“With two races to go, and the option to grab the title already in this
event the pressure was on me to keep the compitition behind me.

For this race I had the maximum 40kg weight penalty and needed all the
luck i could get to make this into a double win again.”

But that wasn’t the only hurdle Rudy had to take to reach his goal.

“My preparation for this race wasn’t as good as previous races, a new
internship started last week and i suddenly got a lot less free time.
Because of that I went into the race evening with only 10 laps under
my belt and I had a hard time putting decent times down.

After that it was time for race 1, wich turned out to be just as
dificult as in the qualifing. Robin Tol was running behind me within one
second for the whole race and with my tires going down very quickly I
got into more trouble in the end of the race. With 2 laps to go, I got
tabbed in t2 and nearly spun, Robin overtook me and I could start the
chase. Fair driver as he is he let me by again on the straight next
lap, wich gave me just enough breathing space to take the win!”

One down, one to go.

“Race 2 with the reversed grid was going to be all about my start, I
pretty much nailed the launch and was in p4 out of the first turn. A
long slipstream started and in t2 I could overtake Frank Zweers and
continue my way to the front. On that point my biggest competition
from race 1 had a accident wich gave me some breathing space behind
me. I could see that the guys on p1 and 2 were not on the same pace as
me, and a relaxed aproach was the only thing I could do. While I was
waiting for a mistake from both guys, I could give my tires some more
attention and those were in alot better shape then in race 1. With 5
laps to go the mistake’s came from the guys in front and I could pass
them. Wenn that happend the started fighting behind me, giving me het
edge to drive away and get the double win.”

Mission accomplished!

“Quite a suprise to get this result out a tough race, including the
weight penalty. Though the good news is that 40kg is the maximum allowed
ballast, and the championchip is in the bag.

Next Wensday is the last race of the season, wich is going to be a
relaxed one for me since my job is done. Even though i will do my best
to get some more trophies out of Monaco!”

After missing multiple titles on just a few points over the last few season’s ran at the community simracing.nl I’ve decided to give this one a maximum attack. Even though the last few seasons that didn’t turn out as I planned and were mostly down to computer problems I couldn’t be satisfied with the idea that I didn’t gave it a maximum shot.

When the new Touring Car Racing season came up with the sim Race07 and me having the luck of being able to get myself a new fresh pc I knew that it was going to be either all or nothing. For this season I decided to run the BMW e90 WTCC. My team mate is Dennis Douna.

Race 1 – Oulton park
After loads, and loads of practice laps I was confident of my pace and was prepared to show all hands in the qualifying session. With a near perfect lap I could put it on pole with a gap over 0.5sec!
In the first race I had my other team mate Jeffrey Ruskes – running for Honda – close to me for the first few laps, but after that I was able to create a comfortable gap and keep that to the end. First win of the new season!

In the second race the WTCC style top 8 reverse grid was used, so for me the task was hard. Getting through the field asap in the first few laps sometimes turns out to be a right mess, but this time I had all the luck on my side and could rush through the cars in front of me in just 4 laps. From there on I could see that my hardest competition from race 1 got taken out in a race incident what gave me a comfortable lead to the end. This meant I took the hole shot during the first race of the year.

Race 2 – Brands Hatch Indy
With the first round being so successful I could only score worse results compared to that, but with the motivation up high I practiced quite a lot and got to a decent pace. The thing that was not helping me was the fact I needed to run a 15kg weight penalty because of the good result in round 1.
My teammate Dennis Douna couldn’t run in Oulton Park, but here he was around and grabbed the pole off me by a tenth of a second. To make him feel bad I just put it down to the 15kg in my car.

With the start of the first race I was able to stay close to him and keep him under pressure for 75% of the race before I found a gap to pass him. A few laps after that, suddenly all hell broke loose when it started to rain cats and dogs and we were all running on slicks. I decided to stay out on slicks, what in the end was the correct choice but not the easiest one to put down. On the positive side, I was able to keep it on track and grab the 3rd win of the season.

When the weather forecast for race 2 was announced, the said it would be rain. When the start really took place on the raceday, it was dry but I still gambled to start on rain tires expecting it to rain in just a few laps. This rain didn’t come, and wenn a car spun in front of me in t1 I couldn’t avoid it anymore and my race came to an end with a big bang. This meant I had the first DNF of the season.

Race 3 – Melbourne Park
With the bad result of Brands Hatch still in my mind, I gave this one a full attack to make sure I would be able to perform like I did in the first race. On the positive side, my 15kg weight penalty was going down to 10kg.

For this race It’s a short story since it was one of these perfect races.
During qualifying I could grab the pole, and after that drive to 2 wins without any exciting moments apart from the start in race 2.

Race 4 – Oschersleben
25kg in the bag, and a difficult task at the short and twisty circuit.
After some mechanical problems my team mate was back, and once again he snitched the pole away from me. I ended up 2nd.

During the start of race 1, me and Dennis were able to pull clear of the field within no time, meaning that we could start fighting for the win our self without looking back. Since I had the heavier car I was expecting not to match his pace, but after a few laps I found out I could and I was hoping for a mistake from his side to grab him. I’ve tried it the whole race, but there wasn’t any moment where I could do a serious attack and I decided it was better to settle for the 2nd place. In the end he didn’t mean anything bad in the championchip for me and it was the smartest thing to do.

Race2, starting on the 7th position. With a bad start from my side I needed to put all of my guts in to grab some cars into the first turn. With clearly some luck I grabbed 3 of them, and could strike for the 4th 2 corners later. Dennis was stuck 2 more places behind me at that point, and I could only think of getting to p1 asap to make sure to have a gap once he got through. On the point that I went on to attack for p2 I got the message through Teamspeak that Dennis was of, which meant that I could relax a little and play it smart. After some door rubbing I was through to the lead and could hold it until the end. Grabbing the 6th win of the season.

For now on there are 2 more races on the schedule, I’ve got the maximum penalty weight ( 40kg ) in the car so it’s going to be a surprise how the pace will be.

See u on track.
Rudy

After a disastrous qualifying session, SFH had 24 hours to climb up from 27th place. At the starts our hopes were up. A kindly shared setup (thanks Joerg!) gave us back the 2 seconds each lap we were losing on the competition. The first stint should have been a blast, but turned out to be a hassle.

Even with a faster car, passing and staying in front was harder than we thought. It was hard enough to make a safe pass on Kemmel, even with draft and boost. Too many cars too close together often meant there was simply no room to get by. And when we did, we were a target for counterattacks, slowed down by the next car. The harder we tried, the more risk we took, which resulted in spins throwing us back down the order.

