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edits
Changes
→2010 - ? : Never getting bored of SMK
Meanwhile, Angelo then Matthias pass Guillaume again in PAL, and he will end the year as #7 without playing PAL again. Just before visiting Sami in his "SMK Tower" in October, he switches to NTSC again and starts a long series of PRs, including a couple of national records (on Mario Circuit 2 and Vanilla Lake 1 single laps) that are instantly beaten by Florent. Guillaume has grown up and doesn't give up this way, reaching a surprise CI1 NBT World Record a few updates later. He's now part of both PAL & NTSC top 10, like Karel, Pierre and Florent. He spends the whole month of Decemeber playing, PRing and NBTing in a very aggressive way and ends the year overtaking Florent and even [[Oliver Segarra Gonzalez]] to become #4 for the last update of the year. Sami decides to reward this impressive year with the Player of the Year award, that eventually looks much more deserved than if he had got it in 2008. Guillaume is now part of the best Time Trial players in the world and has reached the summit of his carreer.
Meanwhile, Angelo then Matthias pass Guillaume again in PAL, and he will end the year as #7 without playing PAL again. Just before visiting Sami in his "SMK Tower" in October, he switches to NTSC again and starts a long series of PRs, including a couple of national records (on Mario Circuit 2 and Vanilla Lake 1 single laps) that are instantly beaten by Florent. Guillaume has grown up and doesn't give up this way, reaching a surprise CI1 NBT World Record a few updates later. He's now part of both PAL & NTSC top 10, like Karel, Pierre and Florent. He spends the whole month of Decemeber playing, PRing and NBTing in a very aggressive way and ends the year overtaking Florent and even [[Oliver Segarra Gonzalez]] to become #4 for the last update of the year. Sami decides to reward this impressive year with the Player of the Year award, that eventually looks much more deserved than if he had got it in 2008. Guillaume is now part of the best Time Trial players in the world and has reached the summit of his carreer.
== 2010 - ? : Never getting bored of SMK ==
== 2010 - 2011 : Never getting bored of SMK ==
Guillaume doesn't want to have a rest this time. He starts 2010 with an amazing barrier breaker on CI1, becoming the first player ever under 53 seconds there. Sami starts to play NTSC seriously and to threat Guillaume's goal which is passing his Brazilian friend [[Guilherme Arantes]] for #3 NTSC. He manages to achieve this ultimate goal for just two weeks, Sami passing him in the middle of March. Guillaume disappears for a while, before coming back to PAL in the end of April, dreaming about getting his pre-CDM rank back to be inside both PAL and NTSC top 5. He plays regularly and takes advantage of Angelo's unfortunate retirement to become #6 during the summer, just between his two first PAL World Records on Koopa Beach 2, a track where he proves stronger than anyone else for the first time with his personal flatboost strategy. He also beats Karel's old non-NBT single lap (a WR that standed since 2005!) on Rainbow Road in June. Actually, Guillaume keeps on fighting very hard all August long to pass both Matthias and even Sami to reach #4 PAL for the first time ever but fails because of Sami's efforts just before the 2010 CDM.
Guillaume doesn't want to have a rest this time. He starts 2010 with an amazing barrier breaker on CI1, becoming the first player ever under 53 seconds there. Sami starts to play NTSC seriously and to threat Guillaume's goal which is passing his Brazilian friend [[Guilherme Arantes]] for #3 NTSC. He manages to achieve this ultimate goal for just two weeks, Sami passing him in the middle of March. Guillaume disappears for a while, before coming back to PAL in the end of April, dreaming about getting his pre-CDM rank back to be inside both PAL and NTSC top 5. He plays regularly and takes advantage of Angelo's unfortunate retirement to become #6 during the summer, just between his two first PAL World Records on Koopa Beach 2, a track where he proves stronger than anyone else for the first time with his personal flatboost strategy. He also beats Karel's old non-NBT single lap (a WR that standed since 2005!) on Rainbow Road in June. Actually, Guillaume keeps on fighting very hard all August long to pass both Matthias and even Sami to reach #4 PAL for the first time ever but fails because of Sami's efforts just before the 2010 CDM.
This edition is held in Thil again, and Guillaume has to combine the organization, his president status and his participation as a high skilled player now. Maybe all those responsabilities were a bit too much for him: even if CDM 2010 is a popular success for everyone, he ranks only #9 overall just behind Geoffrey and Karel, reaching the quarterfinals only in Time Trial. In the end of the competition, Guillaume joins top players like Karel, Sami or Matthias on Julien Holmière's SMK hack "Super Parigo Kart", just released on catridge for a few dozens of players. The SPK madness lasts a bit before an incredible battle for PAL #3 happens between Florent, Sami, Matthias and Guillaume, almost all September and October long. None of those two is able to reach a better rank than #4 but Guillaume manages to become #4 PAL for the first time of his carrier, and breaks RR non-NBT 5-lap World Record in reaction to Matthias's... NBT PR within less than a week. He's getting closer to #3 in November with some final Ghost Valley 2 efforts, very close to the 5-lap WR, but he gets fed up with PAL and goes to NTSC again since he fell down to #6 while having not played for months here.
