MBlackketter

Andy,

How did the way I put Ralph's car down have to do with what happened to Josh's car? Did I miss something in the driver's meeting stating that the car must be centerd in the box?
Mark

Andy who?

Mark,
The way you put Ralph's car down had ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with what happened to Josh (or anyone else) and in no way did I imply that it did! I stated that I'm not bashing or blaming others. I said "Congrats, good race" and shook your hand after the race and still would. Nothing but respect sir. I'm only speaking for myself that I should have placed Josh's car in a better position as did others.

Andy Power

esham

Thank you for the report Mike. Expecting your great photos late today or tommorrow. (sgrid online). It is a mixed feeling, mixed opinions and facts from us at the otherside of the globe. Congratulation to Ralph, Mike S, Joel, Chris.. And that was bad luck and sad tragedy happen to Josh and the other that involve in the collision.

Slo-MTX4

iTrader: (1)

I can see Josh's point of view here. Looking at the video frame by frame should not come into it. What you guys are saying about the .001 of a second or 1/64th which ever way you want to put it is crap, listening to when a noise that might represent a horn as to when the car starts to move is crazy. NOONE has reactions that quick NOONE. The earliest that anyone would react would be between .3-.5 of a second. So from anyones point of view, especially a official that has to adjudicate on one of those calls, it would be a jumped start. For gods sake taking a video and slowing it down that much to judge on a jumped start, what is the world coming to????

thor

Sounds like it was a great race but the closest was Chris T. and Mike S. in 1995, Chris won by .51sec. that was the closest.

tex1

iTrader: (4)

You can't penalize someone on what the limit of human reacton is. The legal line is drawn at "did he jump the horn?" Whether it is .oooo1 or 1/64th it doesn't matter. A good race official might have had reason to think he may have.
If he thought that there may have been a false start, but wasn't sure then he clearly has the tools with the written rule language covering recording devices.
The infraction's remedy could have clearly been put in place after the fact. Simply deduct one lap.
However, in this case it looks like someone timed it just right. Congrats!
The evidence is in and what happened to Josh is just unfortunate.
Good luck next year!

Now if he would have jumped the gun and caused something like that, what would have been done for the guy that got broke?
Just curious.

ROAR - you need to work on your PR stuff here.
TEX

smn_says

Most of our "rules" are based from IFMAR rules.
IFMAR rules - 10 cars only (Roar provides for more but the rule based on the length of the drivers stand or dividing the average lap time by 1.4 is stupid. The primary consideration has to be to the safety of the marshalls, some of whom are not as young as they used to be!) Not all 14 cars are in view. How can you tell if one of the cars on the tail end was actually the one who jump starts. If you look near the car 9 or 10, there is a car out in the lane before Jared even moves. The car that sends Cyrul flying actually came from the turn before the straight.
IFMAR rules also say no restarts, but it does provide another the Rule for the Race Director to call for one if he feels that the requirements for a clean start have not been met including a jump start. Restarts have been done in the past. Last year Barry Baker(?) was given a thirty minute delay to rebuild his car after a similar incident and then the race was restarted. Roar-you set the precident.

Was there any referees at this event? Nationals rules call for it. If so, why didn't the referees do their job? I thought that a flag man was an official for making sure the grid was set? Where was the flag man? Why wasn't there an official to make sure ALL cars were in the box? Why were drivers required to start on a painted surface off the driving lines with no tranction, dirt, etc. Cars 2,4 and 5 are the only ones in the top 5 to start in the paint. Shouldn't a penalty have been given to others that did not? If there was no requirement to start in the box, why did most of the competitors comply? Why wasn't this covered in the drivers meeting by the "race director"? Why did the announcer yell at the "race director" for a false start and why did the "race director" do nothing? Why was a disqualified driver allowed to compete in the main and then only after a protest was filed? It was predetermined to allow only 13 in the main and 14 raced. Why?Because the "race director" made a mistake? And the protest after the main? Another example of the stellar work of the "race director" and "president" following Roar rules. Unfortunately, controversy follows these two to every event they officiate. Why do these officials think that "team driving" is acceptable? Why is it ok for one driver to take intentional shots at another to prevent "the other team" from winning? Our officials consistently feel the need to rewrite the rules on the fly or to suite the needs of their own personal agenda or favorite driver/team. This is not the first event that this has happened at and it won't be the last sad to say. That is why there is little or no respect for this organization or its officials. That is why no major event would even think of sanctioning their event with Roar.

Note: bash my comments if you choose but I have been around all forms of racing for nearly 30 years and I have organized, scored, race directed, been a referee and held a Roar position for nearly seven. You won't hurt my feelings, I've been called worse.

JetMD

iTrader: (1)

I just watched the video about 10 times in normal speed and it seems pretty obvious that he jumped the start. I don't have software to do the super slo-mo to measure in .0001 of a sec. but in real time, it sure looks like he jumped it and should of been penalized. Don't hate me, just a ROAR member opinion.

Slo-MTX4

iTrader: (1)

I guess what i am trying to say is why do we have to slo-mo everything that might or might not be right or wrong. At normal speed it certinaly looks like a jumped start.

DaRollaRacer

Here's a website talking about reaction times.

http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2006/reactiontime.shtml

The fastest recorded reaction time for a male student was .09seconds. A reaction time of .001 is 90 times faster. )A reaction time by a female reached as low as .05 seconds.) Seems impossible.