But after the first stop there was a bit more room, and stretching our legs during the second and third fueltank we quickly moved up from P27 to P10. But the further up in the field we came, the harder it was to make the next pass.

Wilfred van den Brink and Bert Knops had good speed though, and between them made up for most of the remaining positions gained inside the top ten, with Marcel Offermans driving steady stints and staying out of trouble – always the most important endurance racing factor.

The video shows the events in the 24th hour. Enjoy!

picture by Dietmar Sommerfeld

From P27 to P3, from the back of the grid to the podium! Granted, we had 24 hours to do so, but we’re still very happy with the result. On to the next one!

In the testing sessions I didn’t find the right gearing ratio. I Tried four different fdr’s, finally went with the one that was fastest but with a slightly long 2nd and 3rd, and possibly too many revs on the straight. It seemed to work out in practice where I didn’t have too many engine health issues.”

Qualifying
However the Capri’s were faster I was pretty happy with a personal best and fastest Celica, but Anders Nilsson spoiled my party and I couldn’t respond. Fourth.

Race
Fixed the faulty qualifying order in lap 1, and Jeffrey, Ryan, me and Anders drove away from the pack. However I immediately noticed engine health dropping to 98, 97, 95.. Issues.

When Ryan got close to Jeffrey he braked early for T1 and almost caught me out, lifted, and almost missed T1. I snuck to the inside and got my nose in front fir T2, but with Ryan still to the outside had to brake a little earlier to be able to leave room to the outside in the exit. Ryan must not have seen me cause he took hid normal braking point and went for the apex. Contact, Ryan onto the grass, I could barely keep my nose pointing in the right direction, but I got P2.

Anders jumped in the gap to P3 but had three BIG moments after the fast left sweeper and Ryan came back one place.

We then continued for a while, my engine going down into below 90, way too soon. I had to stop using 1st and 2nd in S2. Jeffrey started slipping away and Ryan passed me on the straight and went on to catch Jeffrey who wasn’t about to give away his first place.

At the pitstops – car was a handful! – I had 10 seconds on Anders but started losing time. One off in the penultimate lap almost cost me the podium, but I just made it. It was a long, hot race, but these cars are always fun when you’re racing.

Next event: Bathurst

Q

I was pretty happy with 9th place, with a pb of 1.37.3, right between Tim Heinemann and Luke Walsh.
Even though three tenths extra would have given me 5 grid places.

R
Fuji is dangerous. I was very afraid to run into early damage. In sector 3 nose-to-tail incidents are always around the corner, especially in the first laps when everybody is fighting for position. It’s also very easy to run into spinning cars. But I had not expected to see people spinning in the warmup lap. Tim Heinemann lost control while (uselessly) warming up tires RPS 2:38. Close call, but on spot won and no damage (yet).

In the first few laps Max and Markus were having a sprintrace duel. Multiple contacts within the first three laps before Max got the short straw at another bodychecking duel and spun in front of me. Another close call but still no damage.

I wanted to get away from Luke Walsh and Christian Sippel, as the latter had already shown not to shy away from bump-overtaking. When Markus took a wider line into T4L I tried to take advantage, but the gap was smaller than I thought and I hit Markus, resulting in Luke running into my rear bumper. RPS 9:00

Damage. Mission failed.

For the next twenty minutes Markus, me, Christian and Luke were running within seconds of each other until Markus got cut off on the fast run towards sector three resulting in a high speed spin. RPS 33:45


This unfortunate accident gave me P5 in class, but I was very aware that something similar could happen to me any moment, and sure enough there were a lot of close calls which could have easily cost me my front bumper and a lot of time in the resulting 7 hours of the race.





When I got caught by surprise by the tires losing grip, too late to catch a slide, I lost 5 seconds and two places. RPS 57:15
Such a close race after pushing for an hour. P7 in class. Luke pitted after 68 minutes, Christian went in a little later while I was still aiming for the 80 minute mark. If we kept that up we could just reach the flag before our sixth tank ran empty.

2nd stint
The damage didn’t seem to cost us much but we still decided to swap drivers. On light fuel I managed to jump Christian and Wilfred took off in P5 for the second stint at RPS 80:40. We were on schedule!

But then it turned out that Wilfred wasn’t really gaining time on the front runners. Also somehow the T2SP Ferrari seemed to be able to run a lot longer on their F430 tanks than we could, and we were running boost 1 on 1/1 wing settings. Hope for a podium finish started sinking when the race didn’t seem to come our way throughout Wilfred’s stint. Bad luck for the Motorsport4all Viper did give us another position: P4.

Our fuel strategy wasn’t looking good either. For sanitary reasons Wilfred had to stop one lap early, which meant we were looking at a splash and dash in the final stage of the race. This could make or break our podium chances. And still, trouble was always lurking round the corner.

3rd stint
I love the track, and in my second stint for the first time I felt that the Ferrari was doing what I wanted it to do. Laptimes dropped by a couple of tenths and throughout the stint the gap towards Jean-Marie Zmiro, now running 3rd in the rSeat BMW, kept getting smaller and smaller. I was looking forward to the fight for the last podium position when Jean-Marie steered into the pit lane. P3.

4th to 6th stint
Wilfred came back on track in between a pack of GT’s, some of which were two laps down, not a lot faster if any, but were still taking awful chances trying to outbrake Wilfred to unlap themselves. Very scary moments where we could have lost the podium.

Then Wilfred had three of the best stints of his life. Not even the fastest ones, because we were still running on the edge of having to make an extra fuel stop. The first stint was still relatively careless: put your foot down and try to catch the leading couple. Like me, Wilfred felt better in his second stint, and this time the gap was coming down seriously. Wilfred took 2nd place.

But then we started doing the math. This was not going to work out for us. The extra stop would cost us dearly. The next two stints were going to have to be fast, but economic at the same time. Shortshifting around the track, not going down to 3rd gear for the long right-hander, not going down into 1st for a number of other corners, every trick in the book was used to keep fuel usage down. And it worked! Wilfred reported that an extra two laps would be possible with this strategy. And even better: it didn’t even cost that much time: half a second at most.

Slowly but surely the leading NoLimit Motorsport Porsche was reeled in, and – even four hours into the race we wouldn’t have believed you if you said we could – Simracing For Holland took another victory!

Race broadcast

Part 1

Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10
Part 11
Part 12
Part 13

Broadcast of the SimracingOnline historic DRM race at Interlagos, 10 july 2012. Jeffrey Ruskus competing in div1, Robin Verdegaal in div2. The race starts around the 25 minute mark.

Because we jumbled up our planning this 24H overlaps the 6H Nürburgring event and our drivers face a serious challenge. We’ll keep our fingers crossed, our visors down, and hope for the best.

