Racing Team Den Kaap

Wednesday August 24th, Indianapolis Motor Speedway

Today 10 drivers took on the road course of the iconic track in Indianapolis in the 5th round out of 7 of the IRacing Nederland - IRNL Pro Mazda Fun cup. The car track combi is a great one as the long straits offer good overtaking opportunities for the drivers and in between there are some technical challenging corners.

Free practice resulted in Thomas Renders taking p1 with a 1.22.552 closely followed by Forenz Arabian at 0.114. Ricardo Michalewski took P3 at 0.525.

In qualification it was Michalewski who took pole with a 1.22.545 followed by Renders at only .076! Arabian was almost as close at 0.170! A very tight field it was for the rest of the drivers as well while the whole field was within about 2 seconds.

The 12 minute sprint race was as tight as qualifying! Joao Nascimento spun in T2 causing a break of 5 drivers; Michalewski, Renders, Arabian, Steinmetz and Gorissen. Gorissen made a minor mistake and lost contact. A special compliment to all the drivers behind Nascimento for avoiding him, as the incident could’ve taken 6 drivers The other four took the battle almost to the end with changing the order almost every lap. Renders took victory in the end before Michalewski and Arabian.

The feature race had a similar course and the same 5 managed to breakaway early. The pace of Michalewski and Renders was a bit faster than the other three and they broke away. The lead two took the battle all the way to the final corners where they had a minor touch. This caused Renders to have a little damage at his suspension and losing the lead battle and falling back to P3 as well. Michalewski took the victory in this great and fair battle over Arabian and Renders.

Next week the drivers head of to the second and final oval of the season at the in real life long gone USA international Speedway in Lakeland, Florida. Ovals always tend to mix up things a bit so it should be interesting to see what happens!

Wednesday 16th August, Road America

After the summer break 15 drivers took on the challenge of this iconic track in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin for the 4th round of the IRacing Nederland - IRNL Formula Mazda Fun Cup. The drivers had to take on the chicane instead of the kink. A change that was a great addition for this car. The track and car combi was one where draft came in to play a lot, but the technical sections did prove to be difficult with less downforce. This meant that both a high and low downforce setup could work in the races and different strategies were a viable option today.

In free practice Thomas Renders proved to be the fastest with a 2.09.516, very closely followed by Forenz Arabian at 0.017. Behind him Ricardo Michalewski took P3 at 0.316. The top 10 was within a second so the differences weren’t that much!

Michalewski said he was looking for some setup changes in the free practice. This meant he only went fast for the first time at qualy, setting a 2.09.504. With warmer temps, this was an amazing performance! Renders took second at 0.657, which was a huge gap compared to FP. Joeri Steinmetz got in 3rd at .0853. The differences between the rest of the field were a bit larger as well.

In the sprint race, there was a lead group of 5 cars: Michalewski, Renders, Arabian, Steinmetz and Joao Nascimento. Michalewski set such a high pace that the drivers behind him could only follow. This meant that after 12 minutes, the group came in in that order, all separated by about a second from each other!

In the feature race Michalewski made a rare mistake and spun out of the uphill lefthander halfway through the first lap. Most drivers could narrowly avoid him and the race went on. At the front a lead group of 3 formed with Renders, Steinmetz and Gianni Van de Craats. This battle went on for about 26 minutes until Steinmetz spun out of turn 3. Van de Craats had to pit in the penultimate lap as he took to little fuel. A problem Arabian also experienced! In the end Renders took his maiden victory in the series, about 12 seconds before Antonio Reis and Arabian.

Next week the drivers go to the newly added Indy Road Course! Another fast track with drafting opportunities. See you next week!

Wednesday 27th July, Barber Motorsports Park

Race 3 of the IRacing Nederland - IRNL Pro Mazda Fun Cup brought 10 drivers to the track of Barber Motorsports Park. This spider mascot track is a fast and winding track where you need both speed and downforce to get you going.