Dave

mikemyers

To smn,

You might want to try to figure out how to do what you suggest. IFMAR events are around 10 days long, with three days for qualifying, one day for lower finals, and another day for the upper finals. The ROAR Nationals are less time, and with two very long A-Mains. If you want 10 cars per final, with the same number of racers, held at this track in October, the only way it's going to happen is to shorten the races, and/or reduce the number of racers or classes. As it was, the racing started a little after 9, and we were finishing up less than an hour before the light was gone. In Brisbane, racing after dark was no problem - they just turned on the track lights. There aren't any in Cincy.

You asked how can they could tell if one of the cars at the end jumped? Easy, there were two people watching that, one at the back of the pack and one near the front.

It's not IFMAR, it's ROAR. If we want different rules than we have now, they can be submitted to the on-road fuel commitee, or to ROAR, to be considered. Maybe you want to volunteer and get involved?

If the race management goofs, and messes up the start, the race is restarted. If a car messes up, it gets penalized. If a car messes up another car at the very start, I agree with you - something should be changed for next year. That will be considered. Where does it stop though? Only before the first turn? Before the second or third turn?

Starting in the paint or the boxes - as far as I know, there was no rule that the car had to be inside the box, or in/on the paint. Some tracks don't even have boxes or paint, just numbers. Cars were only to be penalized if they moved before the horn sounded. There were no instructions as at IFMAR events that specify how the cars were to be placed in boxes, etc. Watch the tape, paying attention to the "line" each car took after it left the box. Jared's car is coming down the track very, very close to the outside edge of the track. Had he gone "out" further, as others did, he'd have left room for Josh even if Josh was a bit slow. Maybe Jared's car was aimed a little too much "down" the track and not enough "across" the track.

If a car moved just as the horn went off, I think it implies that the driver was trying to guess when the horn would sound. I don't think anyone is fast enough to leave .001 seconds after the horn, so I think Jared was not waiting for the horn, just anticipating. It doesn't matter though - either the car did or did not move before the horn sounded, and Bob's tape proves it didn't.

Why did the race director do "nothing"? Because there was nothing to do. The horn sounded, Jared moved instantly, and the rest is history. The officials watching for a jumped start agreed that there wasn't one. From watching the tape, what busted up Josh's car was more likely Darin's car, that plowed right into Josh while still accelerating hard. It would have been better if that car could have tried to go around Josh, as others did.

Had Jared's car started moving a few hundredths of a second sooner, Jared would have been at fault, but everything else would have happened the same. For that matter, if Ralph's engine had blown up ten seconds later, the results would have been different. It doesn't get anywhere playing the "what if" game. Nobody is 100% perfect. I think Jared is just "lucky" that his car didn't move before the horn, as he must have already been reacting even before the horn sounded.

Please explain what you mean by "team driving". Maybe I was too busy taking photos to notice, but I didn't see anyone doing that. Nobody I asked saw it either. Please explain here, or send me an email about it.



Jetmd, it may or may not seem obvious he did or did not jump the start, but the video proves that the car didn't move until after the horn sounded. Maybe I can get the original tape from Bob, and create a video in slow motion, with the sound track superimposed over the video, so peole can "see" the sound level increase. As I see it, Jared was reacting before the horn went off, as no human being can be that fast, but the rule is whether the car actually moves before or after the horn.

mikemyers

Dave, you said it better than I did. Nobody can react in .001 seconds, so Jared must have been "anticipating". That's why I said he got lucky. Still, the rule isn't whether the driver is "anticipating" too early, but whether the car moves too early.

Thank you for the website - I can use some of that information in the article I'm still trying to finish.

fraz

Anticipating the horn is very much a part of the game in this sport. I have reviewed the video a bunch and will not comment on jumped starts**. what I will comment on is what I feel was the root cause of the problem... bad car set downs. I have been doing this long enough to know you don't set the car down at darn near a 90 degree angle perpendicular to the track and I saw a few cars that had to make a hard left turn right after they got on the gas. This is just asking for trouble.

Granted I have not been to this track and if the painted [read:implied] starting boxes are at a drastic angle like that, the person who did so should be questioned as to why. I don't believe we spec it out in ROAR but IMO pit starting boxes should be at no more than a 45 degree angle to the track. Also, having so many cars in a main where some have to start "around the corner" is plain stupid. Mike Queller, why was this allowed?

**One of the reasons I cannot comment on the "jumped starts" is the slo-mo replay has omitted the sound. When you say "horn sounds", what part of the horn; beginning, middle, end? That tone itself is close to a second long and your mark could be anywhere for all we know.

1FastSerpent

iTrader: (1)

I think anticipating the start is part of the race. So the Same in Drag racing, or Formula One. YOu don't wait to see that Golden Green light, you react to when it is coming. And if you want to wait for the ( light or horn ) well... you see the rest of the field FLY BY. and if you leave early,// Well you tried your best and Got Nailed.

tomkelley

Its just my perception from the video, Jarrod's car jumped. You can hear the carb opening up just before the horn. Some say it didn't jump, others say it did. Officials make mistakes all the time when it comes to judging of course, and some of us have been lucky or unlucky based on the call. I find it difficult to blame the officials because they're mostly volunteering well intentioned people, I think its important for people to realize this and move on and hope we can learn from the mistakes. Many may complain, but not many are willing to fill those shoes either.

It seems to me that there should never be 14 cars in an RC race, no matter how big the track is. If other steps aren't taken to enusure clean jump starts, then there should be no reason for 14 cars. Josh's car was hit by a car that appeared to be in 13th or 14th position. I assume the 14 was chosen to shorten the number of heats to put in the finals. This came about because of lack of daylight time and the number of participants. Therefore you either lenghten the daylight time, or shorten the number of participants. Other than using lights, ROAR could schedule such events in the middle of summer closer to the summer solstice.