Team orders at first round of the Masters
After weeks of growing anticipation the masters were unleashed for Round 1 at the unforgiving Circuit Of The Americas. It proved to be a tour du force of the Belgian contenders.
Track limits
The Circuit Of The Americas hosted the first round of the CrewChief GT3 Masters VI, and from the get-go the word 'track limits' was trending on our discord server. In practice all drivers struggled - in various degrees - to keep their wheels within the limits when on a flying lap. Needless to say a lot of rubber was laid down over the countless practice sessions, in a bid to get to grips with the unforgiving track.
Come race day, it turned out that all drivers on this huge (40+) grid had found their rhythm. The 'usual suspects' were out in front again, but with a grid this big entertaining battles were to be expected troughout the field.
Messy first lap
Immediately after the field was let loose there was mayhem on the start/finish straight. An unfortunate combination of errors in settings and focus let to some accidents before the cars even got to the top of the hill at turn 1.
A lot of drivers found themselves in unexpected positions on that first lap. Some had a long evening and recovery drive ahead of them. Some where lucky to escape the carnage and grinned while looking at the leaderboard.
After the dust had settled everybody tried hard to get in a rhythm. Some nice battles were fought in the mid field, but at the front nobody was able to challenge Team WRT. Amedeo Dekeyser and Bram Depraitere controlled the race.
Team orders
At one point Martin Hughes, our excellent commentator, got all excited as in the pitstop phase team WRT swapped positions. Cunning strategic thinking, which after the race turned out to be excellent team play: both cars were out in front and a 'truce' was quickly agreed upon via the team channel on Discord.
Clever, as team WRT clearly had the upper hand at the difficult Circuit Of The Americas, but there are still a lot of miles to be covered until the series finale in Spa-Francorchamps.
And the race at COTA proved - once again - that a lot can happen on track. And it usually does, even in a field as strong as this year's Masters.
Next up: Japan
This weekend (September 25) the iconic and challenging Suzuka track will host round 2. Brace yourself, more esses.
Final results of round 1
With David Dhoore coming home in third place, Belgians reigned supreme as you can see on the championship table after round one. Even the winner of our Porsche 911 GT3 Cup, eight time RRL champion Ralf Arella and other 'aces' could not prevent the Belgian clean sweep.
But I am sure this will make them even more determined...
