My3id Gaming dominate Round 1 of iRacing.com World Championship Series

By Niall McEvoy | Feb 27, 2011 14:48 UTC | 1201 Views

My3id Gaming claim 5 of top 6 positions with Jesse Nieminen taking the win!

Round 1 saw the top 50 sim racers in the world take to the renowned Spa track to battle it out for first blood in this gruelling 18 race season. There was an air of both uncertainty and confidence in the My3id Gaming camp in the weeks preceding the first race of the season. A new car and a new track was the first obstacle for all the drivers as they tried to get to grips with the Williams FW31 formula 1 car. This single seater not only needed your full concentration, but a near perfect setup and strategy - so our boys got to work early on to try and master this beast.



In the weeks leading up to the race, it was difficult to gauge how the performance of our drivers compared to other top teams who kept their pace under wraps. This brought some uncertaintanty as to whether or not we had really extracted everything from the car or if in fact our competition had found any extra tenths over us. As the race day approached though, and other teams came out of the woodwork and began posting practice times it started to become quite clear that we were looking good. 

Jesse Nieminen topped the qualifying charts with a blistering 1:44.874, beating championship favourite and Team Redline driver Greger Huttu by .024 of a second. My3id Gaming also secured positions 3rd, 4th, 6th and 7th by Hugo Luis, Klaus Kivekas, Aleksi Elomaa and David Williams respectively, with Marcus Saari qualifying in 21st.

"Qualifying was pretty tough, I didnt get a time until my 3rd attempt I think and it was only a 45.3, so I was definitely starting to feel some pressure. Before the qualifying I decided that I wouldn't look at the f2 standings screen until I was done with my last attempt, and that definitely helped me to just focus on my own runs well. Finally I managed a 1:44.87 which I was incredibly happy with as it's only a tenth from my pb." -Jesse Nieminen



Nieminen got off to a great start and was able to pull a gap in the opening laps. Hugo Luis, Kivekas and Elomaa went 3 wide into turn 1 asWilliams overtook Masier off the line. Unfortunately for Saari, he got caught up at turn 1 and had to retire due to damage.

"So it was matter of if my engine could make the start without blowing and if I could make the turn one. Well it didn't blow up and I had a good start, as I passed Klaus, Luca and Hugo before the T1" - Aleksi Elomaa



With Nieminen pulling a gap, Luis got the better of Huttu in the first lap with Elomaa and Kivekas following closely. On lap 7, Huttu had a slight spin which was enough for the following duo to capitalize on giving My3id Gaming a 1-2-3-4 early on. Williams was battling closely with Bartsch for 6th position.



Elomaa and Huttu battled fiercely with Elomaa defending brilliantly. However, after a few laps, Huttu got the better of him and began his comeback. All our drivers pitted on lap 15, with Williams passing Bartsch during the pitstop. Huttu did a lap longer and rejoined the race in 4th position. At this point, Nieminen had a 4 second gap to Luis, with Kivekas a further 3 seconds behind and Huttu 3 seconds behind him.

On lap 30, Huttu overtook Kivekas for 3rd position. The next round of pitstops was interesting. Once again, Huttu stayed out a lap longer which played to his advantage as he leapfrogged Luis in the pits. The Brazilian wasn't giving up though, nearly getting the opportunity to overtake Huttu on his outlap. Nieminen was now 7 seconds clear.



"My first pitstop went very smoothly, and allowed me to just about jump infront of Bastien to take up 6th spot. For the rest of the race I tried to peg the gap to My teammates ahead, who looked like they had some great racing with Greger." - David Williams

At this stage, it was looking comfortable for My3id Gaming in positions 3 - 6, with Nieminen trying to keep a large gap to Huttu behind. As the laps counted down, the gap was getting smaller and smaller as many factors came into play. Huttu, having pitted later had fresher tyres and Nieminen not being in this situation before, got the gap down to 2.3 seconds at one stage. There was a scare for Nieminen in the closing laps as 2 backmarkers collided with eachother (with one going airborne) in front of him. However he was able to squeeze through a gap and get away unscathed.



Nieminen was able to keep the gap and drove his car home bravely to take the checkered flag and 50 points. Hugo Luis finished 3rd, with Klaus Kivekas 4th, Aleksi Elomaa 5th and David Williams 6th.

"Five cars in top-6 was a pretty good result and we gotta be happy with it. I would like to congrulate Jesse too, awesome result, almost perfecto!" - Aleksi Elomaa

"Wow what a race, I still can't believe I won it First of all congrats to Greger for making a ridiculous comeback, he definitely had me sweating at the end there. " - Jesse Nieminen

"I'm currently serving my military service so my practice time is very limited, few days here and there. That's no excuse for this race though, I had enough time to practice the track, just messed up everything. I had been awake for 18h so maybe I was just too tired to focus." Marcus Saari making up some sort of "excuse".

"I still find it hard to believe that we managed to take 5 of the top 6 positions in a field this strong. Everything went pretty much as perfectly for the My3id team as it ever could. What a fantastic way to start the season! I'm really happy that Jesse got the win, he did an amazing job getting the pole and drove a great race, congrats!" - Klaus Kivekas

Hugo Luis was nowhere to be seen after the race, however he dropped in at 4am to say "I'm very happy".



This is an outstanding achievement for My3id Gaming who are relatively unknown in the iRacing world. A huge congratulations goes to Jesse Nieminen who went against all odds to win the season opener. It is also worth noting that Hugo Luis had zero incidents during the whole race, which is incredible at this level of racing with the Williams FW31 at Spa. We are very proud of all our drivers here and we hope to build on this as they go to Phillip Island for round 2.

Race Results

Season Standings

Comments

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BenjiMC (1 year 85 days ago) kickass stuff guys :D

v1rg0 (1 year 86 days ago) Good job guys, it made me want to be out there with you! You've done yourselves and the team proud.

niall09 (1 year 87 days ago) \o/

DaveWS (1 year 87 days ago) \o/

GuRu (1 year 87 days ago) Congratulations! That`s nice to hear and watch how few of the best LFS`s drivers tries other simulators and are able to win the most prestigious event in iRental, especially when it`s the first race of the season! Well done and lets hope it is not the only win for you! :)

zeromussov (1 year 87 days ago) Well done o/