Race start
At 15.30 the race is on! The Corvette starts from 6th, the Porsche is 2nd in class. But it soon turns out that the Corvette’s race pace is relatively high compared to the competition. Király and Knops take the lead and drive away from the rest of the field.

Meanwhile the Porsche is still in 2nd place, losing time on the My3id Spyker. Hopes are down, but it’s a long race and Douna keeps going. After three stints Verdegaal flies in from the Nürburgring 6H and takes over the wheel for three more stints.

Trouble for the competition!
Technical difficulties during a driver change force the leading My3id Spyker to spend 10 costly minutes in pitlane. Their lead turns into a 2 lap disadvantage. Drama, so early in the race!

Full course yellow
Then there’s bigger problems. In the early evening technical difficulties force a safetycar situation. A couple of restarts fail and to make things worse Verdegaal keeps being removed from the server. But at the final restart everything is okay. Eye of the needle.

Night falls
It’s getting darker and darker. The Corvette doesn’t cringe. Lap after lap it builds on its lead, and around midnight both SFH cars lead their class by 2,5 laps. Laptimes drop, but it seems the SFH Porsche doesn’t suffer as much as the direct competition. The My3id Spyker though is in a league of its own. In pitch black conditions it takes one lap off of SFH’s lead in an overtaking move on Hunaudières. Unbelievable how fast they still are, winning a full second in the Ford chicanes alone, every lap, this race is far from over!

More trouble for My3id
During the darkest hours of night the My3id prototype entry has a huge accident and is forced to retire. We’re not exactly sure what happens but it becomes clear that not only the prototype entry but also the GT2 Spyker has left the race. With the strongest competitor gone and a two lap lead suddenly SFH looks as strong in GT2 as it has done from the start in GT1.

Another safetycar
Early in the morning, close to happy hour, another streak of bad luck strikes the field. This time the full course yellow takes only half an hour. Again, Verdegaal has connection problems. This time the SFH Porsche only rushes out of pitlane when the field lines up for the next restart, losing two minutes of its lead in the process. It’s a long race still.

Losing the lead
Almost noon, a couple of hours to go, Douna is driving the Porsche leading the class by 2,5 laps when suddenly his radio goes silent. Disconnection, on track! What seems like 15 very long seconds later he is back online and in pitlane, but it’s too late. Just like My3id earlier, the SFH GT2 is stuck in pitlane for ten full minutes.
While the team is counting down, trying to get the Porsche back on track, with half a minute to go they lose the lead to the Wilgrave Motorsports Porsche. Douna rushes back on track but we’re now looking at a 30 second gap that needs to be closed.

Racing for the win
While the GT1 Corvette is still running its laps without trouble the GT2 team puts their heads down and starts eating away at the leaders advantage. Slowly but surely the gap is closed and during a Wilgrave Motorsports pitstop we take over the lead again, this time not giving it away.

Finish
In a side-by-side finish the SFH Corvette and Porsche take the double in the GT classes. A prolongation of last year’s GT2 win and our first double!

We feel privileged to be able to race with this large competitive endurance field. Much appreciation goes out to the race organizers and all competing drivers, and we hope to be back next year. Race on!

..and what happened at the Nürburgring?

The Nürburgring race is only 6 hours long, but as it happens, this weekend SFH is also competing in the Sim-Racing.org 24H of Le Mans. Three drivers, 30 hours of racing. While it’s physically no problem to race in Germany and France at the same time when you’re simracing, we’re facing a logistical puzzle beyond anything we’ve done before.

Below is the live coverage of the qualifying session plus the full 6 hour event. Enjoy!

Starting from 8th place in the competitive GT field, Simracing For Holland kept out of trouble and was running in 4th place halfway the race. In the second half Wilfred van den Brink drove the Ferrari to P1. We’re very proud to have two wins in this strong league and we’re looking forward to the next race in Fuji.

..so what happened in Le Mans?

Early race
Three different cars lead the race in the first stint. Amiel’s BMW kept on point for a long time until lapping traffic allowed van den Brink to pass in his Ferrari. Behind them the Glatter’s Viper slowly fell back after a strong start. Van den Brink drove to a 30 second lead.

Verdegaal had been showing slow pace in the pre-season tests. Lack of trust in the Ferrari lead to overcautious driving and the lead slowly crumbled. One hour into his stint Verdegaal ran into trouble between a P2 and GT2 car. The impact meant an early repair stop for splitter and hood. After repairs the car lapped two seconds slower, spun once again and with eight hours to go things were looking grim. When van den Brink took over the car still felt sluggish, but with each stop the crew was able to bring back more of its speed.

Meanwhile the competition had all had problems of their own. Nobody seemed to be in top form anymore and after a while van den Brink lead the race again. Three of the four leading GT’s were out of sync due to repair pitstops, it was hard to judge which team was going to have the advantage in the final stint. Coming back from P5 felt good, but there was another half of the race to go still, and it was obvious that not all teams would see the finish.

With 3 hours to go, Verdegaal behind the wheel, Renato Dornelles in the 05 Motorsports Porsche closed the gap. Verdegaal, still struggling with the Ferrari’s balance, spun the car again under pressure which cost eight valuable seconds. At the end of his stint SFH was running 25 seconds behind.

Thrilling finale
Van den Brink took over for the final double stint, a little shorter than the earlier ones. A different tyre choice meant extra speed, more than enough fuel on board and the SFH Ferrari flew over the track. At the final pitstop the gap was down to 8 seconds.
Dornelles had also changed to soft tyres and the gap was now decreasing by mere tenths of seconds each lap. But when the gap seemed to have stabilized on 2 seconds, suddenly a couple of errors meant that Wilfred was there on his bumper.

After more than 11 hours of racing we had two teams fighting it out side by side on track, amazing stuff. Three, four times the SFH F430 came side by side but the 05 Motorsports Porsche was not having any of it. Finally, in a breathtaking move van den Brink attacked Dornelles around the outside of the last long righthander, door to door, risking a certain DNF if there was contact and made it around to take the lead!

Watch all ten parts of the Sebring 12H on YouTube.

SFH wins the opening race in the SRO LMS GT class. One of the most special victories in our endurance racing career. Next stop: the Nurburgring 6H – 23/6

Rudy wrote a little story about his experiences racing the iRacing replicated Impala Sprint CUP car in the familiar SFH Livery and his #8.

The first of 3 sub seasons 12 of 36 races in the Deutsche Online Meisterschaft (DOM) flew by. The DOM hosts a huge regular grid (35+) of DETACH club drivers (+2 dutchies) that enjoy racing ovals. There is always someone on track that runs an equal pace. Racing is good most of the time, but as oval racing isn’t as common in Europe compared to the USA there’s a road racing mentality seen quite often, more give n take please.