This edition is held in Thil again, and Guillaume has to combine the organization, his president status and his participation as a high skilled player now. Maybe all those responsabilities were a bit too much for him: even if CDM 2010 is a popular success for everyone, he ranks only #9 overall just behind Geoffrey and Karel, reaching the quarterfinals only in Time Trial. In the end of the competition, Guillaume joins top players like Karel, Sami or Matthias on Julien Holmière's SMK hack "Super Parigo Kart", just released on catridge for a few dozens of players. The SPK madness lasts a bit before an incredible battle for PAL #3 happens between Florent, Sami, Matthias and Guillaume, almost all September and October long. None of those two is able to reach a better rank than #4 but Guillaume manages to become #4 PAL for the first time of his carrier, and breaks RR non-NBT 5-lap World Record in reaction to Matthias's... NBT PR within less than a week. He's getting closer to #3 in November with some final Ghost Valley 2 efforts, very close to the 5-lap WR, but he gets fed up with PAL and goes to NTSC again since he fell down to #6 while having not played for months here.
2011 begins with a NTSC World Record, a bit like he did in 2010 with CI1. It's on KB2 again (53"16), where he now owns both PAL and NTSC NBT WRs for the 5-lap performance. His first quarter is made of NTSC top level activity, earning all French Records on the three first tracks on the game, reaching top 3 everywhere and even a surprise 59"31 World Record on Ghost Valley 1. Guillaume is #4 NTSC again, which is still his current rank. He also breaks KB2's single lap WR in May, then reaches his first RR single lap WR, before going back seriously on PAL again. On June 18th, he performs an unexcepted and (according to other SMK masters words) surrealistic, even unbeatable 1'26"74 non-NBT WR on RR, just 0"02 from Karel's NBT WR. Then comes a small battle for #4 between Florent and him before CDM. Florent will eventually win this battle after passing Guillaume 3 times within one month and a half!
2011 begins with a NTSC World Record, a bit like he did in 2010 with CI1. It's on KB2 again (53"16), where he now owns both PAL and NTSC NBT WRs for the 5-lap performance. His first quarter is made of NTSC top level activity, earning all French Records on the three first tracks on the game, reaching top 3 everywhere and even a surprise 59"31 World Record on Ghost Valley 1. This doesn't prevent him from driving well on the PAL side: he attends the SMK Belgian Open and gets the bronze trophy for a couple of points ahead of eternal rival [[Harold Christensen]]. Guillaume is #4 NTSC again, which is still his current rank. He also breaks KB2's single lap WR in May, then reaches his first RR single lap WR, before going back seriously on PAL again. On June 18th, he performs an unexcepted and (according to other SMK masters words) surrealistic, even unbeatable 1'26"74 non-NBT WR on RR, just 0"02 from Karel's NBT WR. Then comes a small battle for #4 between Florent and him before CDM. Florent will eventually win this battle after passing Guillaume 3 times within one month and a half!
CDM 2011 is probably Guillaume's best, because even if he ranks 5th like in 2009 and only quarterfinalist in GP, he manages to get a silver medal in Time Trial, like in 2004 but this one looks much more deserved than seven years before. He's also very close to knock Karel out in Match Race quarterfinals (leading 5-2 then 6-5, he falls somewhere in the decisive Rainbow Road round), and reaches his first Battle Mode quarterfinal, even giving the chills to Florent who "only" beats him 7-5. At the end of the awards ceremony, he asks Sami to join him and they both announce their common "2012 project" to celebrate the 20th anniversary of SMK.
Guillaume almost stops playing Time Trial for a while after CDM, letting Florent extending the gap between them so much that he even passes Sami for #3. This is another failed opportunity for Guillaume in his quest for #3 PAL, but he manages to make an unexpected comeback on November to tie Sami's MC1 f-lap WR (11"32) ! Unfortunately, Sami felt obliged to react as soon as possible, leaving Guillaume with "only" a French record there. Just after having lost his CI1 WR to Karel, he moves on his beloved KB2 in December, on the NTSC side, to achieve his "sub 53 project", breaking both M+ standards with a 10"05 single lap and an impressive 52"80, more than half a second away from [[Chris Balch]], the previous WR holder there. Guillaume ends 2011 as #5 PAL and #4 NTSC.
== 2012 - ? : Life changes and new projects ==
2012 starts with a terrible lightning strike from UK: Sami eventually broke RR 5-lap WR using boosts and lowered it to 1'26"70. Just in order to show to Sami he would react the same way as his rival did on MC1 a few weeks ago, Guillaume beats it by 0"02 less than 24 hours after Sami's WR announcement, using NBT too. Guillaume feels he betrayed his own beliefs there and instantly realizes how useless that move was, when Sami improves the WR to 1'26"64 the week after. He swears the battle is not over, but suddenly moves to Bowser Castle 1, a track where he had never been a real killer before, just after Pierre L'Hoëst visited his place and let him challenge his awesome 1'28"69 non-NBT WR ghost. Guillaume manages to steal the NBT WR from Pierre here with one of his most solid runs ever, being the first one to reach the M+ standard here with a 1'27"85 WR. A #2 ranked f-lap 0"01 from the WR and some good Bowser Castle 2 cuts earn him another Player of the Week award, then he stops Time Trial to focus on other video games and meetings with kartmates, like Fun Cup 2012 for example. On a more personal life side, moving to another flat and getting a new job makes him putting SMK away for a while, apart from the SMK 20th Anniversary event he decides to hold in Thil again (and for the last time, according to his own words).
However, his semi-retired situation doesn't prevent him to prove reactive again. Back from a retrogaming meeting that Pierre and other kart fellows attended in the North East of France, he realizes that Sami has just stolen a WR from him again, and not one of the less important: his first PAL NBT WR on KB2 full race, with a 0"10 cut (55"30). Guillaume just cannot accept it and finds time enough to burst Sami's WR and break another barrier and M+ standard with a 54"84 WR which looks as hard to challenge as his 52"80 performed on the NTSC side.
To be continued...
To be continued...