Friday, August 30, 2013

Ready on the Red...

Over the span of the past couple of events, we’ve tweaked the start- within the limitations of the technology and mechanics. The pre-course briefing addresses this change, as does this BlogPost.

Specifically, we have eliminated the Christmas tree count down. Under the law of unintended consequences, what was to be the application of Drag Racing starts, we ended up with a sub-plot: guys gaming the reaction time component and risking the false start infraction and a penalty of five seconds. For what? At best, we’re talking about tenths of seconds.

So, now the system has been adjusted to go from staged to green in approximately 1.5 seconds. The positive upshot has been the virtual elimination of false starts. In fact, in Lexington, we had only two instances and they were in races with rookies. The operant word is approximately in that the system is designed to be random, to avoid the gaming component. See previous posts on this subject for a better understanding of track rules on false starts.

In the absence of a pressure switch for 42 pounds, this might be the final solution. Once again, the best way to avoid a penalty is to go on the siren.

If you’d like to be heard on this subject, once again, the best way to communicate is on the Chuck B’s Blog or send me an email directly. It’s our preference to avoid making any changes during the course of  the season; however the response has definitely been in the positive and the results bear this out.



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