Rudy runs the DOM with the SimSync Pro Racing Team, drivers whom he met and competed against in IRSS late fall of 2011. Being his first races with the Impala CUP car the experiences of the team were very helpful. Thank you guys for taking me onboard and sharing our joys and frustrations!

Below there are a few words on the races from the first third of the season.

Race 1 – Kentucky Speedway (1.5mi)

DNS (did not start): Rudy was side lined as the license to be on the grid was not yet obtained.

Race 2 – Chicagoland Speedway (1.5mi)

40 Drivers were on the grid of Rudy’s first race official race in the DOM. In practice the pace was pretty good. In qualifying Rudy ended up 2^nd on the grid just 0.020s off the pole. The race pace was great, especially on the mid and long runs. Rudy was able to maintain a top 5 position for the #8 the entire race. A late yellow caused a sprint to the finish where Rudy had a tough battle to eventually bring the car home in 3^rd place. A great result in such a huge and competitive field.

Race 3 – New Hampshire (1.0mi)

DNS: Vacation J

Race 4 – Daytona (2.5mi)

Two car tandems everywhere. A benefit of being in a large team is there are a lot of teammates to draft with. Shortly before the race a little change in the engine cooling resulted in tandems that had to switch at least once every 2^nd lap to prevent engine trouble. Team SimSync who dominated pre-season Talladega Superspeedway went into this event with confidence. A lot of work went into the race set to allow stable tandems. Unfortunately that resulted in midpack qualification. Rudy positioned his #8 at the 18^th spot on the grid in the middle off the 43 cars counting grid. No worries, as a tandem there should be enough time and space to find a way to the front.

The race itself was a bit of a surprise, due to the front tandems not being able to pull away from the pack there was old school pack racing and little room to gain spots. The #8 of Rudy ran together with the #65 of Ralph Krause, but could not find any clean air until green flag pit stops in lap 45. After the green flag stops the field was spread out and the #8 and #65 found themselves in a lead group of 4 tandems. Unfortunately a yellow came out and everything went back into a big pack of cars. As the last stop was made and hanging just outside the top 10 the #8 and #65 made it 3 wide in an attempt to move forward. Quite a number of spots were gained but eventually a car in the middle got to high entering Turn 1 and collected the #8 ending it’s race and dropping to 38^th place on the final standings.

Race 5 – Phoenix International Raceway (1.0mi)

The first track that really included braking. A nice stable setup for the #8 and qualified a good 2^nd place on the grid. The race started off well. Looking at the race pace from it’s competitors the #8 was definitely at top 5 car. But as it’s a ‘short’ track trouble and strategy comes into play. Halfway through the first fuel cell Rudy pitted under yellow making him fall outside the top 10. With a bunch of cars on fresh tires chasing a bunch of cars on older tires thing are bound to get tight. In lap 71 Rudy went a little to wide coming off Turn for and made contact. Hard contact with the wall damaged Rudy’s car beyond repair and a 35^th place finish that day.

Race 6 – Las Vegas Speedway (1.5mi)

With the recent wrecks Rudy didn’t want to roll the dice at Las Vegas. A lot of effort was put into the race set to make it as stable as possible. The #8 qualified 7^th on the grid and started the race off slowly. Early in the race Rudy stayed out of trouble hanging just outside the top 5. After 2 quick cautions the green flag waved for the last time at lap 34 of the 180 lap race, which mean 156 laps of consecutive green flag racing. The #8 was a great car on the long run as was the #65 of Ralph who found it’s way forward through the field. For a long time it looked like the #65 and #8 would devide P2 and P3 between themselves, but being eager to get a bonus point for leading a lap the both of us lost ground on the #2 who pitted early. Working together the gap to the #2 was closed quickly, but the pass was very very hard. Eventually tires got destroyed trying to pass the #2 and Rudy hit the wall very hard in an attempt to get a run out of turn 4 that made him settle for 3^rd place finish. A good race with multiple green flag stops, more of this please!

Race 7 – Richmond (0.75mi)

The short track that want to be a speedway. The race would be all about tire management and staying out of trouble. Although Rudy is not the biggest fan of short tracks he seems to be able to get around them at a good speed. Great qualifying lap put the #8 on the outside pole. After an early stop putting Rudy back in the middle of the pack Rudy noticed his car was great if not the fastest car out there on the long run. Even on older tires he was able to chase for the lead of the race. In lap 147 of 250 the #8 received a black flag for passing under yellow (a false one). Being on the outside and having to enter pit lane at the drop of the green Rudy waved in an attempt to notify his colleague drivers. Unfortunately they didn’t notice and as the #8 slowed down to create room to enter pit lane he got sent into the wall hard. After long repairs the # rejoined the track many laps down and finished the day in a disappointing P27.

Race 8 – Atlanta (1.5mi)

First time the #8 ran a coil bind race setup as a last minute swing around from conventional spring settings. The car felt sloppy and did slide off turn 2 a little. Taking it easy and a trouble free race was required as Richmond really set back any chance of going anywhere in the overall standings. Rudy put together a solid race. He started in 5^th hang around the top 5 for the entire day. After 2 green flag pit stops the #8 got lucky with a yellow trapping all but 8 cars a lap down. With good tire strategy Rudy was able to go from 8^th to 4^th in the last 30 lap sprint to the finish. Green flag racing and a good finish to rebound Richmond.

Race 9 – Martinsville (0.5mi)

A track built for drama. The SimSync Pro team built a setup for their cars and they went flying around the paperclip. Good on the short runs, great on the ‘long’ runs. It didn’t take until half point that there were 2 cars holding the top spots, Ralph’s #65 was in first, Rudy’s #8 in solid second place.

Unfortunately disaster struck when the pace car pulled off and the green flag waved in turn 3!!!. Chaotic restart as it caught the whole field by surprise. Crossing the flag, both leading Simsync cars got a black flag… Why??? Disappointed both limped through pit lane and lost more then a lap in the process. Trying to get a lap back Rudy somehow scored another black flag putting him 3 laps down on the leaders. Frustrated and anxious to prove the raw pace his racecar had Rudy ended up passing more then 100 cars as he got put back in behind the lead lap cars each yellow that fell. Sad result as SimSync definitely had cars capable of winning.