Free practice saw Steffie Stevens again on P1 with a 1.19.375. Forenz Arabian followed on only 0.074 on P2. Thomas Renders got P3 a bit further back at 0.666. Joeri Steinmetz and Ricardo michalewski were also close at 0.720 and 0.751 respectively at P4 and P5.

In qualifying Arabian took pole with a 1.19.778. The laptime was slower than free practice due to a warmer track later on in the day. Steinmetz took P2 at 0.0193 and Michalewski took P3 at 0.339. Stevens didn’t set a laptime and had to start from the back! All the other drivers were within 2 seconds so the field was very close together!

Arabian took some damage in race 1 due to some minor contact. Causing him to fall back in laptime for the 12 minute first race of the day. Steinmetz, Renders and Michalewski profited from this incident. Stevens fought himself up to the front group very fast and could battle with Michaleski for the lead. Though a minor contact between them meant that they went of track and losing the podium positions. Renders also made a mistake in the same corner touching the grass, resulting in a heavily damaged car. Steinmetz took victory in front of Joao Nascimento and Arabian.

The many fall backs for the fast guys meant they had to work themselves back up front, this meant a lot of battles were going to take place! The race was very interesting and very fair! Steinmetz also took victory in the feature race closely followed by Michalewski. Arabian again took the last podium step!

Next race will be at Road America with the lesser known chicane instead of the kink. This also means the championship goes in to a 2 week summer break. After that we’ll be halfway through the season with 4 more races to go.

Wednesday 20th july Phoenix Raceway

This week 14 competitors got to the start on the first of two oval races in IRacing Nederland - IRNL Pro Mazda Fun Cup. Again in a heat and feature race format! This oval is kind of a tri-oval with a small dogleg on the back straight and for these cars the track is just about full throttle. Only in T1-2 you need to lift or else you will hit the wall on the exit. This meant it was going to be very draft dependent!

In free practice it was once again Steffie Stevens who lead the field in the end with a 26.241. Forenz Arabian followed in just 0.059 seconds. He was followed by a very strong Frederique Rijsdijk who was 0.066 seconds behind Stevens. The whole field was within 0.6 of a second! Most of the drivers had gotten a drafting lap in, so it was yet to be seen how fast qualifying will go.

The qualifying time was set with a 3 lap average, which means you’d got to get in 3 clean laps! Rijsdijk got pole with an average laptime of 26.274. Behind him was Arabian, just 0.019 seconds behind him. P3 went to Bobby West, also just 0.113 behind Rijsdijk! Stevens and Guido Prins were the only one who hadn’t gotten a time in and that meant they needed to start from the back in the sprintrace!

The 12 minute sprintrace was a very good and fair fight in the front! Most of the race there was a 5 driver fight with 3 drivers just about in the slipstream behind. In the end it was Ricardo Michalewski who took victory with Arabian right behind him. A minor gap of 0.619 seconds behind was Rijsdijk. A small mistake around P4 saw Simon Mayer and Bobby West fall back to P6 and 7 after being on P4 and 5 the whole race. This meant Reinier Hut and Thomas Renders took P4 and 5.

The feature race went a whole lot different than the sprintrace! Lots of driving behind the safety car due to incidents. Mostly mistakes of inexperience on ovals. That meant the race was driven on the last couple of laps. So in a way, the feature race was more of a sprint race than the sprintrace itself.
In the end Arabian took victory only 0.196 before Michalewski on P2. Rijsdijk once again got the final podium position.

Race direction is looking in to the matter of the safety cars and how to try and prevent them from happening in the other oval race in the future. Nonetheless, we’ll return to road racing next week at the track of Barber Motorsports Park. An undulating track with lots of long corners, a good challenge to everyone, as the track isn’t that well know to most of the drivers

Wednesday 13th of july Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.

Today the first round of the Formula Mazda Fun Cup was due at the winding track of Mid Ohio Sports Car Course. The series is held over 7 rounds on all American tracks, including 2 ovals. After the series there will be a runoff race at Sebring as a fun finale to the series! Big thanks for IRacing Nederland - IRNL to aid in organizing this league!

