Request to review on track incidents and officiating
#26270 from Marc Cefalo · Taken care of · Minutes (2019-07 Fastrack)
Improving On-Track Driver Conduct
Plan:
- Develop Facebook post to keep members up to date on current process (See below for
latest post in italic)
- Discuss at the face to face BOD / CRB / staff meeting in May.
- Use SM as the catalyst for improvement and standardize common in all classes.
- Get SMAC and possibly the CAT (collision avoidance team) to identify possible ideas to
help educate new (and experienced) drivers to establish common expectations.
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- Continue to evolve, educate, and standardize race operations on how to deal with on
track incidents and car damage.
On track behavior- Working towards cleaner, safer race events.
Contact between racers- a metal to metal incident, whether minor or major, is a hazard
that comes with our sport. We all want close, hard racing, but we also want to load our
car up at the end of the weekend without the hassle and expense of damage. This is a
particular concern in our large fields, where it is easy to cross the line or get caught up in
another on track event. In fact, we have received recent and specific feedback from
the racing community that many believe there is a disconnect between each drivers
interpretation of the conduct rules.
The GCR in section 6.11.1 On Course Driver Conduct attempts to define the parameters
of on track conduct, most notably with this phrase: Drivers are responsible to avoid
physical contact between cars on the race track….(It goes on to lay the groundwork for
corrective action)…… If a driver is involved in significant body contact, the driver and car
shall stop at the designated incident investigation site for review of the incident by the
stewards before going to their paddock area…… “Significant body contact” includes but is
not limited to:
contact resulting in 2 or 4 wheels off course, spins, loss of position, or repairs to
suspension or bodywork. The Clerk of the Course at Hoosier Super Tour events will be
coordinating with Race Control and the Safety Team to present disabled cars involved
contact to Tech.
Currently, our leadership is looking into the best way to establish a common and uniformly
understood interpretation of this part of our rules- essentially, our expectations for on track
conduct. While SCCA provides a safety infrastructure and Stewards to deal with these
issues, these steps only deal with the fallout of poor conduct - at the expense of valuable
track time and potential repair costs.
One idea is to increase the driver awareness and education level by setting up a library of
videos that use a known driver doing the narrative on what they see and how things
should have been done (are you reading this, Randy Pobst). Other ideas involve more
punitive measures including maintaining a centralized database of contact logs of repeat
offenders.
If you have any thoughts on this topic, please write letters to crbscca.com. Let’s all work
together to improve our on-track racing experience.