looking back at the 2007 CSC

[Slowpoke]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

This was a national level event, there should be no need for instructors to "sign off" inexperienced competitors. This is a national level event!

Saftey is still our #1 priority ... I'm not sure how to better address this ... maybe a 3 lap follow the leader or something to see the layout, then off you go? I dunno .... Mosport is a track that can bite hard, and we want to avoid this if possible.

We had a lot of rookies this year who had not run the big track before who signed up for the Nationals. In fact, the rookies were essential for financial viability of the event.

That track is not very forgiving to people who go in too fast to a corner, panic, lift throttle and brake. Less so in the rain. It's not ASE. We thought it prudent to put an instructor with people NEW to the track to show them around the first time to keep THEM and fellow competitors safe, not to make instructors and organizers feel self-important. Once they were comfortable on their own and lapping safely they were fine to lap on their own. (five laps with me driving the new person when practice opened, after that a five lap session with them driving, all during practice was all that this person and I thought was necessary) I'm sure that some were signed off faster than that. One thing that would have helped here though, was for people who were instructors to have known it BEFORE lapping opened rather than after marshaling assignments were given out. I didn't realize I was charged with instructing and just stepped in to help.

Although this was a National event, there was no qualifying procedure. You could have registered for this event if it was your first time on a track. (Should that change?) The decision of the organizer was for one instructor to get a person comfortable with the track. For some people, that meant an instructor in the car, for others there were no instructors available, and they had to try and follow and keep up on an unfamiliar and challenging track, or wait for an in car instructor.

The Ontario series policy, as it was announced in driver's meeting minutes during the year, was that TWO instructors must sign a person new to Ontario Solosprint off as a novice. (I mistakenly thought it was in our ruleset, but it was only in the drivers meeting minutes.) As you mentioned, many of these people at the Nationals were not novices, so that policy was not applied.

Did the host club of the Nationals at ASE in 2006 not put cones on the front straight in the rain? Did that not take track space away from National level competitors? Did anyone really complain about that safety measure though?

If it was their first morning on the big track, one might think that most competitors would be faster WITH an instructor for a session or two than without.

As for the sunroof thing... it is a typical lapping rule with different organizations I've lapped with and something that you expect. Window policy is something that an experienced competitor asks about. There's nothing in the rules about car windows needing to be all the way down, or all the way up either, though that is enforced in Solosprint. Others allow you to lap with windows half-way up or all the way up, but not all the way down without a window net.

Should window and sunroof policy end up in the rulebook?

[craig]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

So, Carl, my take is what you will want are essentially improvements in communications:

1. to and from ASN Canada FIA, the Nat'l Solo Ctee., and Mr. Epp; and
2. timely and more complete (and accurate) communication to competitors (and other clubs/territories).

At least, that's what I'm reading.

[CobraStang]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

Actually, Impound is for checking cars for complience during an event. In regional racing for example, after the race, cars come into impound, and some or all cars are checked. Non-complience leads to disqualification. We did a similar thing, though I agree that it should have been in the rules that it would be happening. it was news to much as much as you guys

Terry Epp, the ASN Director responsible for SoloSports, was in attendance at the event. It was Terry who instructed that impounding would be performed. As Arek says, it was unexpected, or I'm sure it would have been mentioned in advance. The fact that it resulted in at least one significant change suggests that it was a good instruction by Terry. He happened to tell a story about how impounding was done at this year's Targa Newfoundland, one result changing a competitor from finishing very high, to way down in the order.

[ScotcH]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

Group Z on Saturday..... I understand both sides of the coin, but it was still messed up (as were the conditions). If competitors felt their personal safety was at risk, decline to run. If you are going to run, get in line where you should be and run.

This was not really a competitor's call, so much as a griding call. See above for my comment on this.

Impound..... That is where other competitors go over their competition's vehicles and launch protests. Scrutineering is for safety, impound is for protests from competitors.

Actually, Impound is for checking cars for complience during an event. In regional racing for example, after the race, cars come into impound, and some or all cars are checked. Non-complience leads to disqualification. We did a similar thing, though I agree that it should have been in the rules that it would be happening. it was news to much as much as you guys

Rules NEED to be posted in the spring. ASN needs to get there stuff together. I know everyone are volunteers, but you can not properly prep for a national competition with rules released a month or so before the event (or in the case of CAC major changes the week leading up the the event with no advance notification)

Agree completely!

This was a national level event, there should be no need for instructors to "sign off" inexperienced competitors. This is a national level event!

