Racing Like Golf?
In golf, especially professional golf, players are expected, and most of the time do, call their own penalties. I’m sure in amateur golf that doesn’t happen nearly as often. We’ve all seen Caddy Shack the movie, right. “That doesn’t count, I was interfered with…”, said Ted Knight. Anyway, it’s called the honor system.
What if in racing, drivers called their own penalties for an incident? Ty Majeski is one of the most recent examples when he “tapped out” for an incident where he made contact with his competitor and rather than having both drivers sent to the rear, he opted to take the blame. That was the honorable thing to do.
One could say this is not to be unduly praised as it is the right thing to do, but it might be considered rare in the sport of racing. It seems that everyone sees what happened as someone else’s fault, most of the time.
I think deep down, everyone knows who played a larger part in most incidences. And sometimes it’s just a racing thing where someone gets in too deep thinking the other driver’s spotter will surely tell them, “inside, inside…”. But maybe not.
It would be nice if there were more of the golf mentality in racing. I know personally I get annoyed when I see over-aggressive drivers take out other drivers and then try to pass off the blame. And the boos from the grand stands tells how the fans feel.
What if they did take the blame? I honestly believe that not only would their fellow racers respect them more and give more room on the track in certain situations, the fans would appreciate the gesture and root them on more aggressively. Hey, we could all use a little racing love, right?
The more mature drivers could set an example for the younger, up and coming, drivers. Then the sport would grow to be more racer and fan friendly. I really think both the racers and the fans come to the race track to see good hard racing and not overly aggressive tactics and fighting. You can tune in to MMA or go watch a hockey fight that turns into a game at some point if that is what you are into.
I wished more racers would take the high road like Ty and just tap out when they need to. He gained a lot of respect when he did that and you would too. And here is another thought.
What if the driver really doesn’t have a good idea about what happened? Many times they need to look at replays on Youtube to really understand the situation. So, if the spotter, or other team member, or even the officials, were to talk to the offending driver and tell them hey, you were the guy, it would help them make the decision to tap out.
Nobody wants to be “the guy”, but sometimes in life we just are. Suck it up and admit when you are wrong and get on with life. Resistance to admitting doing someone wrong hangs in the air much longer than admitting that we have made a mistake, trust me on that.
It takes guts and maturity to “man” up and do what is right. Do you think of yourself as tough? Then show it. It takes a very mature person to admit being wrong, so how mature and tough are you, really? Think about it.
If you have comments or questions about this or anything racing related, send them to my email address: chassisrd@aol.com or mail can be sent to Circle Track, Senior Tech Editor, 1733 Alton Parkway, Suite 100, Irvine, CA.
Becoming A Setup Guy
Hello,
I’ve been helping a team with their racecar for a couple seasons now and I have reached the point where I want to become more involved with the actual setup of the car and become more help to the team. I love reading the chassis tech articles, but want to study and learn more.
Do you have any helpful resources or ideas that I can pick up and speed the learning process up. And I know that there isn’t magical formulas out there and I know every car, track, and driver is different.
Eric Wise
What I did when I first started wanting to be the setup guy was study all of the books and magazine articles I could find. When I finally thought I knew enough, I asked to do the setup for the next race.
It was impossible to talk the crew into doing that, we were leading the tight points race at the time and it was late season. I talked the owner into convincing the team I could do it. Then when I changed the setup, it was horrible. What I thought I knew was all wrong.
Then we didn’t have the resources we have now. There is much better information out there from not only Circle Track, but the companies that specialize in offering the equipment teams use to setup the cars as well as the actual car builders.
Back in the day some twenty years ago, the builders often learned new technology from the teams who raced their cars and then that technology eventually found its way into the new designs of race cars. It is still that way today, but the builders are much more eager to learn than they were back then.
For you in your situation, show the team you have studied the current trends and try to learn how they are developing their setups. Make small inroads into helping with your team’s setup. Little gains and victories can add up to them having much more confidence in your abilities.
When you have learned enough and shown you have knowledge, the day will come when you will be trusted to make the setup decisions. For most teams, those decisions are usually made by a group of two or three, but being in with that group and being able to make a difference is its own reward.
Track Safety Comments
Dear Mr. Bolles,
I have read with interest your story and the follow up comments with regards to Track Safety, or lack there of. The incident at Toledo Speedway was not only disappointing for someone who is involved with a safety team but embarrassing as well.
I am a key member of a Safety Team here in Canada called the Canadian Motorsports Response Team. We are a volunteer team comprised of Doctors, Nurses, Certified Paramedics and Fire Fighters. We currently provide fire, rescue and medical services for the Formula 1 Grand Prix of Canada, the Grand Prix of Trois Rivieres, the World Rally Cross Championship in Trois Rivieres as well as coverage for Castrol Raceway in Edmonton, Alberta and, this year we became the travelling Safety Team for the APC United Late Model Series here in Ontario.