Steffie Stevens showed tremendous pace in free practice, clearing almost the whole field with a second. Forenz Arabian was the only one who could come close, only 3 tenths down. Behind the field was a lot closer with 11 drivers within a second!

In qualifying Arabian lead the way, again with a margin of almost a second on P2. Tim Wijffels was the one on P2 and Thomas Renders got third. Though the field was very close again with P2 till P14 within on second of eachother! Stevens couldn’t get in a clean qualifying lap and had to start P17.

In the sprintrace Arabian managed to break the draft pretty quickly and could drive away slowly from Renders, who had overtaken Wijffels in to turn 1. Joeri Steinmetz proved himself to have a great racepace and drove from P7 to P2. Renders lost a position he had overtaken to Steinmetz and finished on the sprintrace podium on P3.

In the feature race, Steinmetz lost control in turn 1 and Renders took P2. Arabian was fast, but Renders could hold on a bit longer this time. Though once the draft was broken, Arabian drove of in the distance. Renders and Simon Mayer were to fight a 28 minute battle for the remaining podium places. Both kept their nerves very well and finished on P2 and P3 respectively.

In the end the first races were good and besides some minor incidents it was pretty fair racing! We had 18 starters tonight and that looks promising for the remainder of the season! Good attendance is a hard thing to achieve, especially when it’s hot like next week at the Phoenix legacy oval!

Hungaroring June 1st

Renders wins strategic race at Hungaroring

For the final round of the IRacing Nederland - IRNL Porsche 992 Pro/Am cup we went to the Hungaroring. This technical track is a nightmare for offtracks and is a really difficult one to get right. Luckily this goes for all drivers and once again, the field was incredibly close together! Though a little less close than usual due to the character of the track.

Two drivers were in the mix for Racing Team Den Kaap and once again there was a real life crew chief in Hungary as well. Thomas Renders needed 2 more points to secure his 2nd place in the Am championship. Thomas qualified 6th in class and 13th overall, just behind his rival for 2nd, Ruthger Gerritsen. Scott Timmermans qualified 8th in class and 16th overall.

Thomas noted that in free practice that stint could be expanded to a 0 stop strategy with the right amount of fuel saving. He quickly checked in on the rules and discussed this with Guido Prins (crewchief) and they decided to go for it right from the start. This caused Thomas to lose some time in the beginning, but due to not needing to stop gained them enough time to overtake the 1 stop strategy.

Thomas: “It was such a different way of driving. After a couple of laps I noticed that my rival Ruthgers also went for this strategy. It was tight but I think I was able to save more due to being in the slipstream of Ruthger. He made a minor mistake after which I could overtake and drive away from him because I saved a lot more fuel! I’m ecstatic with this win, I felt really smart haha! What a way to finish the championship! I really have Guido to thank for this as well, so a special thanks to him for working out the strategy during the race! I’m also very happy with the P2 in the AM championship, it was a really tough one!”

Scott was hit from behind very early on in the race and that caused him to have damage and loss of a lot of positions! He had a great race afterwards but was disqualified due to too many incident points.

Sunday June 5th,

Spec 2 championship for Thomas Renders!

The day of the grand finale of the SRF Weekend Warriors series! But first a quick recap of last weeks race at the Hungaroring. Thomas Renders had a tough qualifying and had to work his way up to the front of the race in Spec2. He managed to do just that and was able to take the victory in class in the penultimate lap in a very exciting 6 corner battle with Flavio Andalo. Joost Simkens drove just as strong this race and drove to P3 in class. With this he managed to strengthen is position in the battle for 3rd. Which he is 5th in, only 7 points behind P3!

Joost and Johan Buitenga drove the race at Daytona International Speedway as Thomas was away for a small holiday. Johan saw a spun driver from very closeby and had damage because of that early on. Something you want to avoid on a draft dependent track like Daytona! Joost drove a strong race but was unable to beat Alain McKane, who came in third in the championship in the end!

