Yesterday, nine BGR drivers, including four who had never done a race longer than 3 hours, competed in the ACCSS Silverstone 6 Hours.
We were spread across 3 teams:
- BGR ICAR Quebec #711: Marc-Antoine Landry (CAN), Victor Dominquez (CAN) & Christopher Cao (CAN) – Qualifying time: 01:58.569 – Bentley
- BGR Highly Variable # 237: Naresh Debidin (CAN), Tayler Clarke (CAN) & Gabriel Lira (BRA) – Qualifying time: 01:59.635 – Aston Martin
- BGR Snailor Moon #696: Phillip Clarke (CAN), Denis Doucette (CAN) & Rylan Facchinato (CAN) – Qualifying time: 02:00.074 – McLaren 720
The event was very well subscribed so that competition was spread across two separate races (i.e., splits), running more or less simultaneously: one for the slower half of the pack and one for the faster pack. Given the spread in our teams’ qualifying pace, ICAR Quebec ended up in the fast group and the other two teams were in the second split.
The action got underway at just after 7:00AM, which meant a early wake-up for a Sunday morning. In Split 7, ICAR Quebec was starting in P7 and in Split 2, Highly Variable and Snailor Moon were starting P2 and P5, respectively. Yes, we were well positioned, but a lot can happen in 6 hours.
As expected, experience with team-based events played a deterministic role in how things went. Snailor Moon, members of which were all new to long races and team events, found themselves on their backfoot from the get go: wrong driver in the car at the start and that driver didn’t have the file for the car’s configuration and pit strategies, meaning they have no tire pressure (or grip) during the frantic opening laps. Still, they kept their heads and adjusted on the fly getting themselves to P26 by the end. They learned a ton, had a blast, and did the BGR family pround.
Also in Split 2 was BGR Highly Variable. All three of us had least some team based endurance experience and a lot of preparation had us feeling confident. Our hotshoe, Tay-Tay, kept us at the front through the first hour before handing off to Gabe, who used his hour in the car to get us back up to third place before handing over to me (Naresh). I left the pit in P2 and got us back to P2 before swapping back to Gabe for hour 4 of 6. Gabe hauled us back to P1 before our penultimate stop dropped us to P3. By end of my second stint, we were back in P1 when I pitted to hand the car back to Tay-Tay. Gabe and I had opened a big gap, allowing Tay-Tay to exit the pits in P2 with fresh tires and P1 about 14 seconds ahead on the road. Tay-Tay was reeling-in P1 relentlessly, setting the fastest lap of the race in the process. While it was clear we would catch P1, overtaking is always frought with risk, particularly when network lag is a factor, but that risk evaporated when P1 made one too many track limit violations, earning themselves a drive-through penalty, allowing us to cruise home to a win. Detailed results can be seen here.
Over in Split 1, the fast guys had their race broadcast on Twich, complete with commentary.
Bottom Line: ICAR Quebec came home in P3, nipping at the heels of P2!
Congrats to all of our competitors and especially to the rookies who took on a 6 hour as their introduction to team-based sim racing.