> Here's a question or point I have related to this... How many protests
> do we typically see? Out of how many competitors? I bet the ratio is
> much less than 1%.
Great question! How about one really good example? Last year's Nationals.
1090 drivers. Not that many cars, of course, what with co-drivers, ladies
classes, etc.
Here's the protests:
1. Driver apparently cleaning tires, reprimanded. No car documentation
involved.
2. BP car underweight at impound. Rulebook issue. No car documentation
involved.
3. Car left impound early. Driver reprimanded, put on probabion. No car
documentation involved.
4. Car left impound early. Turned out he was told to do so. No penalty. No
car documentation involved.
5. BM car protested for cockpit/rollcage inconsistencies. Found legal,
upheld on appeal. GCR specs applied. No car documentation involved.
6. FF car in CM had no reverse gear. Driver reprimanded. GCR issue. No car
documentation involved.
7. DM car underweight. Times penalized. Rulebook issue. No car documentation
involved.
8. EM car protested on legality of laminar, spoiler and wing. Laminar
determined to be OEM and wing ruled not standard so presumably documentation
WAS involved, spoiler determined to be a wing -- protest was by car owner
for clarification of classification so no penalty involved. -- owner then
appealed and documentation offered (but lost on basis model of car as
presented was not the model approved)
9. Protest of timing and loss of third runs to rainstorm. No car
documentation involved.
10. Protest of timing regarding rerun. No car documentation involved.
11. Protest of erroneous DNF. No car documentation involved.
12. Protest of Chief Steward decision in regard to total runs as result of
rainstorm. No car documentation involved.
13. Protest by event chair of conduct of event regarding runs decision as
result of rainstorm. No car documentation involved.
That's it. 13 protests. Five were conduct of the event, three were on
actions of drivers. Four were protests on cars regarding items in the
rulebook not in car documentation. One item involved car documentation, and
that one was an esoteric Lotus 7 clone running in E Mod where the driver
claimed radical bodywork came original -- NOT a regular street car.
And for this, several hundred competitors had to have documentation at the
ready? One entry -- and a one-off machine at that -- out of 1090 is
definitely the "less than 1%" Mark suggested. Less than one-tenth of one
percent.
However, I also looked back to the 2002 protests. Not going to recap them
all here but there were 1106 drivers, 14 protests. Three were on conduct of
the event, one was action of driver, four were rulebook issues (weight,
etc.). The remaining six all could have involved car documentation:
A GS car on valve clearance & hardware, head thickness, gear ratios
Two different BSP cars on suspension mounting points
Two ESP cars on suspension adjustments.
An FSP car having head not available OEM, gears not to OEM spec and other
items
Six out of 1106, but there were 13 drivers in those six cars (all of whom
were "at risk" in the protests), which puts it right at 1% of the total
entry. The FSP (2 drivers) did not have documentation, but stipulated to
alleged illegality of head and was DQ.
> Is it reasonable to require factory documentation when the overwhelming
> majority of the time that documentation isn't required? Isn't it smarter
> to incur the cost that one time its needs vs. the 1000 times its not?
It may well be that, for an event such as Nationals, SCCA could even develop
relationships with most of the car dealers in Topeka, and perhaps some in
Kansas City for more esoteric makes, to enlist their expert assistance in
the event protest situations arise that require their expertise. Might even
make it possible to get an answer that evening instead of waiting for next
Monday.
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