Flavio Andalo was the only driver able to keep Thomas from winning the S2 championship. With him being away just as Thomas, the championship was decided before the race started! Thomas won the championship!

Thomas Sunday after the race: “I’m ecstatic! I did my utter best all season long. To be able to grab the championship, it’s just amazing! I’ve never felt safe anywhere during the season because the other guys were always there if I made mistakes or was a bit of pace! In the end I think my consistency is what helped me get it! I got a podium in Spec2 every race I started and really focused on not making to many mistakes. I really am over the moon and I’m going to get a drink now to celebrate haha!”

Racing Team Den Kaap had a great SRF Weekend Warriors season! Thomas won the S2 championship! Joost got in P4 in S2 championship, just missing out on the podium! Johan got in P8 with one race down on the others! We also got some great occasional drivers with Alex Gorissen and Danny Mulder getting some good results!

A special thanks to Ray ESportsRacing for organizing the series! I know he always says we as drivers make the league, but we as the drivers shouldn't underestimate what he's doing for us and really appreciate it! So again! Thanks a lot for giving us a way of enjoying ourselves so much!

Bathurst May 25th,

Thomas Renders, Pawel Jakubowski, Alex Gorissen and Scott Timmermans took on the penultimate round of the IRacing Nederland - IRNL Porsche 992 Pro/Am cup at Bathurst, a.k.a. Mount Panorama Circuit. This is one of the most challenging tracks on the calendar due to the tight, twisty and undulating character. Just surviving the race is an accomplishment on its own. To aid the drivers, Danny Mulder and Guido Prins came in to help and took the roles upon themselves as crewchiefs and spotters!

Only 24 contestants got down under today, probably due a football finale. Most of the drivers were Am drivers though, which was good for the fight both championships. Nonetheless the pace was high. Both Pawel and Thomas got in to the top 10 overall. Pawel took P8, Thomas took P10. He wasn’t totally happy with the laptime though. Scott got P16 and Alex got P18.

The race started of a bit rough as all four of our drivers hit some wall and got a bit of damage before the pit window was open. Thomas even drove with a crooked wheel for 6 laps. This meant that all Kaap drivers pitted early and took repairs. The nature of the race and events caused the field to spread out very quickly! Though Scott and Alex battled a lot for the remaining top 10 Am positions!

In the end Pawel got a great P6 overall and podium in Am class! Rutgher Gerritsen crashing out early, Ferdy van Verseveld not being there and Thomas beating Michael Vester in the race meant that he has secured his P2 in Am class! Scott got P11 in the race and Alex got P14.

Only one race to go at the Hungaroring next week! The season sure flew by!

Sebring May 22nd,

Round 10 out of 12 of the SRF Weekend Warriors series was due. Sebring was the venue and the club circuit was the layout. It's a layout that isn't used that often, but has great racing as it goes around the most technical part of the track. It has 2 great overtaking opportunities at T1 and the hairpin as two straights are in front of that. Thomas Renders and Joost Simkens took on the challenge for Racing Team Den Kaap this week. Thomas looking to maintain his championship lead and Joost looking for a good result after some bad luck had struck on him the last couple of races. He is still very much in the battle for the podium in the championship as well.

Qualifying proved to be very close as the front 31 out of 48 drivers were in the same second from pole and 41 drivers were within 2 seconds! Thomas proved his feeling that he had good pace around this track during the week with a P8, within just 4 tenths of a second! Joost got a P29 and he felt he was a bit of pace. That means room for improvement!

The race was a pretty straightforward one for Thomas. He was around the position where is pace was true. So he needed to maintain his positions. There were some faster guys behind due to qualifying and that meant he was probably going to fall a couple places back. He also overfueled the car a bit and that cause him to lose connection to the battle for P6. In the end he got P10 (P1 in Spec2).