Race 10 – Infineon (road coarse)

Right… Turns to the right and working the gear lever. Not a perfect, but a good spot on the grid for Rudy as he took the green flag. This race was all about saving the rear tires as long as possible. The winning strategy would be a stop, although trying it was soon obvious that Rudy needed a bit more fuel then some of his competitors. Still running strong in the top 5 Rudy went for a 30-21-20 pit strategy. A miscalculation at the second left the #8 between 2 and 3 laps short on fuel. Limping on the throttle, short shifting and a slow pace just to make it through the last 15 laps. The goal was to stay in 5^th. That looked to be able as the leader put a lap on the conserving #8 with 2 (actually 1) more to go. The #6 car was on the bumper off the second to last turn and as the #8 bogged in the last turn to take the checkered the #6 was able to steal 5^th spot.

Race 11 – Texas (1.5mi)

A race cancelled after 75 laps and rescheduled a week after. SimSync cars look strong on the long run, but would they still be strong after the update?

The rebound race proved to be quite the challenge. The new build made the old setups useless and gave us more realistic cornering combined with coil bind setups. Rudy’s #8 was nevertheless quick. A last second decision to tighten the car up a little bit on exit was a good decision. Qualifying 2^nd on the grid # 8 challenged the #00 for the lead from the green flag. Soon the #8 was at the point and creating a gap to it’s nearest competitors. No surprise some early yellows to see the gap being undone. Soon it was obvious the #8 and the #2 would be running for the win as both were cars were evenly matched and could break away from the pack after each restart. A really late caution made the flag drop with just 4 to go. Wheel spin, sent the #8 in the wall and 2 others that needed to avoid the spinning cars caused quite a big one short before the flag. The #2 won the race and Rudy dropped to 8^th. A good but disappointing result.

Race 12 – Bristol (0.5mi)

Bristol can be an impossible track to drive with the wrong setup under the car. The 60% cross weight and burning right front tires and some insight on how the real sprint cup cars are setup for Bristol (Nascar Performance). Big springs, less crossweight, and try get the right side tires balanced. The changes were spot on, the #8 was a bulled the first official practice and kept the gap all the way up till race day. Still unaware of what the #00 and the #29 would bring to the track for a long run, but a solid result was up for grabs. From P2 on the grid and taking care of the tires Rudy was running very solid. On runs longer then 20 laps the #8 was the fastest car on track and capable of running the low line to pass and lap. 3 cautions in the 350 lap race and the #8 was by far the fastest car on track. Shortly before the 2^nd round of pit stops (under green) Rudy lapped the entire field. From there onwards Rudy was cruising to victory. At lap 315 a car spin right in front of the #8 caused Rudy to brake to hard and spin bumping the wall slightly. A pit stop with optional saw the #2 regain a spot on the lead lap by taking the wave around. The race stayed green till the end and the #8 caught the #2 to put it a lap down again and cruised to victory in a dominating run.!

The 1^st sub season sees Rudy just outside the top 10 in points. As someone who enjoys building sets and having learned a great deal on the CUP setups, chassis geometry, tires and down force, Rudy is confident he and his SimSync teammates will have stronger cars as the season progresses. Running for more race wins should definitely be possible.

Sub season 2 kicks off with the 2.66 miles long Talladega. Also lots of setup challenges ahead with the recent changes. No time to get bored.

And here’s Ruud de Wit in a shakedown lap around our home base Zandvoort

In NL.iRacing Ruud ended up dominating the lap charts from the drop of the flag in the Mustang Cup. Ruud won every event he entered in the SFH livery equipped Mustang. The series had a nice schedule featuring Barber Motorsports Park, Infinion, Road America and Laguna Seca were good venues to race. Unfortunately attendance seemed to drop a bit during the season. In the end Ruud claimed the inaugural iRacing championship at Simracing.NL, his first since 2005.

The Escors Endurance Series is a multiclass series featuring the HPD ARX-01c LPM2 car, the Corvette C6R GT1 and the Ford GT GT2. Races are 1 hour and 30 minute races held on 6 different locations. Initially Ruud signed up as an LMP2 driver, but discovered after finishing 2^nd the first race that the LMP2 was not his preferred class. Kindly the series administrators agreed and allowed Ruud to wheel a Corvette C6R GT1 from round 3 onwards. Like in the Mustang Cup there was a prominent and dominant role for the SFH racecar from the get go. Ruud started with 2 solid wins on the old tire model C6R on Watkins Glen and Road America. Shortly before the Silverstone event there was the unexpected introduction of the new tire model. In the practice and qualifying leading up to the race the gap looked smaller then before, but nonetheless the SFH Corvette won the race with ease lapping the entire field as done at Road America. Coming into the season finale there were still 4 C6R runners who could claim the title. Early in practice it was obvious Ruud was once again the driver to beat. He claimed pole by a good 2.5 second margin and during the race again putting everyone a lap down. The win at Spa meant Ruud claimed a second championship in a single season.

Whats Next? Ruud currently runs the Impala B COT on ovals wiz ze germanz in the iRacing Sim Series to work on his oval setup skills. The season consists a massive 18 races of which 8 are have been completed.  Ruud currently is 3^rd in points after missing race 1 and 8.

In the fourth and final race in the SR Multileague Reloaded season, SFH entered with two teams: Corvette and Saleen. The SFH Saleen team had a strong season start but due to a disconnect they are now the runnerup in the championship standings. SFH Corvette only first joined in the second event, but since this is a double points event, both teams can still take the championship. As could many other teams. Much was riding on this race.

But problems arose for both teams before the race had started. The Saleen team had a drive lineup problem. Due to conflicting agenda’s Robin Verdegaal was to stand in for Wilfred van den Brink who couldn’t race the first part, and stay to relieve Dennis Douna who wasn’t able to race until the finish. However an overlooked rule in the driver enrollment regulations prohibited Robin to take part.

But that was nothing compared to the trouble that the Corvette team had. They didn’t even make it to the starting grid when Johan Nieuwenhof’s car would not join the warmup lap. No race for Johan and Marcel Offermans. ..or was it?

A quick regulations check revealed that Marcel Offermans would be eligible to drive for the Saleen team. Problem solved, now all Marcel had to do was get to know the Saleen within the first two-hour stint of Dennis Douna. And he did, and a flawless stint followed, driving the SFH Saleen to a solid 2nd place early in the race.

And that’s where they would be for the remaining 8 hours. The leaders, VRL Endurance Team, were too fast to catch up with. But they weren’t competition for the season championship. The real contenders, Witchwood racing, ran into trouble before the race was halfway. In true endurance spirit they continued with a damaged car, but in the end had to throw in the towel.

This opened up the road to the championship for the SFH Saleen. The only thing they had to do was finish. And they did! SFH Saleen are the proud champions in the SR Multileague Reloaded GT1 class.

Race one in the eleventh season of NL.GTR took place in Elkhart Lake on the circuit of Road America. Three SFH cars made it to the grid: Dennis Douna in the Porsche 997 and Johan Nieuwenhof and Robin Verdegaal in Spyker.
The team was looking to challenge reigning series champion Reijer de Nooijer but taking pole position he proved to be a hard man to beat. The race took off in a positive way but went upside down in the finale. Enjoy the race video review.
The complete racereport.

