RDRC S9 Round 4 - Rally Poland (15th March - 21st March 2021)

[LuMue]

So here's the recap of what Müller Motorsport did at the RDRC Poland Rally:

As usual, Paul did the opening for the team in his Mitsubishi Octavia

He made a solid start in those wet conditions and managed the first two stages without mistakes or accidents.

When the track got dry, the mistakes came and on SS3 he had a crash with a 9s reset. Not that bad and the car wasn't damaged that much - all fine!

SS4 - SS6 went fine again without any issues. Not the fastest on the track but constant driving without risking too much!

SS7 saw the first roll and SS8 the second roll and some offroad-action.
SS9 went fine again, but in the last sector he had a roll again, this time the car had to be reset which cost another 8s... Look in their faces...

During SS10 he hit one of those huge obstacles...

The radiator was damaged, the motor overheated and the next two stages were easy cruising for Paul as the car's performance was gone...
So the nice fight with @alex2106 was over...

It was a mistake that wasn't necessary at all - but that's rally life! He was lucky in Argentina, this time the luck wasn't on his side!

See the full run here:

Next one on the track was Lutz in his Delta HF.

The Delta is a beast and after the desaster at Argentina I wanted to handle the beast properly this time around...

So I gave everything on the first two stages in the wet conditions and stayed in touch with @Magnar Haarstadsveen , who is on the same level as I am - he's mostly that little bit faster, depending on the location.

As the wet was gone my performance in comparison to Magnar was gone, too. I couldn't keep his pace from SS3 on...

What can I say? I made no mistakes, didn't risk too much and kept the car within the boundaries and away from the trees... Here are some impressions from my run...

I had a spin on SS10, but that's all to report from my side. I brought the car home and hopefully I'll reach the Top 10 again in RDRC-2.
Don't think that Poland will be the location where I score points in the overall ranking for the first time this season...

See the run re-live here:

See you in Spain...

 

[Roy Magnes]

This rally requires speed and presicion, and I lack both... Should be an interesting event

I drove the first 4 stages before heading to work today, the notes from these are below.

ss01 - Started way too carefully, and then I lost concentration and rolled at the end of the stage. Looks like there is no major damage.
ss02 - Overshot a junction, other than that I just struggeled with the grip.

ss03 - This one felt a lot better, more confindence in the dry.
ss04 - Felt okay on this one too. Just not brave enough on the fastest places, and that shows in the time sheet...

Looks like there is no major damage to the car at the service, so I will have the best starting point for the final stages when I do them during the weekend. It is a difficult rally for sure!

 

[Magnar Haarstadsveen]

ahhh finaly a proper rally for the first time this year. I had a good run on all the stages, no big mistakes, just a bit carefull on difficult places and it payed off in in the service. I had only 16 min repair time in total so i'll guess the teamboss @Roy Magnes is happy about that!.
Thanks for all the work that is done to make us all have fun in this championship!!!

 

[Eckhart von Glan]

But since this is the rally of thousand cuts,

which i never knew

 

[Joakim Skalstad]

Going live on Twitch after my dinner is done
Guessing it will be in about 1 hour

Twitch.tv - Joakim Skalstad

 

[Joakim Skalstad]

As usual

No practice
No brain
No guts
No glory


Also my head is killing me
Aiming to finish in one piece

Going live now!

 

[Peter Roche Racing]

Decent run from me at SS1-4.
I was quite nervous and scared which led to small mistakes and backing off a bit too much in some places.
But other than that no major issues. Hopefully I will be able to find more pace in the car tomorrow.

 

[Joakim Skalstad]

DNF after second service...
Someone in Codemasters should go on a real rally and check if the red posters marking the finish of an stage really is built in two big solid boxes!
I have been rallying in real life for 3 years now and i have never, NEVER seen any in other than plastic materials..

Went really fast over the finishline on SS6 and crashed into one of those boxes, then the radiator broke and the engine started acting weird on SS7/SS8..
Most of SS8 was driven with a stalled engine..

And then when the game would not let me take the penalty for fixing the engine i chose to retire...

 

[Rawbear]

DNF after second service...
Someone in Codemasters should go on a real rally and check if the red posters marking the finish of an stage really is built in two big solid boxes!
I have been rallying in real life for 3 years now and i have never, NEVER seen any in other than plastic materials..

Went really fast over the finishline on SS6 and crashed into one of those boxes, then the radiator broke and the engine started acting weird on SS7/SS8..
Most of SS8 was driven with a stalled engine..

And then when the game would not let me take the penalty for fixing the engine i chose to retire...

I tried to finish this stage at high speed from EVERY possible angle and the only safe way was to slow down to a (fast) crawl!! There is another subtle finish where a quick left-right can make you DNF in the trees on the right...

 

[Mathieu Labbé]

When are the easy rallies coming exactly?

Quite satisfied with my pace, but so many mistakes and 3 punctures later (luckily one was in the last split) I'm still 6min behind in last, of the survivors!