Joost fought himself in to the top 15 of the race with some good overtakes, steady driving and good pitstop. In the last couple of laps he made a minor mistake, causing him to lose about 4 positions. He was dissatisfied with his spin, but he did drive a very strong race, coming from P29 to P19!

For the championship this means that Thomas is in a very strong lead (about 100 points) and has a great chance of becoming the 2022S2 SRF Weekend Warriors Spec 2 champion. Joost and Johan Buitenga are both very much in the mix for third podium position together with Alain McKane and Andrea Favini.



Ray ESportsRacing

Spa may 18th,

For round 8 of the IRacing Nederland - IRNL Porsche 992 Pro/Am cup we travelled to the legendary track of Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps. It has a bit of everything, great speeds, hard braking zones, fast and winding corners and a lot of height differences! Besides that, the offtracks are know to be very harsh here!

3 Drivers of Racing Team Den Kaap were here tonight. Thomas Renders got P13 overall in qualifying. Alex Gorissen got P26 and Scott Timmermans got P29. We had 35 drivers at the start tonight and it was going to be a difficult turn one in La Source.

The start was a bit messy and very crowded as you can see on the pictures. Lots of nudging going on, but nothing really went wrong. The nudging though caused a lot of drivers to have 4x's and a lot of drivers were halfway trough the limit very fast. Thomas e.g. had 11x after 3 laps, causing him to drive more cautiously throughout the rest of the race. This cost him a lot of positions and he quickly fell back to P7 in Am (started P4).

Alexander on the other hand drove the other way around trought the field as he too was around P7 very quickly! A great job by him. Scott had tough couple of laps and spun twice. He forfeited the race a couple of laps before the end.

In the end Thomas could score good points for the championship with a P6 in Am (P14 overall) and Alex had a great P8 in Am (P16 overall). For the championship this means that we still have a contender for the podium in Am class. Thomas is currently in second, 27 points behind P1, 10 points in front of P3, 25 points in front of P4 and 32 points in front of P5. These are the guys that going to fight for the podium positions with 2 races to go.

Next week will be Bathurst (Mount Panorama) and that will be a tough one! The walls are never far away and mistakes are punished very harshly most of the time! Be sure to check in on the IRNL Porsche 992 Pro/Am cup stream at Bathurst next Wednesday for the penultimate race of the cup at: https://www.youtube.com/c/iRacingNederland

-francorchamps

Okayama May 15th,

While the IRNL 992 Porsche cup had a week off, the SRF Weekend Warriors travelled to Okayama International Circuit in Japan. This well know track in iRacing is very technical en usually provides for good and fun racing. That said, qualifying isn't the most important objective while racing is very much possible to do.

One of the main competitors for the S2 championship, Flavio Andalo, got pole just in front of Johan Buitenga, who positioned himself on a great P2 and P15 overall in class! Thomas Renders wasn't satisfied at all with his qualy performance and got P5 in class and P22 overall. Joost Simkens was just 1 tenth of a second behind and had P26 overall and P7 in class.

The race started a bit rough with some check ups before the race had started. Both Thomas and Joost had damage because of it, but Joost had more bad luck and spun off the track. Causing him to start at the back. A couple of laps later he was touched again and the car was toast after that. A DNF for him, which is a tough one because of his championship position in S2!

Meanwhile Thomas stormed trough the field the whole race with some great overtakes and good racing! He ended up in P13 overall and P2 in class. Johan also had some bad luck with a spinning car (which Thomas narrowly escaped as shown on one of the pictures) and fell back a bit. Nonetheless Johan continued his strong streak finishing in P17 overall and just outside of the podium in S2 (P4).

Meanwhile in the S2 championship Thomas still has a strong lead on Flavio Andalo. Johan is currently P6 in S2, but has had 2 drop weeks already, which might give him the opportunity to gain some points on his rivals. Joost is in P7. If he manages to finish the season in a strong way, he might still be able to fight for a podium position, though it will be a tough task to do!



Ray ESportsRacing

https://youtu.be/SKhbS4gd_Gg