Pat,
Your generalizations sure didn't mesh with my observations at the Glen. I
thought the event was well run, the flagging was good, and I had no
complaints. I also think SVRA did a great job. I think we had one wreck in
the Monoposto group all weekend (at the entry to the "bus stop"), and I
attribute it to the closeness of the Armco to the track. We had a number of
mixed sessions with F5000s, FF, and FJs on the track at the same time and
everyone was careful and I don't think there were any wrecks at all in the
mixed sessions. I only saw one or two guys in a bad mood all weekend. The
guys around me said they had a great time and said they plan to go back next
year.
Vaughn
>
> There seems to be a pattern here. If you understand the pattern, you
> understand why the SVRA Watkins Glen seemed to be out of control.
>
> First, understand that RCA (Race Communications Association), the long
time
> Watkins Glen flagging group, was outbid by a splinter group for the annual
> contract with WGI and the people in charge of flagging are not the same
> people as the last few years. Next understand that SVRA had planned many
> feature races for cars which are not often seen at SVRA events and
therefore
> have drivers who are new to SVRA in spite of their long standing "no
rookie"
> policy at the Glen. These included 911 variants, GTP cars, NASCAR Stock
> Cars, Formula Juniors, an M-G only race, and "Group 10" (roughly
translated
> as "everything that is not legal in our other groups"). All these extra
> groups took track time from the regular SVRA groups and put most regulars
in
> either a bad mood or a mood which says: "we have to run fast real soon".
As
> a matter of fact the most significant incident of the weekend (6 cars)
> happened in a Friday Enduro with an unmanned flagging station at the blind
> part of the Esses. I have never seen a race scheduled on a Friday
(standard
> worker shortage day) let alone an Enduro.
>
> The "lowered barriers to entry" contributed to the greater potential for
> incidents. Bud Merrill, SVRA's very capable veteran Chief Steward, was
not
> given the expected courtesy of setting the red flag procedure, in fact the
> flaggers used their own local procedure while the drivers were instructed
> contrarily. Bud was not even able to make the red flag calls, which mostly
> were dictated by the new communication's leadership. This "workers take
> charge" pattern first emerged at the HSR event (per Joe P), SVRA walked
into
> the aftermath, and you have seen the "conservative flagging" at the
> following event.
>
> Perhaps the presence of Speedvision had more than a few drivers in
Earnhardt
> mode. This was the first time in my 90 races with SVRA that we had
national
> coverage.
>
> The "new SVRA" with their open door policy can be expected to be more like
> HSR in the future. This might be good, or bad, depending on your point of
> view. The point is It Is D i f f e r e n t so take note. That is the
first
> part of the pattern. The new flagging regime added a measure of confusion
> and made the number of incidents seem like a deluge.
>
> The total number of incidents was actually down slightly from last year's
> Glen event (number of cars was up), but the full course yellows and red
> flags happened in almost every session. I only got to drive on Thursday
> (broken valve spring), but the overflagging was quite obvious and there
was
> a shortage of workers. The outrageous numbers of passes under yellow on
> Saturday and Sunday might relate to overflagging or to the lack of track
> time or to Speedvision. There is no excuse for passing under the
> yellow....ever, but patterns emerge for a reason.
>
> Pat Ryan
> SVRA Member since 1988
>
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