ISE so far...
Back in April, ISE was about to get underway, and no one was really sure as to how the series would pan out. Well, with one round remaining in the championship, I believe it's finally time to bring those unaware up to speed with what's happened in the 5 rounds since our last post on ISE.
ISE R1 - Beijing
The season opener of the first season of ISE was a rather eventful one!
With 7 runners, the start of the season looked promising, with Tyler taking pole in RNvolt's first race alongside Miles who qualified 2nd after mistakes from both ZERO cars on their qualifying laps which still landed them 3rd and 4th on the grid.
The first lap was filled with action, as the short turn to the 90 degree right-hander of turn 1 meant the cars closed up quickly, meaning Will lost his rear wing and Ricky his front wing.
Perhaps the most exciting element of the race was the battle between Tyler and Lorenzo, which lasted for several laps. Every element of a classic battle was there: late braking, switchbacks, and even some contact at times! It all came to an end as Lorenzo lost his front-wing and was forced to pit.
Tyler later pitted also, wanting a fresh set of tyres, allowing Miles, who was planning to go without stopping, moved into the lead. However, on lap 21, Miles saw that his energy level was low, and so opted to pit, going against his initially planned strategy. Locking up on old tyres meant he collided with the wall at the pit entry, throwing away a potential win in only his second race across the different ISAM series. And so, Tyler strolled to victory in China, followed by the other two of the remaining cars that were running: Josh Cresswell and Ricky Davies.
ISE R2 - Long Beach
Round 2 brought similar challenges as were discovered during the first race of the season. Despite the cars lack of straight line speed or cornering speed, the brakes were still relatively ineffective, causing difficulty for many drivers.
Once again, the front row was Tyler on pole and Miles in 2nd. The opening lap promised another eventful race, as Miles gained a better launch off the start and Tyler was forced to go defensive into the first major braking zone. Miles attempted a switchback after turn 1, but the bumpy street surface caused Tyler's car to bounce into the Sim Sport car, slowing both cars and allowing Will and Josh to close in, though Josh came off badly as he lost his front wing on the high kerb of turn 3. As Will pushed to catch Miles and Tyler, he locked up into turn 9, also losing his front wing. Both cars needed repairs, almost colliding as they both dived into the pits.
The race then became somewhat processional, as the cars each had large gaps to one another and were all lapping at a similar pace. That was until Will lost control, spinning his car at turn 3 and retiring abruptly. Two laps later, Miles made a critical mistake and oversped into turn 1 as he pushed to try and catch Tyler, losing both his front-wing and front-right wheel. Another long period of little action followed, once again broken by a driver error as Miles reclaimed 2nd position from his teammate, Josh, when he locked up into turn 1, losing his front-wing. Only a lap later, Miles would retire after a peculiar incident where his car caught on a wall unexpectedly and his engine immediately cut out.
And so, after a dominant performance, Tyler took his second win in a row for the RNvolt E-team, with Josh following in 2nd.
Link to race results here.
ISE R3 - Monaco
And now for perhaps the most exciting race of the first season in ISE so far!
As Tyler did not attend the race, he was unable to continue his streak of pole positions, allowing Daniel Calvo, who had competed in the season opener, to assume P1 on the grid, followed by the two Sim Sports of Josh and Miles, then the Zeros of Will and Lorenzo. Despite the reputation of Monaco for turn 1 incidents, the cars all got underway cleanly, with Miles quickly losing positions to both Will and Lorenzo. Josh immediately went on the attack against Daniel, searching desperately for a way past the pole sitter. Unfortunately, this backfired as he spun at the harbour chicane, falling to last place as he almost became beached on the anti-cut kerbing.
It soon became apparent that there were two battles developing, as Will hunted down Daniel, having been promoted into 2nd position by Josh's mistake, and Miles against Lorenzo, with Josh catching them both rapidly. Soon, however, the mistakes that were becoming common to ISE started rolling in, as the driver pushed. First, Josh lost his front-wing at the Casino square on lap 4, having to pit. Next, on lap 5, Daniel locked up his rears into turn 5 (above left), allowing Will to pass and their battle to truly begin.