Saftey is still our #1 priority ... I'm not sure how to better address this ... maybe a 3 lap follow the leader or something to see the layout, then off you go? I dunno .... Mosport is a track that can bite hard, and we want to avoid this if possible.

[ScotcH]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

I will post a reply from Marc M. since he doesn`t have access to post on this forum yet.

------------

Since I cannot post on the CASC-OR Forum (yet), I will answer Carl's request on this forum, since I know that CASC-OR members are being refered on this post to get our opinion.

You therefore understand why I am writing in English. I will also mention that I will try to be the voice of Quebec competitors since some that were at the 2007 CSC are very rare posters on this board.

I sincerely hope that no one will be offended by my comments. I know how hard organising these events is. I will post my comments on a plus and minus format:

+ Pre-registration and registration went flawlessly

+ Tech. inspection on Friday and Saturday went flawlessly

+ The organiser, Rob McAuley, is one of the nicest people I have met

+ Mosport is a great track

- The National rules, as they were posted on the ASN website, were changed a few weeks before the event. Prior to this change, these posted rules were the same as last years rules and were the ones used in Quebec for 2006 and 2007. If these were not the national rules, why were they posted as such on the ASN website?

- At the first drivers meeting, a commotion was created by announcing that drivers with no experience at Mosport would need to be signed off before driving solo. Strangely enough, our licences were not checked by anyone. This measure affected mostly Quebec drivers. Most of which who were there, coincidentally, are recognized driving instructors that did not want to carry 200 extra pounds during the timed runs. No instructor was available for about 20 mins as we were waiting in the pits. In the end, we did our own instruction, as we had planned, by following the three Quebec drivers that had previously driven at Mosport.

- "Rules" were applied strangely:
ex. 1- A car was black flagged because: "Your sun roof is popped open" This occured during the "signing off" process and was very frustrating since the ASN rules provide that "[...] The removable sunroof panel" and "removable T-top panels" may be removed." When the undersigned voiced (!) his concern over the fact that the rules do not preclude him from running with the sunroof popped open, he was answered that "It is in the rules, just do it!" Please note that my car has a roll bar!
ex. 2- When the rain storm got serious as Z group cars were gridded for their second timed session, the first seven cars sent out were chosen because they had rain tires on, with no respect to grid order. After that, the next session was black flagged. All Z cars except for the ones with rain tires ended up doing their timed session 1.5 hour latter on a damp track instead of in the middle of a flood.
ex. 3- A Quebec city driver who arrived on Sunday morning was told he could not participate because his helmet is a Snell M. Now, his car does not have a roll cage. Appologies were later given but can you imagine how he felt after having done the whole Quebec season with that helmet and having driven 700km to Mosport? By the way, the guy in question is president of Delta, the most important Quebec city SoloSport club.
ex. 4- A car that was registered in GT2 was latter included in GT1 results after being scrutinized, instead of being disqualified (which it latter was after a formal request for action).

- Quebec drivers did not hear calls for drivers' meetings from their paddock area. When yours truly voiced that concern to one of the organisers, he was answered that: "We're here to race, not for camping." (Thank you very much but it was dark when we arrived and we did not know that we would not hear the PA system.) No sollution was offered.


I know that to some, what you read above are minor concerns. I will admit that some of it is minor, but some is not. Also, imagine that you are going through this on a strange track, and that this goes on in a language that is not your mother tongue.

All of this just makes me wich that in the future, these mega events will be co-hosted by as many clubs as possible, with people from as many areas as possible.

If I have hurt anyones feelings, please accept my sincerest appologies. I did not have the time to reread myself.

_________________
Marc
directeur SoloSprint, CADL
Scirocco 8v no 4 catégorie T2

Good feedback ... thanks! Here is my (personal!) take on your points:

Agreed on all your + points ... the things that worked, worked VERY well. TAC and Rob did a great despite some of the issues (like weather!). As for your - points:

- The posting of the National Rules was not under our control, as far as I know ... ASN was sitting on them (they were available in the spring I believe!) This was definitely a problem, and I agree with your frustration here. Rules need to be known as early as possible.

- The need for an instructor is a saftey measure, and is common place in all the Ontario series events (new competitors get signed off). The execution of this seems to have perhaps been lacking. The intent is good, but perhaps it needs to be streamlined so that time is not wasted, and also needs to be CLEARLY spelled out in the supp regs as to what is expected.

- Black flagged for open sun roof is BS (my opinion!). It should not have happened. Perhaps the Mosport marshals are not used to seeing this, so they black flagged the car? The clerk cannot see the cars except on the front straight, so we rely on the marshals to call it in.

