>Every entrant has the option to seek out a competitor at the event.
Yoo hoo! Anybody else here in my class? I'm seeking you! Aw, gee, nobody
else came. Guess I'm just gonna have to go eat worms or something. Nobody
wants to play with me. Boo hoo.
Yeah, if you show up at an event and there is nobody else, just how are you
to "seek out" a competitor? My car is a Prepared car. Am I supposed to go
get that stock Civic and talk him into running DP instead so I can have a
class. Maybe the OTHER stock Civic would not appreciate me making HIM a
one-car class. Then what? We start stripping his car so he can be somewhat
competitive, never mind his DoT tires?
Or maybe I am supposed to let anybody and everybody drive my car? No thanks.
I have MY money in that car and no one is helping me with the bills (which
lately have been more than I shold be spending). You want to drive my car on
a regular basis, you pick up a major chunk of the tab. I cannot afford to
support your racing and mine too.
>Nobody
>says they HAVE TO run by themselves. They can bump themselves to the next
>class in the rule book so that they could have some competition (see above)
>but they CHOSE NOT to do that. Why? Because they might get beat by a
>supposedly better car? Hmmm...
Not really. Appendix B says, "...the following bumping order is recommended
for regional events in cases where a class is to be combined with another
class." That becomes the event organizer's option, not the driver's option.
If the Region decides that "one car makes a class" then one car makes a
class. If the Region declares "2 cars to make a class" then they invoke
Appendix B's bumping order, or some other system of their own design. It
matters not what, but it does matter that a policy is stated up front and is
consistent.
Look, you tell me the rule is 2 cars or 3 cars to make a class, and that is
fine. I will, and have, bumped to AP or even Modified when encountering that
situation with no complaint. Hell, I'd rather. But I have also seen it often
done "2 cars to make a class for event trophies, points will go back to the
driver's regular class." Now sometimes that means I finish 2nd to an AP car
and we both get winner's points. Sometimes that means I finish 2nd to an AP
car and I take 2nd place points back to DP.
Or sometimes it means I beat that AP car and take winner's points back to
DP, but at season's end I am still the only DP on the points list. Oh,
pshaw, he didn't beat anyone, his season was worthless, he doesn't deserve a
trophy.
I don't mind a bump rule. But more often than not, where I run, the
organizers choose not to invoke that rule. Mirror Khana and WichiKhana are
about the only events around here that do (and in a head-to-head event, you
MUST have cars to run against). I set a 3-car minimum now for Mirror Khana,
and WichiKhana sets a 4-car minimum class. I tend not to go up to event
chairs and tell them they should change their procedure just because I might
want it done differently.
>Not legal? Let's see... there are a ton of ways to make a car
>not legal in Stock but legal in SP. Then if you remove one
>seat you can bump yourself into Prepared. Then remove one bumper,
>BUT leave the mounting brackets and you get bumped to Modified.
Come on now. You are advocating that a driver has to begin dismantling his
car on the spot and make himself illegal so he can bump .. not to a higher
class but a higher CATEGORY?!? Why should someone have to start yanking
parts of his car just to satisfy YOUR concept of whether his participation
has any inherent worth? Get real!
>Don't forget that this is partially a cost issue. If you want to give
>out great trophies to those who are serious competitors, ...
And now the person who comes out nearly every event, but finds himself in a
one-car class, is not a serious competitor? Oh, and where is it written that
only the "serious competitor" is worthy to receive awards? Perhaps the
proboem here is that some people are just too damn serious about this. The
disdain is really getting onerous. Remember, HE did not make himself a
one-car class, that just happened through no fault or action or intent of
his own (and likely quite against what he would have preferred).
>> Because sometimes we need that bureaucratic BS to make sure everyone is
>> having fun. You make the leap that the BBS is a bad thing. That is
>> simplistic thinking, IMHO.
>Just reflecting what Rocky said. Lambast him, not me...
No, the bureaucratic BS of which I speak is not what is in the rulebook, or
the organization of the event to establish start times or requirements that
certain classes run at certain times of the day. It is the establishment of
local policies such as trophy distribution that demean the efforts of
drivers for reasons beyond their control, such as nobody else showed up.
Establishing a run order is necessary. Demeaning a driver's effort and
commitment is BS. Establishing such demeaning treatment as policy is
bureaucratic BS.
--Rocky
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