Lorenzo retired on lap 8 due to connection issues, releasing Miles into some clean air, and on lap 11 he allowed Josh to pass cleanly since the Sim Sport team did not want to hold up their faster driver that weekend. Meanwhile, the battle continued for the lead, with more mistakes appearing. On lap 12, Will locked up into turn 1, losing his fron wing. It appeared that Will no longer would have a chance at the win, but as he approached sector 2, he regained the lead, after Daniel had locked the rear brakes again, this time at the Grand Hotel Hairpin, and lost his rear wing. Both cars continued, however, opting not to pit and instead crawl around at a reduced pace, considering that Miles was so far off the pace and Josh's first lap error meant he was relatively far behind.
Josh quickly closed the gap to the two damaged cars ahead, with Will struggling with understeer due to his missing front-wing, and Daniel fighting for rear traction, as he instead had no rear-wing. This eventually resulted in a complete loss of control on lap 14 as he launched over the crest at Casino Square, spinning directly in front of Will, who took evasive action to move back into the lead. To add to Daniel's woes, on lap 16 he lost his front-wing after locking up at turn 1, falling to P3 as Josh's attention moved towards catching Will. This charge was cut short quickly, though, as Josh spun at turn 7, losing 2nd to Daniel till he went deep into the harbour chicane, and Josh finally passed Daniel.
By lap 19, Josh had caught Will and was pressuring him, forcing him to once again lock up into turn 1. This time Will elected to take the escape road and avoid further damage to his car, resulting in him falling to 3rd. Will eventually repassed Daniel for 2nd place, who then pitted to persue the bonus points for fastest lap, knowing that his 3rd place was secure.
Despite the fact he was so far behind and no one really cared at this point, on lap 20, Miles had locked up into turn 1, going one further than when both Will and Daniel had made a similar error, losing both his front-wing and front-right wheel. When pitting for repairs did not work, Miles continued at a snail's pace to the finish on only 3 wheels.
To contrast Miles' poor weekend, his teammate, Josh Cresswell, enjoyed finally taking victory in ISE, the first for Sim Sport in ISE.
Link to race results here.
ISE R4 - New York
In round 4 of the ISE championship, ISAM returned to the streets of New York, not having raced there since round 9 of IS1 Season 2. On pole, for the first time, was Miles, having bounced back from his sub-par performance in Monaco. A new team made their debut in New York, with driver Ricardo Bohadana Martins for the Red Bull E-team, qualifying 2nd on the grid after a dispute during qualifying where Sim Sport challenged the team over their use of track limits.
Spurred on by missing out on pole position in his first ISE race, Ricardo made a bold start, passing Miles who struggled, as now seemed usual, in the opening lap as he fell to last place. The order was now Ricardo, Tyler, Josh and then Miles going into lap 2, though this quickly changed as Tyler, who had had little practice at the circuit before the race, locked up into the main hairpin in sector 1, spinning out and conceding positions to both Sim Sports. The field split into 2 pairs, as Tyler caught and started to challenge him for position Josh and Miles pulled away as he closed in on Ricardo. However, the battle for 3rd was cut short as the two driver collided and soon after Tyler retired due to disconnection.
On lap 7, Miles finally caught up to Ricardo, and so began an exciting battle as the cars exchanged positions multiple times in the following few laps. Once again, a battle was cut short as Ricardo pulled into the pits to retire, leaving behind in chat: "Gotta go for lunch. Good race guys :D" Slightly confused, but glad that he now held the lead, Miles moved into the lead of race, with a considerable gap to the car behind. The Sim Sport team did have scare on lap 21, as Miles closed in to lap Josh when he had decided to pit on that lap. In his haste to pit, Josh locked up badly directly in front of Miles, who was attempting to gain a slipstream, almost resulting in a collision between the two teammates.
