James had retired shortly before after hitting the turn 3 fence, while Jordan had also broken a gearbox fairly early on.
GILLET - Seron is probably the least talented of the four drivers, yet was the only one to make it to the end. Albertini got taken out on lap 4, while Moll and De Bock retired at the same time on lap 54, with Moll crashing and De Bock getting a puncture.
JONES - Whether Sammy had deliberately hit Mori was up for debate, but in the eyes of some he regained some respect when he voted to backtrack the results to lap 125. If the results were taken from 127, Rhys Davies would have won and Jones Racing would have three Dan Wheldon trophies in a row. With the backtracked results, Davies would only be second, the only Jones to get home. Hawkin had probably sustained some sort of damage in the collision with Katayama, as he rubbed the wall a few more times, losing a front wing once and eventually lost it completely, while Vantini broke his gearbox on lap 56.
KAMAHA - Kamaha looked quick. It was just a shame that after 15 laps, three cars were already out. Mori put himself out, McKane crashed on lap 14 and Du Lei had had a gearbox failure the following lap, after hitting the T3 wall early and losing a front wing. Tomo Kazama was running very well until Anderson's brainfade on lap 62.
FOXDALE - How Pippa Mann lasted 112 laps was a very good question, as she had no rear end grip all day and was lucky to keep the car out of the fence that long, including some excellent saves. Douglas was a victim of al Faisal's idiocy, McFry crashed out early and Fleet was a late victim of the gearboxes.
ARROWTECH - Both cars were slow all day, Acuri was barely able to keep the Dofascos behind him. Mignolet stopped with a water leak on lap 25, Acuri blew his engine on 42.
HRT - Dean Melville managed to take a podium place, although he only really deserved fifth, having hit the turn 3 wall about 7 times yet never breaking anything. The other Melville was a late engine failure, while Carter Simpson was the first victim of the troublesome gearboxes, and Frank Zimmer fell victim to Saeed al Faisal.
AERORACING - A bit anonymous today, with two mechanical failures (suspension for Souto Maior and gearbox for Steele) ending their day.
PROSPEC -
IIDOTR: Fredo Mestolio, easily. Despite an early crash costing him a front wing and almost a lap, he stayed out of trouble for the most of the day to work his way forward, with proper pace in his car. Setbacks such as slowing for al Faisal and then just avoiding the wreckage on the next lap, as well as a throttle problem forcing him into the pits didn't put him down. He deserved a podium, much more than Melville, but that first crash set him back just a bit too far. While Dan Greenlaw ran well early, he was one of the gearbox victims.
BOXTEL - Hershall managed to find the T3 wall in between the first two accidents, ending his day early. Kekkonen also hit the wall early, right behind Mestolio, before being the first to hit al Faisal. Rueckert was one of the better drivers before crashing out, while Battani made it to lap 73 before his suspension failed, ending Boxtel's day.
ALITALIA - Oh dear. To start with, the car was crap. Agyeman-Badu and van Nieuwenhuijzen both retired with wheel-related problems, a puncture for BVN and one of Marcel's wheels falling off. As for Kremnicky, many in the paddock were calling for his head after he hit the marshall. The unlucky man was immediately airlifted to the nearest hospital, and unfortunately passed away during the night. Kremnicky did win the instant karma award, with his engine starting to smoke precisely 8.927 seconds after he hit the marshall, but he'll have an investigation into the incident over his head, and Tom Douglas is reportedly not too happy with him...
DOFASCO - Of all the cars you would expect to finish, Dofasco was not one of them. Yet Samelko managed to get home. 6 laps down, but he still finished. Even better, he was one of the four to survive the final crash. Tajner and Buyvolov would both break gearboxes, Tajner from behind Samelko and Buyvolov from in front.
KINGFISHER - David Neuberg broke an ankle in his violent smash, but will be ready to race in time for even the French GP early next season. The other two cars ran competitively all race, before a gearbox problem put Valsattis out and van der Maeyede lost oil pressure.
MECHA - Mackintosh and Anderson have both been mentioned, while Whitechapel did all she could to haul that Mecha to places where it didn't deserve to be. For the first 6 laps, anyway, before her engine blew. She deserves a much better car than this.
REVOLUTION - The Japanese pair are fairly talented, yet it was the weakest link in the team that finished the race, with Marie Simon staying out of trouble (mostly) to make it home. Katayama got taken out by Hawkin, while Shizuka's gearbox let go on lap 50.
SIMPSON -
ROTR: Saeed al Faisal, for his poor way of parking, but Michael Cameron was one of the better drivers in the race, with only one mistake on lap 109 costing him a podium, when he shattered a front wing on the turn 3 fence.
