ECR 2014 Post Race Media

[MikeP99Z]

First incident = 13 month probation.
Second incident while on probation = 13 month suspension.

[Fbody383]

Thunder was the worst group for incidents in 2014.

A higher percentage of these incidents occurred during the inverted races.

We need public data. Any reason we can't post up all the contacts in '14? To you vets, is there a "difference" in terms of scoring ability/consequence depending on how/why an incident occurred?

You have my permission to post any incident I was/have been involved in. I believe I would benefit from hearing more (not less) about contact events, what happened, what could have been done differently, etc.

I like the inverts and want to keep them. Hell, I like the full field inverts the best. Not opposed to a 13/13 kind of rule either.

[marshall_mosty]

All,
Let me discuss this with Will, Adrian, and Glenn to see if we can gather all the contact forms and put a running tally of contact for each driver, outcome, and points that were assigned to each incident (for both drivers).

Not for this to be a public "tar and feathering", but if you want to stay off the public list, race clean...

I know that I should have three on my log for this year...

1. MSR-H, deemed at fault during contact with Mark L. in R1.
2. MSR-C, hit from behind by Jack Murray in rattlesnake. Deemed a racing incident.
2. TWS (April), deemed at fault (overdrive into 11) and hit Mark Smith

[AI#97]

Rob, thunder already has that reputation and has for the last 5 years. We hear it a lot as we hang out with the other groups and a lot of upcoming drivers.

In blitz, I have been labeled "dangerous" by few of the drivers because I came from thunder.....granted those few folks are not real important but the point is that the reputation is already there and following the group.

Good to see y'all are taking a look into this but IMHO, its a bit late.

[Suck fumes]

I have always said the inverts are dangerous and a bad idea which is why I don't run them. I've participated in maybe 3-4 of them all of which have resulted in a new dent on my car. And it wasn't because I was being overly aggressive, it's because people do t watch their mirrors or simply don't care and like to block. Now there is always someone who loves the inverts and thinks they are the best thing ever invented but those are the guys that don't have to start DFL in the inverts. They are not a good idea especially in large groups. There is a reason why the other groups don't do them.

[AllZWay]

That is simply not true.... I raced for many years with ZERO contact in inverts. Patience is the key to no contact in inverts.

The inverts are the most fun races. You have to learn to race with folks you don't always know what how they react.

[Fbody383]

This should be a thread of it's own... more ECR video would be nice, but since we're on a roll...

They are not a good idea especially in large groups. There is a reason why the other groups don't do them.

Yup, wouldn't want to have really large fields, or long races where traffic management comes into play... might as well just TT and issue DQs and ejections for any contact.

Aaron, I understand your sentiment but it IS racing. If we have decided that there is again too much contact, then as a group let's provide evidence and education to the group.

But I'll not let stand a double standard of "hey, it was in a group of 5 Show Ponies and one of them took my nose off but we were racing for the win" versus "that rookie backmarker got swamped and should have seen me when I stuffed it inside them, and then had to dive off track to avoid them, spun and get collected."

You tell me where the line is: if you haven't seen the video from TWS the 5 and 70 are racing into T1, a hard defensive move, contact and lost position. Behind them the 55 moves several feet to the left and hits the 39 broadside. 4 cars racing - 2 separate incidents, arguably 4 levels of driver skills - how do you call it after the fact?

I'm perfectly fine with strengthening and enforcing more penalties - but i will not put up with a driver taking advantage of another driver because of it.

Ok, propose a solution - we all like easy but what if the inverts scored points based on position gained without contact instead of overal finishing order, tie would go to the car starting farthest to the rear. Winner gets a win - biggest mover gets the points.

[mach1]

That is simply not true.... I raced for many years with ZERO contact in inverts. Patience is the key to no contact in inverts.

The inverts are the most fun races. You have to learn to race with folks you don't always know what how they react.

Patience in a 15min sprint race is hard to come by :-/
Make the inverts 30m races?

[JMR81]

When I posted the video from Eagle Canyon I never envisioned the discussion taking this direction. It seems there is no other video to show what was going on and why the situation developed the way it did. Every contact that Jack has been involved this year except for one whether he was giving or receiving at fault or not took place on lap one. If you look at the videos available you almost always see the lead SI cars in the mix with the AI cars by turn one the exception being TWS CCW. Imho it appears that the group representative for
AI/CMC/SI although SI doesn't have a representative were caught off guard by the performance of the SI cars. I don't race anymore but I watched all of the AI/SI races and the close proximity of the SI cars to the AI cars on the start both standing and rolling is too close. I've watched video of almost every start this year from Jacks car and its almost the same every race msrh, msrc, twscw, hallett,ec are the same. You throw in the inverts and it's multiplied,faster cars coming up on slower cars at the start and somebody gets hit somebody bails and then hits another car coming back on the track. It's a problem that's created by not allowing enough spacing between groups. Increase the space between groups. I also feel the the length of the race contributes to some of the incident whether its an Si car flying through the dirt at eagles canyon or a AI car punting a SI car in turn 4 at TWS or cars going 3 wide through rattlesnake after they have been asked not too, every one trying to get to the front on the first lap.
Look at the qualifying times for the SI cars compared to the AI cars one row between them is not a sufficient gap for a standing start and on the rolling start whoever sets the pace in SI need to recognize when they are too close. One solution would be to grid based on qualifying time, we did that one time this year and it worked fine with AI/SI cars why we didn't continue I don't know. I think Marshall, Glenn and whoever else is a decision maker should take a look at how the races are started. Contact is going to happen, why it happens isn't always black and white. The 13/13 is great for something like TT. If you had it in SM you wouldn't have anyone left at the end of the year.

I think if you were to post the contact forms with names and car numbers deleted so that every one can see what happened would be beneficial. Putting up an offenders list is useless except to embarrass some one. We've never named anyone who hit us in a public forum and never will.

For all you fans of the inverted start I've stated before I'm not a supporter , Jack he doesn't care one way or the other, Lets have a real invert and put CMC in front and see how that works out for every one.

any way my 2 cents just an opinion.

[Suck fumes]

Navigating traffic is not the issue. I've done this long enough to know how to race clean and pass people safely. I'm not afraid or against going through traffic. The biggest issue is blocking. There is a big difference in protecting your line ahead of time and waiting till the guy is next to you then moving over to block. After all like you said the inverts don't count for points so why block? Especially blocking out of class cars. I can't tell you how many times SI cars get stuck behind an AI car that doesn't want to admit he is slower than a car with 100 less HP and has too big of an ego to let them by when they earn the spot but then get motored down the straight then parked in the turns.

I don't make boneheaded moves or take chances on passes I know I can't make either....cough Corey.... Cough cough! Haha.

I'm all for hard racing but when you have a very short race and everyone is fighting to get to the front from the back it gets a little rediculous.