Racers Island - Drift Series - Round 9 @ Nitro Drift Track

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(Race of 7/12/12 - sorry for the huge delay again guys, got sick yesterday, heh, tell me about getting under the pouring rain when you're hafl an hour away from home)

Who gets into the battle today? That's the question you ask before the race, if you're a patron of races at Racing Island (doesn't matter - a participant or a spectator). It's obvious the battle will be, and a hot one, and apparently not the only one, and between different racers...

The practice session

There's a place at the track I haven't seen a racer who haven't had problems with - the first hairpin, to be exact. Without exaggerating, this was the most crusial part of the road - if there were any position changes, most of the time it was caused by how racers passed it.

That hairpin and how Ashbourne
took advantage of it over Mathieson

Only 3 of the racers got under 22 seconds during the practice: Miku Hatsune (Doll Kabuki), Brave Ashbourne and Yuriko Nishi who set the record of the practice - 21.784. Eddie Mathieson got very close with his best time of 22.012, too, but the qualifying round wasn't successful for him -  5th position on the grid, however it was an advantage for him - he got the pole position in the Race B.

Brave was making predictions about the race: that Nishi will take the pole position since Zev Titanium didn't show up, that Laval and Mathieson will make it to the Race A.

How could it be otherwise though? With their position on the grid:
P 5. Eddie Mathieson,  22.318, -0.351
P 6. Shaft Laval,  22.428, -0.461
P 7. Andrea Von Brokenhymen,  22.471, -0.504
P 8. Nella Boccara,  23.073, -1.106
P 9. 2cul4scul,  24.870, -2.903
that wasn't a problem at all for them to do a headstart. Then there was a racelong battle for the 1st place with Laval pressing Mathieson through the whole race. Also, what happened behind them kept on taking my attention too - the competition for the 3rd place, that basically didn't mean anything for the race itself, but was so exciting! Andrea Von Brokenhymen and Nella Boccara were going side by side most of the time, with the 2 seconds gap between them and Mathieson with Laval.
In the middle of the race, Shaft lost a few seconds at the turn failed to drift through, and Mathieson expanded the lead. But it has changed on the 21th lap, when Laval caught up with Mathieson - thanks to the hairpin mentioned above (though Mathieson has showed the amazing skill of quick recovering again, he still was losing seconds there), and Laval gained the lead. Von Brokenhymen started closing on Mathieson... but that was the last lap, and there was a 1,5 seconds gap, so Mathieson finished 2nd and, along with Laval, moved to the next race, Race A, which I find the most competitive one among all I've seen before.


First, the grid:

Pole Position. Yuriko Nishi  21.967
P 2. Brave Ashbourne,  22.077, -0.110
P 3. Miku Hatsune (Doll Kabuki),  22.168, -0.201
P 4. Biggs Braham,  22.300, -0.333
Race B P 1. Shaft Laval
Race B P 2. Eddie Mathieson

Mathieson pulled ahead at the start and got into a battle with Ashbourne for the 1st place - Nishi, despite her pole position, wasn't as good in cutting off as others, and dropped behind, but the pack in the tail was competing hard for the 4th place, so she caught up with Mathieson and Ashbourne on the 3rd lap. The hairpin slowed Mathieson down again - Ashbourne took the lead almost in no time. 


Meanwhile, Hatsune sneak out of the battle behind and took the 3rd place from Yuriko, expanding the gap between them lap after lap. Same was happening with Mathieson, until he reached Hatsune.

And they started the thrilling battle for the 2nd place. Never could assume anyone would be able to compete with Miku Hatsune, keeping her down during 15 laps - 5,5 minutes! Of course, sometimes she was taking his position, but was losing it as fast as she took it. Impressive one, Eddie!


A little remark is needed to be done: Nishi caught up with them on the 15th lap and there was a battle of 3 for the second place won by Nishi on the 18th lap. So the following fight between Mathieson and Hatsune was for the 3rd place. Won by Hatsune.


Braham and Laval were remaining in the end of the pack - the hairpin had no mercy. However, Laval got a chance closer to the end of the race and used it to get ahead of Mathieson. There was a battle, not a long one though - race has finished.


All the final positions, best times and the rest is available at the Racers Island Drift blog, as always. I myself would like to mark again the great perfomance of Nishi and Mathieson (especialy due to the fact Mathieson had started from the Race B), along with Ashbourne and Hatsune - just not sure if it will surprise anyone... great race it was, thanks to all the competitors, and I mean not only the leaders but also those who was competing hard behind them. Thank you very much!