Alternate Title: California has the worst drivers (Page 1 of 5)

The Maxima that was going to race on 1 new tire and 3 used ones got in trouble. 

Can't imagine how that happened.

ifb_mole:

I did find some good used ones with decent tread life still left, in fact it looks like we will be starting the race with 4 different tires from 4 different manufactures!!  We sprung for a brand new tire for the right front since it gets the most abuse at Thunderhill on a front wheel drive car.  we should have 2 full sets of mounted tires, sure they are used, but in perfect shape for a Lemons race anyway.

Yeah, they spent a LOT of time both sideways and in the penalty box.

There was a Miata team that was getting a little lecture from Jay which puts the weekend in a nutshell: (Jay to the whole team:) "You guys are sure you didn't do anything wrong, rig- (interrupted by Miata douche SCCA bepatched team leader) "It's not our fault that the guy was blocking us!" "That's RACING, man!"
Unrepentant asses.

I feel for the judges, two days of listening to a CONSTANT stream of, well, guys like us.

The flagging was amazing.. leaps and bounds better than last year Thill race.

Judge Jonny,

Any more analysis on the cause of all the black flags?  That is, was there a lot of contact, a lot of yellow flag passes or a lot of offs?  Honestly, it didn't seem like the general level of competence was any worse here than Buttonwillow (although, as you pointed out, there were a lot of black flags there, too) but two turns in particular seemed to really cause problems:  T5 and T11.  Oddly enough, they are the two slowest turns on the track.  They also are both blind and both have significant elevation changes - maybe that helped??

A lot of the problems I personally witnessed (full disclosure - I was called in to the penalty box after my hit with the TR7) were cause by drivers not understanding the flags.  Drivers refusing to pass or expecting to be passed when they saw ANY flag at all...  And drivers slowing to almost a stop when seeing a white flag.  As others have pointed out, you have to have very low expectations of the knowledge and "race craft" of the drivers at Lemons, but it was still frustrating to have to come to a STOP so many times for local flags.

Cheers,

Dean

We got just one black flag all weekend. Sunday afternoon.
My driver thought it was a good idea to talk on a handheld radio on track.

It was little hard to read the boards held up in T11 for cars being flagged in.
Other than than, I thought the flag stations were well manned.

KT

I'm sure someone around here can probably quote you line and verse on the SCCA, NASA, FIA, etc. interpretations of this rule, as well as the varying interpretations given at different HPDE's, BMWCCA's, PCA's, etc., but my perspective is that the rule is only as good as its enforcement.

So, if there's a yellow flag out ahead of you and let's say you finish the pass before you reach the flag stand, do you think that you'll avoid a penalty? In other words, I think that the safe thing to do is to back off the pass as soon as you see the yellow.

And from a dastardly deeds done dirt cheap perspective, the guy who you're backing off from might get a black flag for apparent passing of you, giving you the spot anyway. (insert mad scientist laugh)

Did you take into account the 50 extra cars on the track. I thought I read that there were 150 cars racing at this event.  VS  the 100 at most events.
If you cram more cars into the same space things are going to happen.  Plus the odds are up due to more cars.  I agree its still not porportional.  50 cars = 205 more flags..
But I am sure its Linear due to the additional cars.??

Part of my team was there on Saturday as spectators, doing recon and getting info for preparing our car for our virgin entry next year.  On Saturday afternoon, we spent more than an hour around the penatly box watching people come in and penalties getting meted out.  For what it is worth, here is an excerpt I sent to the remainder of my team upon returning home (which might be useful for other future Lemons teams):

"Probably the most instructive part of the day was hanging around the penalty box and watching people come in for penalties. The following list is what I developed for our team as the top 10 ways to avoid getting pulled in for a penalty:

1.   Don't pass under a Yellow Flag
2.   Don't pass under a Yellow Flag
3.   Did I mention: Don't pass under a Yellow Flag
4.   Don't ignore the flaggers (See, primarily, #1-3 above)
5.   Don't make contact with another car
6.   Don't spin
7.   Don't go off track
8.   Don't make a bonehead move
9.   Don't drive like an A-hole
10. And, finally, Don't pass under a Yellow Flag."

Ah  ok thank you for the update.  LOL  so there was more room to go faster and get in to trouble then HMMM.

you would think Californians would know how to negotiate traffic

HAHAHA that was me! You said that I HIT someone, that's why I said it wasn't me. The maxima rammed me in the ass in the braking zone for turn 10. Since I wasn't driving backwards I am pretty sure it was his fault he came in too hot and "contact" was made. That "non-race preped" maxima should have been able to out brake me no problem. But its okay, we became good friends again while we were duct taped around that pole.

I do agree that there was a lot of confusion on what the flags meant. I was in the new to Lemons driver meeting and I feel that is where some of the confusion may have come from. I don't feel the flags were explained very well to those who don't have any prior track experience. I just feel like it has been explained much clearer at some of my previous track days.

Its alright though, I'm not complaining. This was my first Lemons race and I had an absolute blast. Jonny, I'll see you at tech next time but you won't ever see me again in the penalty box

-Mike