Not bad this Rally Poland, but those gravel/tarmac transitions sounds so nice on paper but the implementation is not quite great IMO. Still, having fun!

 

[ltnordb]

Six first stages done. Got a puncture 100m before the finish on stage four, I guess thats not the worst place if you're gonna get one

Some pictures from stage 7 recce:

I thought you said "Keep left over jump" Phil?

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

When are the easy rallies coming exactly?

Spain and NZ?

 

[Eckhart von Glan]

When are the easy rallies coming exactly?

2027

 

[Rawbear]

When are the easy rallies coming exactly?

These WERE the EASY ones!!

 

[Mark Gormley]

Started late this week so decided to take the risk and go through it all in one sitting.

I didn't have a lot of confidence on the early wet stages, the car always feels a bit tight on fresh rubber and the wet made this worse, at least it looks pretty good when it's clean.

As the tyres wear it finds it's balance and I was able to push a bit more in the middle of each loop.

And then as the tyres wear completely it does the exact opposite and becomes very loose and leads to some hairy moments.

None of this helped of course by me enjoying the rally and car so much and pushing things a bit far. I'll blame a wrong pacenote for this one...

https://imgur.com/gcw6NHE

Took a recording of my Power Stage too, slow and slippy with a few mistakes, but at least I finished it in style

 

[bladechildx]

Was looking okay through the first loop kept it together for the most part.

Second loop on the other hand is when it went downhill as you can see here is a picture taken moments taken before...

disaster.

Had a weird collision issue at the end of SS10 that ended up crushing my radiator forcing me to retire in SS11 sadly, shame cause it was looking to be a decent finish otherwise.

 

[Roland]

Upon arrrival at Service Park B after SS4, it turned out that my car was in a lot worse shape than just the missing passenger door.. 30 min was not enough to fix it all, so we had to choose between fixing the Turbo or patching up the bodywork.
To keep the sponsor happy and because this car has way more punch than I can safely handle here, I chose the latter...

While the mechanics were busy fixing the car, I nicked a few spectators' cars to secretly recce SS5.
Tried 5 times, finished once... Not good.. better be a lot more careful here.

So when the car was done, I switched to full grandma mode, which worked pretty well actually.

Got through stage 5,6 and 7 without big issues, just a few hairy moments

And apparently my grandma driving still wasn't very smooth as I had to pull over once when Phil got sick and had to puke his guts out . So if any of you guys encounter a small crest that isn't in the roadbook.....

On SS8 we had a few small tree brushes due to pacenote misunderstanding; Phil still couldn't speak quite as clearly again after the emergency stop..
The 15 min. service after SS8 was enough to get the car in good shape again, even the turbo this time, just not the bodywork which wasn't damaged too badly anyways.

So we decided to drive straight on until the end, as we'd seen most of the remaining stages before, and the only unknown one, SS10, was just a part of a familiar long one according to the Event Magazine.

SS9 started out very well and almost ended very well too...

... There is another subtle finish where a quick left-right can make you DNF in the trees on the right...

Unfortunately I know exactly which one you mean.. Those are the trees I used to turn my regular Lancia Delta into a special superlight version.. and damaged my radiator in the process.

Immediately all warning lights lit up, so I had to nurse the car through SS10, and lost a shedload of time on SS11 but I made it to the start of SS12.

As the crowd of pretty polish girls seemed rather underwhelmed with our performance, I decided to push a bit more in the final stage and hope for the best..

And it worked! We made it! Barely...

Thanks all for your reports, videos and screenshots! They are great to watch.

And once again thanks to Ole, Jack and all others involved in making this happen!! The magazines are truly awesome, and this championship is such a brilliant way for me to discover the Dirt Rally 2 game, which most likely would've stayed on the large stack of "just buy 'em already and will play 'em later on when I have more time" games forever otherwise..

 

[Roy Magnes]

I did get the time to go through the second loop of stages before heading for work today, time for some more notes.

ss05 - Slid off the road and got reset before I hit anything. Difficult to make out the road with the light going towards you on the second half of the stage.
ss06 - This one felt better, but the dry stages usually do anyhow.

ss07 - It did sound like I got a puncture about halfway through, with the sounds of air being blown out of somewhere, but I did not hit anything and all 4 wheels had tyre pressure at the finish...
ss08 - Happy with this stage, it felt like I used the car and road better. And I am only 26 seconds behind 10th at the moment.

Happy with the loop. Looks like the slow and steady-approach is paying off for me this rally. That being said - there is still time to make a mess over the final 4 stages

 

[Eckhart von Glan]

in another thread, Ole writes: "As the 21st of March is my birthday ". I wonder, is he going to do his Poland run on his birthday?

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

in another thread, Ole writes: "As the 21st of March is my birthday ". I wonder, is he going to do his Poland run on his birthday?

Nope. Tomorrow