The iRacing GrandAM Premier Series consisted of a 10 race season with races every two to three weeks, starting in February and finishing in August. With the possibility of driving two-races per event, the best 9 week results would account for the final score.

András took the chequered flag in top spot 15 times during the season. Enough to dominantly take the title in the Riley Daytona Prototype class. His nearest rival, American Morgan Sowerby found himself 208 points behind after the engines went silent at Mid-Ohio.

The Mid-Ohio race itself turned out to be a small deception for the SFH driver. While comfortably leading the 90 minute race, András suffered from a disconnect with only two laps to go. A quick reconnect put him a lap down in 5th place. Despite this last-minute bad luck, the season statistics are still impressive: 15 wins out of 17 races, starting all races from pole and leading 1121 out of 1230 laps.

With the first-ever GrandAM Premier Series trophy being shipped to the Netherlands, András earned his place in the iRacing record books. Look out for another shot at the title next year!

The Belgian VRL 2011 Fall Trophy started on home ground, on the circuit of Zolder. Twentyfive turbopowered machines battled eachother for an hour long race. SFH’s Robin Verdegaal chose the powerful but tricky BMW M1 and took poleposition with a personal lap record, close in front of reigning champion Ricardo Michalewski.

After a fast first stint however it was Tim Vanhee in the Ford Capri turbo who took over the lead with a fuel-only pitstop. On fresh tires Verdegaal charged to close the 14 seconds gap, but after gaining 10 seconds the finish flag fell too early.

Second place, poleposition and fastest race lap puts Verdegaal on par with Vanhee in the season standings. Next race: Norisring.

The complete technical racereport.

Porsche 935 Turbo

Lancia Beta Monte Carlo Turbo

Ford Capri Turbo

BMW M1 Turbo

BMW 320 Turbo

Toyota Celica Turbo

And here’s Ruud de Wit showing you all sides of the Mustang around Infineon:

After a false start in the last season team Simracing For Holland is back for Multileague 2011 Reloaded, hosted by Sim-Racing.org. This time the team chose to focus on the car and spend less money on the driver lineup.

Wilfred van den Brink and Dennis Douna bring the SFH Saleen S7R to the first race at Istanbul Park. From the start, SFH took the lead and continuously built upon that. Due to a different strategy team Torrent Motorsports seemed to be competing for the lead, even though they lacked pace. The long stints on hard tires eventually turned out to be slower than SFH’s shorter medium tire stints, and at the finish we had a two lap lead to show for that.

Livestream Part 1 (qualifying sessions and first part of the race)

Livestream Part 2

Livestream Part 3

Next race at Estoril SFH will carry a 40 kg weight penalty. We’re looking forward to meeting the new competitors.

In the video both SFH pilots can be seen driving a grand prix at the dutch circuit of Zandvoort in the late sixties, earlier in their racing careers. It shows a very young Király furiously throwing the Brabham around the track and taking what must be one of his first victories.

However this race also marks the dramatic crash that forced Verdegaal to end his Grand Prix Legends career. Verdegaal, who had problems in the qualifying session, was making up places in a come back race. After a misunderstanding with a lapped pilot Verdegaal’s Brabham was launched off track to end up in the undergrowth some twenty meters beyond the armco of Tunnel Oost.

Comparing the new and old iRacing class B car around Road America. The standard iRacing fixed setup was used for both laps. Driven with G27. In the 09 car, that is the fastest way around, sliding and drifting, with lots of corrections. The new car, due to the new tire model has to be driven in a much more smooth way. You can see the difference here very well if you compare the steering input between cars.

A nice battle a few seasons ago in a VRL race at Brno.

The 12 hour event took place on the beautiful Le Mans circuit, where we were going to race into the night, starting at noon and finishing at midnight. During the event, we witnessed a beautiful sunset and a clear, starry night, but that did not distract us from our mission!

Qualification went especially well for the GT2 Porsche, with Robin taking the pole position by driving three consistent laps within one tenth of his personal track record: 4:00.7. During pre-qualify Martijn Bont in the ID3 Ferrari had set an even quicker lap but luckily for us, he could not repeat that time when it mattered most. In the mean time, Johan qualified the GT1 Corvette in third place, demonstrating a solid pace in a car that was handling very well. But the race still had to start..

The race started with the Corvette loosing a couple of places on the first lap, but Johan countered in the laps thereafter and managed to take over the lead. Not sure what the competition was doing, because it kind of surprised us to lead in GT1! Anyway, a couple of laps after his second pit-stop he was driving in the Porsche Curves when his rFactor smacked him to Desktop. Hitting the brakes couldn’t avoid a crash. Luckily, the car could continue, but with a flat tire. We went straight to the pits again for repairs and lost the lead with that. For the championship we did not need to win this race, because our direct opponents left the race. At that point we were still wondering what happened with Mickeal Taloc,  because GT Omega Racing had the lead in the GT1 championship and scored no points.

In the meantime, the Porsche started with boost 3 to get away from the pack. Martijn followed, and within two laps both cars were 5 seconds clear of the rest of the field. Back to boost 1. The main Porsche advantage is straight line speed. It’s no match for the Ferrari in both sector 1 and 3. With Martijn in our slipstream on the straights, but unable to pass in sector 1 and 3 an intricate race developed. ID3 passes once, but we could regain P1, and after that it seems that Martijn grew more and more impatient, starting to attack in atypical spots on track. Tense moments!

It turned out that our Porsche is a lap short on the Ferrari range and the pitstops start to run out of sequence. Being further away from each other on track it turns out that the straight line speed is almost enough to level the laptimes. We were unlucky in traffic and lost lots of time, Martijn had a spin and some other little problems, now losing so much time on the straights that they must have damaged their car. After three stints ID3 and Simracing.NL were still very much in touch, but way ahead of the rest of the GT2 class. We’re actually ahead of most of the GT1 class as well, with only Simracing Spain and the SFH Corvette in front.

Wilfred takes over and increases our lead. After another 3 long hours it’s Robin’s turn again and in pitch black darkness he loses a lot of time.

Without a way to change brightness on his monitor, driving with in-car view, with people in the room who need the light on, Robin was practically blind on track. Especially the braking point for the second chicane, but even more so the brake and turn-in point for Indianapolis was really just guessing. It’s unbelievable that he kept the car on track, not planting it  somewhere on top of a guardrail. Mad stuff!

