Round 4 - Spain (Barcelona)

Qualifying Starting Grid Race Report Finishing Order Race Statistics Driver Comments Download Mixed Logfile
Race Distance:  65 laps	1999/2000 Pole Position:  Jan Svehlik (1:11.996) 1999/2000 Race Winner:  Jan Svehlik (1h25:29.727)

Qualifying

The Pro grid has an unsurprising poleman in Parkhouse as usual but Gary Leighton in his first showing of the year lines up less than .150 of a second behind him. Wilson keeps up his good performances with third in the category ahead of the two Volders In their works machines. Leroy and Millican are the final runners with BCR again a no show.

Race

Svehlik snatched back the lead of the race on lap 6 while Parkhouse succumbed to Roberts and Bodlien on lap 7. On the 10th lap Roberts took second place from Diener and 6 laps later the PowerTech made the first of 3 scheduled stops, rejoining in 8th position.

With the majority of the field on 2 stop strategies, the bulk of the stops came around laps 20 - 26 and once the field had sorted itself out Roberts appeared in the lead from Svehlik and the one-stopping Bodlien - all covered by .694 of a second! They battled for 2 laps until Bodlien pitted on lap 28 but he was soon back in again - a broken front wing on lap 35 needing attention.

With the second stops coming between laps 42 and 45, Svehlik emerged as the leader over Roberts, Diener and Crawford. Diener made his final stop of 3 on lap 50 - remaining in a solid 3rd place behind Svehlik and Roberts to the end. A poor race got worse for Bodlien when he was forced back into the pits with transmission trouble on lap 55, the necessary change of parts dropping him to 8th.

Parkhouse lost certain victory in the Pro class towards the end of the race when a bash with the pit wall caused a puncture. Even after a lengthy pitstop for a replacement he still emerged 2nd in class, behind the deserving winner Wilson.

Race Statistics

Selected Quotes

Oliver Roberts (Digitech), 2nd: "I quite enjoy this circuit, although I guess it's one of the ones that I find it hard to get the best out of. My race certainly fits in with that - overall, it was pretty good, and I managed a respectable race time. However, I felt I didn't really get the best out of the car, especially towards the end of the race when I should have been putting in loads of fast laps, but got held up by a lot of slow traffic on all the fast corners. I decided to slightly modify my car setup, but stuck with a normal two-stop DD strategy, which didn't allow me to get the same kind of advantage that I had at Imola."

Steffen Diener (Power Tech), 3rd: "The only word to describe todays race is anoying. Trafic was just too high, I had almost no clean lap."

Darren Crawford (Corgi), 4th: "Although things went pretty smooth, it felt like i couldn't go as fast as i wanted. I guess it was because of all the tight turns. At least i finished the race, i had my machine in pieces trying to put some new tech. into it. That didn't work, and then other parts started to malfunction. Reload some software and Varooom, Purrring like a cat next to a megaphone. Hmmmm, coughed up a fur ball too."

Claudio Di Martino (CDiMa Bros.), 6th: "I started well, feeling I was perfectly in control of the car without too much trouble (by my standards I mean ;) Unfortunately Hakkinen crashed his car at Repsol curve around lap 20 and the track marshals were unable to remove his car. This had the net effect that all CC cars were slowing down excessively because of the yellow flag, and I had to lap all of them many times continuing loosing time. At the end of the race I had lapped three times Coultard who arrived in second place! Without the bad luck of being penalized by a bug in f1gp I could have been possibly thirty/forty second faster... "

Robert Wilson (Powerecoil-2000), 7th: "A reasonably consistent drive matching my lap times or beating them every lap. I had good grip from my tyres pretty much through the entire race and put some fairly decent lap times in during the latter stages. The few slow laps I had was either caused by a whole snake of cars in front of me, or the odd spin caused by oil and water dropped down by the Minardi's and Prost's on the track. Hopefully some more points for my championship title challenge and before long should things improve further I think my Powerecoil-2000 car could be challenging those in the Ace series."

Ian Parkhouse (Phoenix), 8th: "I got off to a decent start, quickly getting into my rhythm and it went very well (apart from a slow inlap for my first scheduled pitstop) until laps 37 and 38 when my car seemed to drift off the track all by itself on three separate occasions. On pausing the game I realised that that my hands had got very sweaty which meant they were slipping slightly on the joystick, reducing my level of control. After drying my hands (and the joystick) I got back into my rhythm by my second scheduled stop. Then I reached lap 60 and unfortunately smashed my front wing trying to lap a back marker (he seemed to almost dive across me just as I was drawing level). Overall I'm disappointed with my race, but at least I achieved one of my goals by dipping under 1:15 for my fastest lap."

Jim Spratt (Lotus), 9th: "Brill!!!! I almost led from start to finish.... No major probs, as I led from pole, tho I puilled in too early lapping Maccazane, and ended his, and Fisichella's races on lap 26. Came out in the Lead after my first stop, but tried to overtake a backmarker round the outside of turn 3 on lap 29, and didn't manage it (spun the car instead), and did the same on lap 34. After the final stop, I came out in 2nd, and set about trying to catch Schumacher, but spun the car again on lap 48 :(. However I finally re-took the lead on lap 54, and went on to win the race."

Mike Hogg (Bolgani), 11th: "I'm getting mighty sick of getting so far into the races just to retire! I don't have time to redo the races like most folk (it shows up in the logfiles ;-) so if and when (usually when) I do crash I'm screwed. I started lapping cars on lap 5 and it was a total nightmare from there. Another wasted opportunity."