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[eh~AAssie]

SL1 Round 9: eh vs hal|

This match started on Island, on a technical, but not a map where mistakes cost very much. This was the perfect setting for rounds where positions change all the way. This was so in eh's qualifying, and it happened again in this match.
Gandos, Nanteq and I played all maps for the elk hunters, while Limp, Sascha and Raptor played this map for henker am lenker. The first round was a nervous one, and all players made mistakes. I finished first, but hal| got the point. I won the next five rounds too, being consistent at low 56's. And this seemed to inspire my team mates, and eh took a 4-2 lead. Then Nanteq was able to beat me, before the posistions were reversed again in the next round; 6-2. Then Limp got a phone call and we had to wait a short minute (or was it at 5-2?). At this moment I lost my touch, and even though Nanteq won a couple of rounds, I kept on letting my team mates down. Raptor got into a good rhytm, and dragged his team mates with him. hal| took point after point with good driving, while eh made nervous mistakes. hal| caught up and tied the score 6-6. What happened next is quite typical for such a development on a map: hal| smelled a victory and eh was determined. The result was that eh made a pretty nice team effort (I overtook Nanteq in the last turn ), while all the hal| players crashed at some point. 7-6 for the hunters!

Then we moved on to coast. This map needed about 10 more CPs, so shame on you Mazzy!!! t!m and BigDaddy came in for Sascha and Limp. Especially BigDaddy was very good on this map, but also t!m had his moments. Gandos and Nanteq were quite consistent for us, while I and Raptor seemed to be the weak link on the two teams. BigDaddy won a lot of rounds, often followed by Gandos, Nanteq and t!m (not necessarily in that order). I crashed a lot in the first part of the map. And even though I almost caught up with the field, I usually just missed out on securing a point for my team. So when I finally got my act together towards the end of this map, hal| already had a good lead and deserved to win 7-4. They should be thanking BigDaddy right now for this (very consistent on 1.03/1.04).

Last we went on to the bay lap map (first map by Rob in the league, so congrats!). This map had many difficult jumps and turns, and it was proven again and again that even though you made a mistake, you could still end up on the podium after three laps because you knew that others would crash too (and omg did they crash ). BigDaddy stayed while Sascha and Limp join the hal| squad again. The first round was a bad one for most players. The only one driving well was Nanteq, who had Sascha and Limp a few seconds behind him. Towards the end of lap 3 I thought hal| would get the point, but due to a good and lucky last turn, I managed to reach to finish line just inside 15 seconds behind Nanteq to tie the round. In the next round I didn't mess up so much, and I followed Nanteq to the line to give eh the lead. In the next round it was my turn and Gandos did a good run too, 2-0. Limp had a very nice jump over the building in this round, jumping past me and hitting the far edge of it, making half a flip before sliding towards the CP upside down I was very careful on this jump to avoid such accidents In the fourth round things looked so good for my team, as I was in front of Sascha, followed by my two team mates. But what happens? Sascha makes and amazing last turn when I drive safely and beat me with 0.02 seconds. Nanteq manage to crash in the last turn. Luckily for us he barely beats BigDaddy at the line for the 5th spot and eh got the point. Then we got another tie, as I and Nanteq finished 1st and 3rd and Sascha, Limp and BD also made good runds. Gandos slid off the very last jump and made the finish line just outside the time limit. After another point for eh (with a good run by Gandos), hal| finally got a well deserved point, before eh wrapped it up with the best team performence of the map. 5-1 the final score. On this map both teams seemed quite equal, but eh was a lot more consistent.

Final score: 2-1 to eh (7-6, 4-7, 5-1). A huge GG to hal| for making this a very good match with lots of good performences by many players!

It's so nice to have Gandos and Nanteq back. It's been a blast racing with them the last three matches. And winning is a very good feeling too
A few thoughts to wrap up the season at the end:

The season started with a lot of fun and an incredibly annoying loss on the very last point to SFO. Then we lacked players for rounds 2-5, something our results shows We finally got a win in round 4 with where guom, Kiff and Rustray overdid themselves (maybe the match I'm the most proud of this season). We lost to RG (what a surprise), but had a lot of fun and close fights. But in that match only two players had good days on each map, and Nanteq's CD was still broken. During the last matches we had a full squad, and we started our climb out of the relegation zone to finish in the top half of the table. I had a lot of fun this season and all teams were fair and fun to play with. I'd like to make a small apology to LM for our behavior after our match. We were just really disappointed in our own performence At last I'd like to add that it's been a blast to watch Nanteq taking the step from a good player to an exceptional racer this season! VGG mate!

If all the participants of the league had just a little of all the fun I had this season, then SL1 was a grand success!! GG to all!

Now, TMO and SL1 cup here we come!!!

AAssie