Thunder - 2014 Contact Issues

[BlueFirePony]

Here's an article I found interesting wrt passing:
http://www.windingroad.com/articles/...ing-etiquette/

[ShadowBolt]

Here is all of our videos. If you look at ECR R3. I did not get a good start but way better than John. If you watch at 6:35 I'm even with John. Did I have the right to the line or did John or did Tyler? I have no idea but I know as soon as we got half way to track-out in turn 1 things were going really bad in a hurry. In my mind I'm even with (or almost even certainly past his door) John and on the inside of turn 2 so I assumed the line was mine. Tyler is pushing John down and John would have hit me had I not bailed out. Please tell me what I should have done and who's fault it would have been if I had held my line all the way to turn two? I'm asking because I really don't know. Maybe it would have been my fault. If so please tell me why? I really do want to know what I should have done. These decisions are made in the blink of an eye.

https://drive.google.com/folderview?...lBCSVhIb1owSW8

JJ

[AI#97]

Jerry, keep both hands on the wheel more and replace your diff or check that your right rear shock isn't "topping out". If you can keep that tire on the ground and under power, you will be able to get on the power earlier out of the corners.

[ShadowBolt]

Jerry, keep both hands on the wheel more and replace your diff or check that your right rear shock isn't "topping out". If you can keep that tire on the ground and under power, you will be able to get on the power earlier out of the corners.

A bad habit I have been trying to get better. Years ago I was even worse. I have felt like the T2R was not right ever since I installed it.

JJ

[MikeP99Z]

SCCA - Each competitor has a right to racing room, which is generally defined as sufficient space on the marked racing surface that under racing conditions, a driver can maintain control of his car in close quarters.

NASA GTS - Section 2.2 - Modified "racing room" definition: In the NASA CCR, under section 25.4.2 "Punting," the rules define "racing room" as: "at least three-quarters of one car width." For racing between two or more GTS cars, "racing room" is hereby defined as: "at least one car width plus 6 inches."

I prefer allowing a car width of racing room.

Have I used the 3/4 rule to my advantage? - sure.

Has it been used against me? - sure.

[Al Fernandez]

Excellent discussion so far. From my point of view the primary purpose of the 3/4 width is to stress the responsibility to the overtaking driver and to make it easier to establish whether or not sufficient room was given. On my earlier point, I think very often overtaking drivers do not have enough grip in reserve to pinch it tighter to avoid contact. In any case regardless of 3/4, 1, 1+6"...thats not what is at the root cause of contact. The root cause is overtaking drivers attempting low percentage moves. The solution is not making it more difficult to establish fault, nor is it to shift fault to the overtaken driver rather to have consistently applied and escalating in severity penalties. James nailed it. This is my opinion as a driver only. As an official my opinion is irrelevant, the rules as written are what matter lol

[drwright]

There is no reason I have to put my car 1/4 car width in the dirt to avoid contact and there be no penalty assessed to the driver who put me there if I had rights to position. My personal feeling is I want the curb to be excluded from the racing surface as well.

I completely agree with Glenn’s comment above. This is amateur racing. NASA is allowing the leading car to defend its position by increasing the risk for the overtaking car and making it the overtaking cars responsibility to make a safe pass. Some competitors will follow the rules as written while others will allow more room than required by the rules to reduce the risk of contact. When I can (which is almost always) I allow 1 full car width when being passed. It is not worth the risk of damage to me.

The Midwest/Great Lakes regions have had the same race directors for years which has been very good. They know the history of the drivers very well. At every drivers meeting they reinforce penalties will be handed out per the CCR and will be increased if necessary. For the 2 regions there were 10 DQ’s for at fault contact with body damage that resulted in nine 1 race suspensions and one 2 race suspension. Six incidents in one region and four incidents in the other region. There were at least that many DQ’s for at fault contact without damage. Another thing they told us this year at every event was that the ¾ rule only applied in the turns. On a straight you weren’t allowed to force the overtaking car 2 wheels off. You must give one full car width on the straights. This was something new this year.

In CMC the last 2/3 of the year we have been running 3 races per weekend with the third race being inverted. The races are 25-35 minutes long. The inverted races are definitely the most talked about race of the weekend. We haven’t had more contact in the inverted races. I definitely feel shorter races put more pressure on to attempt passes that may not be there that can cause contact. The longer races allow a little more patience to let things sort out and still be able to make passes and move to the front. Most of our bigger wrecks occur at the start when people are trying to gain numerous positions on the first lap.

I also agree with Jerry and David 100% on video. Get it and run it all the time. If you can have both forward and backward facing video. I was amazed how bad my recollection of what happened in my mind versus what the video showed had happened. Now I won’t even talk about an incident until I watch the video first. Plus it is the single best learning tool for improving you’re racing if you are willing to study it.

[Fbody383]

The solution is not making it more difficult to establish fault, nor is it to shift fault to the overtaken driver rather to have consistently applied and escalating in severity penalties. James nailed it. This is my opinion as a driver only. As an official my opinion is irrelevant, the rules as written are what matter lol

But you are allowed an opinion and we can change the rule which you will enforce fairly.

[Fbody383]

Here's an article I found interesting wrt passing:
http://www.windingroad.com/articles/...ing-etiquette/

Paging Mike Patterson and other SCCA experienced guys.

How does SCCA intepret their passing/share-the-road rule(s):

First, notice that SCCA does not allow blocking at all, while NASA allows one blocking move. Other sanctioning bodies may have other subtle variations. Many drivers run with multiple sanctioning bodies and it isn’t realistic to re-program your sub-conscious mind based on which group is sanctioning the race you’re in. So, what to do?