- Grid order is never set in stone, so moving people around WILL happen in order to avoid yellows and improve event flow. Cars on rain tires will clearly be faster, so it does not make sense to put them out on the tail of a car on slicks ... it will just slow down the event. This has been pointed out before. I understand the issue, but in this case, what was done was the correct action. The grid order is in fact changing all the time, as people get faster, or conditions change. It is entirely up to the grid marshal and the clerk/timers to set the grid order. The RUN order (as in Z group, then X, etc.) should NOT be changed ad-hoc, and again, it was not changed (correctly) on Staurday.

- The Snell M helmet was BS as well. Obviously a mistake, but handled very poorly ... thanks for bringing it up!

- The moving of the car from GT2 to GT1 was simply a classification correction. In lieu of a proper rule for this case (we need to address this for 2008!), we felt that was the easiest way to handle it. The protest was voiced, and the organizers made a decision to disqualify. I'm not sure how better we could have handled the situation (again, no rules on the subject at all!).

- Driver's meeting times should have been posted in the Sup regs. I believe all of them were, except for the lunch meeting on Saturday. The schedule is also posted in the sup regs. While it is the resposibility of the competitor to know where and when to go, I can understand the frustration here. Communication is VERY important, and needs to be priority #1 before and during the event.

Again, the above is my personal take on the points you raised

[ConesRnotEnough]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

I agree with almost everything that Guillaume pointed out. Communication was no where good enough and an MC would have helped that a lot.

Group Z on Saturday..... I understand both sides of the coin, but it was still messed up (as were the conditions). If competitors felt their personal safety was at risk, decline to run. If you are going to run, get in line where you should be and run.

Impound..... That is where other competitors go over their competition's vehicles and launch protests. Scrutineering is for safety, impound is for protests from competitors.

Rules NEED to be posted in the spring. ASN needs to get there stuff together. I know everyone are volunteers, but you can not properly prep for a national competition with rules released a month or so before the event (or in the case of CAC major changes the week leading up the the event with no advance notification)

This was a national level event, there should be no need for instructors to "sign off" inexperienced competitors. This is a national level event!

Having this thread is a good idea, having excessively defensive people defending every action taken, is not. Sure there is no need to be nasty in your comments or suggestions, but let those that have a concern voice their opinions. If people that didn't run or weren't even there start criticizing the event, well that's a different story, but let those that ran the event voice their observations and concerns.

[djphoebus]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

On my side, i think that we need to improved the communication during the CSC. We had access to the speaker of Mosport but we didnt use it enough. One think that the CADL do really well during their event is having an MC that his job is mainly communication...

I think that it will be sweet for everyone to have the best time of everyone at the end of their session. That way you know where you stand or what`s the time to beat. At the same time, he can announce every change to schedule or any information related to the CSC for the competitor and spectator.

Like most of you know, i was steward for this CSC and i was running like crazy because of this lack of communication. Often i was asking question that i received from different competitor becauses no one on the field knew the answer and i was receiving the answer ''It`s obvious''...and than i had to basically ask a couple of time if it was possible to announce the answer on the speaker so every one could know the answer.. i received 2 to 3 times the answer ''you want to do it''...

I will not go further on the communication issue has i think that everyone saw it. For the Next CSC, no matther where is it we definatly need to improved it during the event as it will remove a lot of none needed frustration and will improve the spirit of competition.

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Regarding the number of entry for the CSC. As a competitor i don`t think that hoping for 100+ competitor for solosprint event is good for the sport. We often have difficulty to complete 3 run per competitor with 60 or less. Going to a national and being able to complete only 2 runs in an entire day or even 1 full run + half of the second one where you need to cancel the score of the second run...would really suck..

-------

Regarding the rule, it`s comming more and more obvious that the rules are better for Heavy and high powered car than light and all handling car. It was already a little bit in the past but now with the new special Suspension PIP and weight PIP it`s now obvious.

It`s for sure that the National rule needs to be available sooner than August and that waiting the end of each season to start working on the rules of the following year is not working at all. Something that i heard from different people during the CSC is that since we are grassroot, ''could we have a rule for a 2 year period instead of changing it every year?''.
-------

I hope that my point can start a nice discussion about the future of the Solosprint...

[djphoebus]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

I will post a reply from Marc M. since he doesn`t have access to post on this forum yet.

------------

Since I cannot post on the CASC-OR Forum (yet), I will answer Carl's request on this forum, since I know that CASC-OR members are being refered on this post to get our opinion.

You therefore understand why I am writing in English. I will also mention that I will try to be the voice of Quebec competitors since some that were at the 2007 CSC are very rare posters on this board.