Ben Crooks drives away half a minute of our lead. But running steady laptimes, making no mistakes, we’re still two minutes ahead when Wilfred takes over for the last part of the race. Wilfred makes no mistakes and wins this race and the GT2 championship, finishing 4th overall!

Meanwhile, in the Corvette Marcel took over after a little over 3 hours. With cars dropping out all around us, we kept second place in class and were slowly moving into the top 10 overall. Three tanks of fuel were burned, producing some of the most intense and beautiful sounds ever from a “small block” engine and giving the spectators goose bumps on every passage, and finally Johan took over again a little after the half way mark.

His last stints of 4 tanks went uneventful, apart from the fact that we passed the 75% mark. In fact, we did not want to do a driver swap before going over that mark, which was important because it meant not only a points finish but also sealed our first place in the championship! No time to celebrate yet as we really wanted to take the car home. Marcel took over for the last two tanks of fuel, still in second place. Before we saw the checkered flag, the first placed GT1 car stopped and dropped out of the event, meaning we finished first in class and second overall! The whole P2 field had actually failed to reach the finish and only one P1 car made it to the end. This has one additional complication as now our P1 car finished joint first in the championship with equal points and number of wins. The tie braker that the organization came up with is that the last race at Le Mans decides, so unfortunately we did not take the P1 championship.

That means we won the championship in two out of three classes!

A big thanks to everybody at RaceDepartment for making this happen. See you on track, next time we’ll be driving a chequered car again! And on to rFactor 2!

During the night though SFH GT2 was able to make the difference and lap the competition. An advantage that was controlled all the way up to the flag, 24 hours later.

SFH GT2
Wilfred van den Brink
Robin Verdegaal
Ruud de Wit
Filip Verbert

Audi R8

The LMP1 team had a totally different race. In the opening laps Matthijs Ottenhoff somehow got a DQ from the game, which luckily could be cleared by the organisation. However that cost the team five laps that would cost them all race to take back.
The scheduled restarts made that extra hard, because it wasn’t possible to regain a full lap within the periods between the server restarts, after which the differences were annihilated. In true endurance spirit the LMP1 team continued to pick up places but never came back close to the podium again.

SFH LMP1
András Király
Johan Nieuwenhof
Matthijs Ottenhoff

Calendar
15-02-11 | RACE 1 | Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course
01-03-11 | RACE 2 | Daytona International Speedway
15-03-11 | RACE 3 | Long Beach Street Circuit
29-03-11 | RACE 4 | Fontana Motor Speedway
12-04-11 | RACE 5 | Vanport International
26-04-11 | RACE 6 | The Milwaukee Mile
10-05-11 | RACE 7 | Vancouver Street Circuit
24-05-11 | RACE 8 | Indianapolis Motor Speedway

Standings

http://reports.simracing.nl/NL.FR/NL.FR.2/Tussenstand_NL.FR.2.pdf

About

http://www.simracing.nl/board/viewtopic.php?t=43405

Start Time: 12:00
Date: 2011-05-24
End Time: 22:00

Keep turning left, untill someone turns right….

Presenting Simracing For Holland’s GT and LMP entry for the Sim-racing.de 24h of Le Mans.

Driven May 28th, this race will feature 24 hours of continuous online competition. Live coverage can be found at www.simrace.tv.

GT entry: #51 Porsche 997
Lineup:
Wilfred van den Brink
Wilfred is a smooth driver. He doesn’t need a rear wing. We don’t know what Wilfred looks like, really. For all we know he has green skin. Either Wilfred likes winning a lot, or he really hates losing. Anyway he’ll do everything he can to be prepared when he gets behind the wheel. Wilfred mainly drives rFactor.

Filip Verbert
Our man in Belgium. Filip fits the stereotype: he’s a happy bloke, he owns his own tavern and speaks Flemish fluently. Filip has come back to rFactor earlier this year but he doesn’t seem to have lost his pace. Filip mainly drives iRacing.

Robin Verdegaal
The team’s painter. Robin spends nights around cars with his black and white brushes. And it doesn’t stop there. Robin tends to paint the track with rear wheel rubber. Being the team nestor, Robin still packs a bit of punch. But will he last for another 24 hours? Robin mainly drives rFactor.

Ruud de Wit
A.K.A. Ruud ‘Kristensen’ de Wit. We lost count of how many virtual Le Mans 24 hour races Ruud has won. All we care about is that he’s on our side now. Ruud mainly drives iRacing.

LMP entry: #251 Audi R10
Lineup:
Johan Nieuwenhof
Known for torturing his G25 wheel while pushing his cars around the track at ridiculous slip angles. After successfully competing with the SFH Corvette in many endurance events, Johan is ready for the next challenge: the diesel powered Audi.

András Király
Young gun turned experienced pro. Aged 17, András started his first virtual Le Mans 24 hour race back in 2004 and has raced many since. Known for driving 3 hour stints of qualifying laps but always sees the chequered flag.

Matthijs Ottenhoff
Upcoming star in the dutch simracing community. Only been simracing for one year, Matthijs was picked up by SFH after winning the dutch simracing.nl touring car title and has shown his talent on many occasions since. Just one month ago, he drove the Simracing For Holland Audi R10 to victory lane at the Racedepartment 8 hours at Fuji.

Calendar
15-02-11 | RACE 1 | Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course
01-03-11 | RACE 2 | Daytona International Speedway
15-03-11 | RACE 3 | Long Beach Street Circuit
29-03-11 | RACE 4 | Fontana Motor Speedway
12-04-11 | RACE 5 | Vanport International
26-04-11 | RACE 6 | The Milwaukee Mile
10-05-11 | RACE 7 | Vancouver Street Circuit
24-05-11 | RACE 8 | Indianapolis Motor Speedway

Standings

http://reports.simracing.nl/NL.FR/NL.FR.2/Tussenstand_NL.FR.2.pdf

About

http://www.simracing.nl/board/viewtopic.php?t=43405

Start Time: 12:00
Date: 2011-05-10
End Time: 22:00

After Road America, the SFH team skipped the Laguna Seca event in order to participate in the GrandAm premier series. The regular season then continued at Barber, where András Király won the high strength-of-field race, with Ruud coming in third. Daytona was next, a track very different from the previous venues. Luckily, Ruud countered this with a setup proven in the iRacing 2.4hours of Daytona event at the end of last season. With András Király on pole, things looked good until five laps before the finish. Guest driver Zach Rupcic rear-ended the chequered car and took the win, scoring 17 points more than Király.

While András still managed to come in second, precious points where lost in the chase for the championship. Although the SFH driver now had a small lead over O’Keefe in the standings, the iRacing best 8 out of 12 system allowed O’Keefe to exchange a bad result with a good one at Mid-Ohio.