The race then continued fairly uneventfully till Josh suddenly collided with the wall at the main hairpin, hitting the barrier hard, as he pushed for the 2 point bonus given to the car with the fastest lap. This now allowed Miles to take his first win in an ISAM league race - taking the hatrick of the pole, win and fastest lap - as well as the team's first 1-2 finish.
Link to race results here.
ISE R5 - Haywards Heath
And now we come to the penultimate round of the first season of the ISE championship, and once again in a location that had not been seen in ISAM for a long while: a revamped Haywards Heath, last seen in the first season of IS1.
For the third time this season, the front row was Tyler on pole followed by Miles in 2nd, then followed by the 2 Zero cars and Josh in P5. The race began cleanly, despite cars aggressively searching for a way to pass, but positions remained the same through to sector 2, when Will had a bad exit, costing him 2 positions and dropping him to last place. Lorenzo, now in P3, went on the attack against Miles, who had already fallen back from Tyler considerably on the first lap.
As they entered the 2nd lap, Lorenzo moved to the inside of turn 2, pulling off a swift overtake on Miles as he struggled with his rear brakes locking. Behind both cars, Will pulled off an almost identical manoeuvre on the other Sim Sport car, meaning the order now stood as Tyler, Lorenzo, Miles, Will and Josh. Lorenzo's charge was cut short, his stream of bad luck in ISE not seemingly not stopping anytime soon, as he lost his rear-wing in the tricky chicane at turn 4. The 3 cars behind quickly caught up to him, but Miles struggled to find a way past the damaged car without risking damage to his own, so Lorenzo held position, for now.
The large kerb at the start of sector 2 finally stopped Lorenzo's attempts to hold position, as he lauched across the kerb whilst fighting for rear traction, bouncing against the Sim Sport of Miles before landing in front of his fellow Zero driver, Will, who, as a result, lost his front wing and P4 to Josh. Will elected not to pit, however, and continued despite the effect of the damage on his pace. Josh now started to push, knowing that a good finish would increase his lead in the driver championship, but this resulted in a mistake on lap 9 at turn 4, similar to Lorenzo, which damaged his front-wing and suspension, meaning the Sim Sport bottomed out and could not continue.
Once again, bad luck struck for Tyler as he lost connection whilst leading by a huge margin, meaning that Miles inherited the lead as he had done in New York. The race then became similar to Long Beach, with only 2 cars remaining and a large gap both on the track and in pace, due to the damage Will had gained in the incident with Lorenzo. Both drivers' concentrations began to slip as they continued to lap the circuit, with both drivers making pitstops for fresh rubber and to replenish their electrical energy. Miles began to push for the fastest lap of the race, achieving it on lap 23.
It was a rather muted victory, but a victory nonetheless, for Miles as he also took the lead of the driver's championship, with 25 points for the win and 2 bonus points for his fastest lap. Race celebrations were peculiar, however, with Miles' car coming to a stop to wait for Will, only to be rear ended a high speed and both cars fly into the barriers!
Standings
And so, here are the standings going into the final race of the season at Donington Park:
Drivers Championship 1. Miles Wheway 98 POINTS 2. Josh Cresswell 97 POINTS 3. Tyler Nyerges 75 POINTS 4. Will Barnes 53 POINTS 5. Lorenzo De Ciutiis 23 POINTS 6. Daniel Calvo 19 POINTS 7. Ricky Davies 18 POINTS 8. Ricardo Martins 13 POINTS Constructors Championship 1. Sim Sport 195 POINTS 2. Zero Media 76 POINTS 3. RNvolt 75 POINTS 4. Zero Academy 37 POINTS 5. Red Bull eTeam 13 POINTS
This does mean that the winner of the constructors title has been decided, but the fight for 2nd in the standing is still very close!