I sincerely hope that no one will be offended by my comments. I know how hard organising these events is. I will post my comments on a plus and minus format:

+ Pre-registration and registration went flawlessly

+ Tech. inspection on Friday and Saturday went flawlessly

+ The organiser, Rob McAuley, is one of the nicest people I have met

+ Mosport is a great track

- The National rules, as they were posted on the ASN website, were changed a few weeks before the event. Prior to this change, these posted rules were the same as last years rules and were the ones used in Quebec for 2006 and 2007. If these were not the national rules, why were they posted as such on the ASN website?

- At the first drivers meeting, a commotion was created by announcing that drivers with no experience at Mosport would need to be signed off before driving solo. Strangely enough, our licences were not checked by anyone. This measure affected mostly Quebec drivers. Most of which who were there, coincidentally, are recognized driving instructors that did not want to carry 200 extra pounds during the timed runs. No instructor was available for about 20 mins as we were waiting in the pits. In the end, we did our own instruction, as we had planned, by following the three Quebec drivers that had previously driven at Mosport.

- "Rules" were applied strangely:
ex. 1- A car was black flagged because: "Your sun roof is popped open" This occured during the "signing off" process and was very frustrating since the ASN rules provide that "[...] The removable sunroof panel" and "removable T-top panels" may be removed." When the undersigned voiced (!) his concern over the fact that the rules do not preclude him from running with the sunroof popped open, he was answered that "It is in the rules, just do it!" Please note that my car has a roll bar!
ex. 2- When the rain storm got serious as Z group cars were gridded for their second timed session, the first seven cars sent out were chosen because they had rain tires on, with no respect to grid order. After that, the next session was black flagged. All Z cars except for the ones with rain tires ended up doing their timed session 1.5 hour latter on a damp track instead of in the middle of a flood.
ex. 3- A Quebec city driver who arrived on Sunday morning was told he could not participate because his helmet is a Snell M. Now, his car does not have a roll cage. Appologies were later given but can you imagine how he felt after having done the whole Quebec season with that helmet and having driven 700km to Mosport? By the way, the guy in question is president of Delta, the most important Quebec city SoloSport club.
ex. 4- A car that was registered in GT2 was latter included in GT1 results after being scrutinized, instead of being disqualified (which it latter was after a formal request for action).

- Quebec drivers did not hear calls for drivers' meetings from their paddock area. When yours truly voiced that concern to one of the organisers, he was answered that: "We're here to race, not for camping." (Thank you very much but it was dark when we arrived and we did not know that we would not hear the PA system.) No sollution was offered.


I know that to some, what you read above are minor concerns. I will admit that some of it is minor, but some is not. Also, imagine that you are going through this on a strange track, and that this goes on in a language that is not your mother tongue.

All of this just makes me wich that in the future, these mega events will be co-hosted by as many clubs as possible, with people from as many areas as possible.

If I have hurt anyones feelings, please accept my sincerest appologies. I did not have the time to reread myself.

_________________
Marc
directeur SoloSprint, CADL
Scirocco 8v no 4 catégorie T2

[thgear]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

+1!

and beer!~

[ScotcH]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

(and maybe some bikini girls )

+1!

[shawn cormier]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

Carl, CSC needs to be glorified like Time Attack (and maybe some bikini girls )

[pigeon]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

- Ne pas faire de différences entre les Québécois et les Ontariens, nottament pour le marshalling...
Dont make any difference between Quebecers and Ontarians, specifically for Marshalling.

marshaling was done by Mosport no?

There were still some duties, like lap timer and little stuff like that. They said that the QC competitors didn't have to, since they travelled so far to race with us, they weren't required to marshall.

I thought that was a very nice gesture! Im shocked that member sees this as a problem...

[thgear]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

LOL!

I hate it when that happens....

i kind of assumed it meant "drivers meeting", babel fish is known to throw out wacky tranlsations

[jonweir]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

- When an advertisement is made in the bed, to make sure that all the candidates included/understood it... Approximately

LOL!

I hate it when that happens....

[thgear]

Re: looking back at the 2007 CSC

- Comme c'est un championnat Canadien, il faudrait utiliser les règlements Canadiens.
Since it's a Canadian Championship, it should use the Canadian Rules


as far as i know, the CSC used the "ASN nationals rules", everything is up to standard

- Ne pas faire de différences entre les Québécois et les Ontariens, nottament pour le marshalling...
Dont make any difference between Quebecers and Ontarians, specifically for Marshalling.

marshaling was done by Mosport no?