Mid-Ohio deception
The scenario for the last race was pretty simple: three drivers still had a shot at the title: Matthijs Ottenhoff in third had to finish in front of both András and Kenneth. Kenneth had to finish in front of Matthijs and András. Both would need a substantial strength-of-field for good points. When this strength-of-field was high, the championship leader had to finish in front of Kenneth and Matthijs to defend his position.

Unfortunately, this exiting scenario for the season finale proved to be worthless as the regular high strength-of-field race was never driven. O’Keefe entered an earlier race in order to outscore Király who wasn’t in this race. Kind of an anti-climax. Matthijs Ottenhoff did enter but suffered from handling issues after hitting a guard rail. Elias Varis won the race and fourth in the championship while O’Keefe retook the championship lead. Since the regular high strength-of-field race did not saw enough entries, Király saw no chance do defend his title in a direct fight. Unfortunate, but the reality of the iRacing scoring system. In the end, the difference between champion and runner-up was 15 points on a 1500 total, making the 17 point Daytona incident even more unfortunate.

Round Up
Three cars in the top five, two cars in the top three, no championship. Winner Kenneth O’Keefe saw himself in the middle between András Király and Matthijs Ottenhoff on the podium. Still, with Ruud de Wit taking fifth overall, Simracing for Holland saw its efforts rewarded with the constructors trophy, if there should have been such a thing. Good thing is that the SFH Riley’s played prominent roles in every event of the 12 week season. With endurance competition coming to iRacing, a lineup featuring three GrandAM 2011 S1 top-five drivers is something to beware of! It’s time to say goodbye with some last screens of the SFH Riley and its drivers: see you on track!

Four SFH members saw the green flag at the Simracing.nl Michigan truck event. Three saw the chequered one. Race recap below.

Calendar
15-02-11 | RACE 1 | Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course
01-03-11 | RACE 2 | Daytona International Speedway
15-03-11 | RACE 3 | Long Beach Street Circuit
29-03-11 | RACE 4 | Fontana Motor Speedway
12-04-11 | RACE 5 | Vanport International
26-04-11 | RACE 6 | The Milwaukee Mile
10-05-11 | RACE 7 | Vancouver Street Circuit
24-05-11 | RACE 8 | Indianapolis Motor Speedway

Standings

http://reports.simracing.nl/NL.FR/NL.FR.2/Tussenstand_NL.FR.2.pdf

About

http://www.simracing.nl/board/viewtopic.php?t=43405

Start Time: 12:00
Date: 2011-04-26
End Time: 22:00

Calendar
15-02-11 | RACE 1 | Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course
01-03-11 | RACE 2 | Daytona International Speedway
15-03-11 | RACE 3 | Long Beach Street Circuit
29-03-11 | RACE 4 | Fontana Motor Speedway
12-04-11 | RACE 5 | Vanport International
26-04-11 | RACE 6 | The Milwaukee Mile
10-05-11 | RACE 7 | Vancouver Street Circuit
24-05-11 | RACE 8 | Indianapolis Motor Speedway

Standings

http://reports.simracing.nl/NL.FR/NL.FR.2/Tussenstand_NL.FR.2.pdf

About

http://www.simracing.nl/board/viewtopic.php?t=43405

Start Time: 12:00
Date: 2011-04-11
End Time: 22:00

After Andras Kiraly’s title in the 2011 Winter Trophy the following 2011 Spring Trophy started off with the 1979 F1 mod. After three races it’s SFH’s Robin Verdegaal who leads the standings. Although he had to forfait on the Salzburgring, victories on Spa-Francorchamps and Estoril gave him a small lead over Ricardo Michalewski.

Johan Nieuwenhof suffered serious technical difficulties and couldn’t get his Lotus lined up in time for the first race. Even in Austria and Portugal he struggled to match his own pace in previous seasons, scoring a 12th and 8th place. Nieuwenhof now shares a 10th place in the standings with Belgian rival Steven van Opstal.

Another Belgian driver, Filip Verbert, returning to the team after an overseas adventure, suffered similar problems in the Tyrrell. A consecutive 9th, 13th and 17th place finish leaves him in 14th place in the standings.

Download the BMW skin here.

Wilfred van den Brink drives to first oval victory. After blasting everybody away in qualify, van den Brink drove a tactical race and attacked at the right time, leaving him and Marcel Visser in the leading lap in the final stages.

Taking advantage of his superior speed, van den Brink was able to take his first oval win.

Watkins Glen madness

The season opener in Watkins Glen mainly evolved around pole sitter Kenneth O’Keefe. After being passed by András on the start O’Keefe hit the rear of the SFH Riley eager to regain the top spot. With Dennis and Matthijs in pursuit, O’Keefe then damaged his car lapping the slower Mustangs. Due to this damage, Dennis managed to win the race in front of Matthijs while Ruud came in fourth. A similar scenario in the second race of the night, with András claiming the win after a close escape when leader O’Keefe crashed out, which can be seen in the clip above.

After the thrilling races at Watkins Glen, the action dried up considerably in the following events. Still with two SFH riley’s on the lower steps of the podium at Virginia, Spa and Watkins Glen Boot, the standings table started to look good. Homestead saw two SFH wins at different high-sof races, with Matthijs and András on the top step.

Indianapolis domination

Three SFH riley’s on the first three spots after qualifying: Ruud certainly had his setup sorted out for this one. Check out this picture of the race start: nice.

Although Ruud lost a spot during the race, it was a great day for Simracing For Holland. With Dennis coming in fifth, four SFH entries completed the top five with only rival O’Keefe in third. Matthijs and András got some good points with the first and second place trophies.

Road America: impossible is nothing
No, SFH does not have a new sneaker sponsor. Road America was the venue for a rather unique event: an actual overtaking. What? Yes. It may not seem much but this was actually the first one of a season defined by the lack of it, at least at the front of the field. Although the Riley is a blast to drive the race action has been slow, but not for that half a lap at Road America. After a good start from P3 András Király bravely outbraked leader Kenneth O’Keefe into the hairpin. Pure class. We actually have it on tape too.

Heading for the season showdown, Matthijs and András are second and third in the season standing, with one week less than leader O’Keefe, bus closely followed by Finland’s Elias Varis. Ruud looks for a jump up in the standings as he has only six of the eight weeks counted so far, unlike the people around him. Make sure to check back in for a report on the season finale and feel free to check out some of the season’s better lap replays at the SFH youtube channel.

SFH teammates challenge for the lead during a VRL race at Fuji.

Left: Jeffrey Ruskus, middle: András Király, right: Robin Verdegaal.

An SFH double in Long Beach! Wilfred van den Brink laps the entire field twice, Johan Nieuwenhof finishes second.