Our training is done all year round with our dedicated group with the aid of our Formula 1 tub, our various racing seats and our three stock cars. One has been converted to a “cut” chassis, one is a live fire trainer and the third is a rolling chassis for practicing driver removal without cutting as well familiarization. We are also Holmatro Motorsports Instructors and Certified ANSUL Motorsports Distributors and Instructors.
When we arrive at any given track for an event our staff wears all the appropriate PPE, our trucks are equipped with a full array of fire suppression equipment (portable fire extinguishers, 65 gallon foam unit), extrication equipment including hydraulic tools, air tools and cordless tools and, advanced life support medical equipment.
Some may see this as overkill, however 99.9% of tracks here in Canada have NO properly equipped or trained Safety Teams! A pick up with a couple of fire extinguishers and a first aid service for medical is about you get here. If drivers express concerns the response is “well, you don’t have to race here”!
Recently, a driver lost his life at a dirt track in Quebec. His car was hit in the roof area by another car and it was a 20 minute wait for the local Fire Department to arrive to cut the driver out. The lack of even basic training is upsetting!
In 2015, key members of our organization who are members of the International Council of Motorsport Sciences (theICMS.org) began hosting a Race Track Safety Program (RaceTrackSafety.net) at the PRI Show in December. We host didactic sessions with topics ranging from proper PPE to responding onto a track safely and choosing the proper fire suppression equipment.
Following these sessions we then do hands-on presentations of helmet and frontal head restraint (HANS etc.) removal, immobilization techniques, extraction and extrication techniques, use of hydraulic tools with presentations by Holmatro and AMKUS, the use of cordless tools and fire fighting techniques with the aid of digital fire trainers .
These hands-on sessions are aided by open wheel props, a stock car chassis, a sprint car chassis and a funny car. When everyone has gone through these stations we end the program with live demonstrations by the Holmatro Safety Team who have been great supporters of getting training to the “grass roots” tracks and our own Canadian Motorsports Response Team. The program has been a great success with Doctors and Nurses as well as Safety Team members attending with very positive feedback and we continue to improve and add to both the didactic and hands-on portions.
I just want to get the word out that there are teams out there that care and that training for those who are interested is available. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you for your time.
Sincerely, Blaine Bates, Canadian Motorsports Response Team
This wonderful information and I urge any track safety crew members who are planning on going to PRI to try to attend the sessions given by Blaine and his group. This may be the only chance you get to become better informed about what you do. If you’re were not planning on going to PRI, then maybe you should.
Setup Art Comments
Hello Bob,
I just enjoyed your article on “Painting suspension set ups”. This was quite interesting to me, being a life-long painter and car enthusiast. I do like original and exotic suspension systems. My current project isn’t original, but it thrills me. After restoring all the muscle cars over all the years, this is my first resto-rod/street rod.
You seem to be quite a talent. Try to find how deep it runs in you. Like you said, some are lucky and the well never runs dry. We will improve until we die at the easel.
Bill Ewing
I really think the artist in racing will never truly feel that they are complete in their knowledge. That is what drives us, and like you said, thrills us. It is the constant challenge and no matter how good you get at your art, there is always another challenge just around the corner.
Fuel Burn Off Thoughts
Bob,
I just finished reading your article on Fuel Burn Off Trade-Off in the March 2017 issue. Interesting. All things being equal, I thought the car would get tight due to having too much cross weight for the reduction in rear weight as the fuel burns off. I reviewed your prior articles about cross weight and how cross weight needs to increase as the rear weight % goes up.
If I was scaling a car with half a fuel load vs. a full load using the Chassis R&D software I would reduce the cross weight. Can you tell me why during a race, the car should stay balanced?
Art Salve, Tolland CT
I think that is what I was trying to demonstrate in the article. That has been the question, why does the handling not change with fuel burn off? Let me give you some food for thought. One thing that might answer your question is this, remember that the front tires have a variable grip generator, and that is steering.
When we steer the car more, we gain grip in the front from the greater angle of attack the added steering gave us. When the car is neutral in handling and neutral in balance, the steering is reduced compared to if the car were tight in handling or balance. So, we have room to gain grip by steering a little more.
If the cross weight does not change, but the front to rear percent changes, then what the car needs for cross weight does change on a sample car by 1.8 percent of cross. We go from 52.3 to 49.9 percent of cross the car needs, except that the installed cross weight does not change seemingly making the car tight. But that’s not all.
If we can steer against that almost two percent of cross plus from what we need, then we can still be neutral in handling with just a bit of a tight car. But, as we all know, there are a lot of things going on in the car besides just fuel burn off. Here is something else to think about.
What is also happening as the race progresses is the rear tires are getting hammered and many cars want to go loose in the later laps of a long race. If during fuel burn off the installed cross weight begins to be higher than what the car wants, then there might be a compensating factor here that tightens the car. The combination of, and offsetting factor of, the two keeps the car more neutral and neutralizes the loss of grip in the rear tires. It’s complicated.
The post What If Drivers Called Their Own Penalties? appeared first on Hot Rod Network.