And not entirely on the SVRA event.
I raced with SCCA Volvo Historics this last weekend at W-G and had to
endure the wrath of several of the SCCA Scrutineers and officials over
vintage drivers. The were apalled at the carnage at the SVRA event the
week before. I was told 30 cars were damaged in incidents.
The big issue for them (many of whom have been officiating for over 30
years and remember the vintage cars when they were new) was why people
would drive such valuable, irreplaceable cars like an IT car! (If that
does not make sense, you should try to find an IT car without dents
-serious dents.) The second complaint was the ignoring of flags. The
third was poor driving, esp. overdriving the car or the conditions. The
"more money than sense" comment was made too, referring to the rows of
transporters with shiny vintage cars.
These guys, who work numerous pro races, are obviously not very
impressed with vintage events or drivers.
Now before you decide to kill the messenger (that's me), I think you
need to understand I did not question these guys, they vented to me as a
vintage driver unsolicited.(I do not know how many times I told them I
was not there the week before!) One guy was particularly upset at the
damage to the Lotus 17 in the esses incident- he was a big Lotus fan.
<I'm merely feeding back to the list that vintage has a serious image
problem with these guys.>
The problem that occured in the esses did change how they flagged
incidents. There were numerous full course yellows and a number of"
black flag all" sessions. I have never seen such conservative flagging.
They discussed the yellow, waving yellow and full course yellow at one
meeting. They said the lights were equal to a waving yellow. I asked
what the local rule was on red flags and it's come to a controlled stop
on the track and we'll send a pace car out for you when the track is
clear.
BTW, our Sunday race ran incident free and I finished in a pack of four
cars that passed and repassed seemingly dozens of times - then crossed
S/F three wide. Wild, but clean racing.
--
Jim Hayes Winchester, MA, USA
hayes@mediaone.net http://www.fotec.com/jim/jim.htm
jeh@fotec.com http://www.fotec.com/
All generalizations, with the possible exception of this one, are false!
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