24 hours 05 minutes 41 seconds...

[ryosuke]

thats the total racing time which LFS displayed today afternoon for our TPS team 2 XRR...


no, your eyes don't fool you, it was time again for a 24 hour endurance race.
yesterday, shortly past 16 o'clock CET, 34 drivers on two servers nailed it after the pacecar had entered the pits, to engage in a battle against each other, fatigue and reliability.

as usual, the competitors were spread across all classes with 22 GTRs, two XFRs, one LX6, two FZ5s, two FXOs, one XRT and even three GTis.

team TPS send three cars, two XRR and one GTi. i took the challenge in the GTi with jaakima, dee and one of our newest members heinz. we qualified 2nd in our class and hoped to at least keep that position till the end.

one FXO team from czechoslovakia was pretty brave, they entered with two drivers only!

our two competitors in the GTi class were both from team burnoutcrew and because we have very friendly relations to them, we invited them over into our TS-channel to take on the challenge together in good spirits. cheering each other up during the seemingly neverending race and making sure nobody fell asleep during the night shift..
so with plenty of people in the channel, the race never got boring even if the gaps between the cars were quite big most of the time.

i had the honour to drive the start, and it was quite an experience. the competitors were still close and the faster GTRs came to overtake in huge groups. you hardly ever had time to concentrate on driving fast, since you were looking into your mirrors all the time and making room for the GTRs.

surprisingly, i could overtake team BC1 pretty early and managed to put some distance between them and us. after two hours, when i came in for the first stop and driver change, the distance was about 30 seconds.

our second driver, ralf, could extend that to over a minute. mostly due to benjamin, the second BC1 driver, being rammed by a GTR and the following extra pit stop and a drive through for speeding.

then dee took his first stint and was involved in a few accidents that put us back almost two minutes behind BC1. but at leats he could stay ahead of BC2, who were closely behind us.

our fourth driver, heinz, then did a pretty good job of keeping the distances. especially since the BC1 GTi was now in the hands some seriously quick drivers.

then we started into the long night with the help red bull, coffee or short naps. in regard to positions, nothing much happened from now on. the quick guys from BC1 slowly increased their lead, but we could keep their second team in check.

our XRR teams were also doing well. although the FZRs appearently had a benefit, we were the quickest XRR teams most of the time.

in the middle of the night, our XRR driver el barto provided for great amusement, when he, in the middle of a three stint turn, entered the pits for his second stop and managed to run to the toilet and take a pee in the time it took the pitcrew to refuel. he might not have washed his hands, but he kept the position!

as the sun rose, i was back in the car for my third and last stint and managed to overtake BC1 for the second time...they had already lapped us however, so it didn't really matter. although it was nice to see another GTi on the track again.
during my last laps, i had difficulties keeping my eyes open and afterwards i was absolutely knackered. so i went to bed with the intention of getting up at half past three to be there during the last laps, but then i slept till 8 pm.

while i slept, my team secured the 2nd position in our class and the XRR drivers did a pretty good job, too, coming 8 and 11 overall. places 1-7 were only FZRs though!
all in all the best event that i have ever taken part in, the team spirit was amazing.

the brave czechens did the most impressive job though, they finished in front of an FZ5 with their FXO!

you can view the complete result here:
http://24h.lfs-tracker.de/

[Buba]

WTF! My respect! I'd like to get into some more serious stuff myself, but my Girlfriend gets rather nasty rather quickly, I guess...

[GraemeH]

As soon as i get the spare Supra seat bolted on to my current chair mount, i'll be able to play LFS for more than an hour without wanting a new spine..

24 hours is nuts, what if the server guy tripped over the cable

[ryosuke]

Originally Posted by GraemeH

24 hours is nuts, what if the server guy tripped over the cable

he'd get a friendly visit by 65 angry drivers.

mmh, you comment made me think about the amount of drivers for the first time...34 cars with mostly 4 drivers each makes for about 130 drivers!

and the greatest thing is, no team has given up! they all finished.
(of course it was allowed to rejoin after a disconnect or really bad crash, but you lost a lap. the tracker counted all the laps independantly from the server).

[andyhui01]

Originally Posted by Buba

WTF! My respect! I'd like to get into some more serious stuff myself, but my Girlfriend gets rather nasty rather quickly, I guess...