AUTODYNAMICS - Every time one of them was competitive, misfortune struck. Apart from Schiller's DNF, Miko Fakkinen was on the outskirts of the top 10 when his engine went up in smoke. Damon Cannon was inside the top 10 when he caught some debris from the Anderson/Kazama wreck. As for Bobby Dollar, while he was less competitive and cost the team a fortune in front wings, he was one of the last few runners.
ResultsCode: Select all
Pos Driver Team Time/Retired Gap Pit
1st Jason Hamilton MRT 1:37:25.494 125 LAPS 4
2nd Rhys Davies Jones 1:37:31.909 + 6.415 1
3rd Dean Melville HRT +1 LAP 3
4th Fredo Mestolio Prospec +1 LAP 4
5th Michael Cameron Simpson +2 LAPS 4
6th Marie Simon Revolution +2 LAPS 2
7th Justin Case Sunshine +3 LAPS 5
8th Laurent Seron Gillet ENB +3 LAPS 3
9th Cezary Samelko Dofasco +6 LAPS 2
DNF Pippa Mann Foxdale Accident (L112) 3
DNF Bobby Dollar Autodynamics Accident (L106) 5
Code: Select all
DNF Daniel Melville HRT Engine (L80) 2
DNF Ben Fleet Foxdale Transmission (L77) 2
DNF Andrea Battani Boxtel Suspension (L73) 2
DNF Tomo Kazama Kamaha Collision (L62) 1
DNF Damon Cannon Autodynamics Collision (L60) 2
DNF Dave Anderson Mecha Engine/Collision (L59) 2
DNF Marcel Agyemang-Badu Alitalia Loose Wheel (L56) 1
DNF Rosco Vantini Jones Transmission (L56) 1
DNF Miko Fakkinen Autodynamics Engine (L55) 1
DNF Aurelien Moll Gillet ENB Accident (L54) 2
DNF Thomas De Bock Gillet ENB Puncture (L54) 1
DNF Daniel Martins Sunshine Transmission (L52) 1
DNF Nicolas Steele Aeroracing Transmission (L51) 1
Code: Select all
DNF Hagane Shizuka Revolution Transmission (L50) 1
DNF James Davies Sunshine Accident (L50) 2
DNF Martin van der Maeyede Kingfisher Oil Leak (L48) 1
DNF Andrea Acuri ArrowTech Engine (L42) 0
DNF Daniel Melrose MRT Engine (L42) 0
DNF Alexey Buyvolov Dofasco Transmission (L41) 1
DNF Johannes Rueckert Boxtel Accident (L40) 1
DNF Phillippe Nicolas MRT Accident (L36) 0
DNF Raul Souto Maior Aeroracing Suspension (L33) 0
DNF Andrej Kremnicky Alitalia Engine (L32) 0
DNF Frank Zimmer HRT Collision (L29) 1
DNF Douglas Mann Foxdale Collision (L29) 0
DNF Jari Kekkonen Boxtel Collision (L28) 2
Code: Select all
DNF Saeed al Faisal Simpson Engine (L28) 0
DNF Matthias Valsattis Kingfisher Transmission (L26) 1
DNF Tomislaw Tajner Dofasco Transmission (L25) 0
DNF Ron Mignolet ArrowTech Water Leak (L25) 0
DNF Terry Hawkin Jones Accident (L21) 1
DNF Jordan Davies Sunshine Transmission (L20) 0
DNF Dan Greenlaw Prospec Transmission (L20) 0
DNF Bastiaan van Nieuwenhuijzen Alitalia Puncture (L16) 0
DNF Du Lei Kamaha Transmission (L15) 1
DNF Nathan McKane Kamaha Accident (L14) 0
DNF Martin McFry Foxdale Accident (L9) 0
DNF Carter Simpson HRT Transmission (L6) 0
DNF Poppy Whitechapel Mecha Engine (L6) 0
Code: Select all
DNF Sammy Jones Jones Collision (L5) 0
DNF Jean-Vincent Albertini Gillet ENB Collision (L4) 0
DNF Barii Mori Kamaha Collision (L4) 0
DNF Shinobu Katayama Revolution Collision (L4) 0
DNF Richard Hershall Boxtel Accident (L3) 0
DNF David Neuberg Kingfisher Collision (L2) 0
DNF Steven Mackintosh Mecha Collision (L2) 0
DNF Jean-Luc Schiller Autodynamics Collision (L2) 0
DNS Alessandro Marchesi MRT Injury
Fastest lap: Jason Hamilton - 0:44.242
Lap leaders:
Nicolas - 1, 29-35 (8)
Hamilton - 2-28, 42-92, 98-125 (106)
Melrose - 36-41 (6)
R. Davies - 93-97 (5)
After this show, the F1RWRS will not return to Indy in 2016. Whether I run another NC race at a different venue will depend on my mood. I wonder what would happen at Talladega...
R.I.P.
GM HOLDEN
1948-2017
