Race day schedule

teejay

Member
Haven't seen anyone post about it yet, so figured I would bring it up for discussion.

Is there anyway that we can call for a riders meeting if there are any schedule changes? if it wasn't for max rushing up to me and taking everything off my bike I would have missed the superbike race. I know Allen, Lee, And myself didn't even get a warm up lap, and 4 other riders completely missed the heat.

I know there was a lot of crashes last round which cause grouping of races, cuts in laps etc but it would be sweet if everyone knew what was going on.
 

the_fornicator

Active Member
It's a legitimate question and has been brought up before, but unfortunately, the logistics behind calling a rider's meeting in the midst of a race day is nearly impossible given the various factors which I'll try to briefly touch on. We try to make due with what we have and it's not perfect, but the brass tax is that, at some point in time, the onus is on the rider to keep informed. I'll try to spill out all my thoughts and factors behind not having an ad hoc rider's meeting. I'm speaking partly as a member of the exec, but predominantly as a person who regularly volunteers.

From a noise level standpoint, the general noise from the drag strip pretty much makes any type of announcement impossible from an inclusion perspective. All changes are announced on the radio as well -the EMRA pays an announcer (Stu) for his time to announce the races and this includes any changes over the frequency indicated in the morning riders' meetings. It stands to argue that if every racer has a radio, a rider's meeting is not required because they can all hear the changes over the radio (now we get into the chicken or egg thing). If riders can't hear the 5/2 minute warning for a race, it's sound to reason that the rider probably also wouldn't be able to hear the rider's meeting announcement/call out. The take-away from this is that it might be best to invest in a cheapie radio (though, this is not 100%).

From a timing standpoint, taking 10-15 minutes to gather everybody out of their pits for an announcement adds time to an already tight schedule. If we run 1 minute past that 4PM marker, the club is charged quite a bit of money so we have to do whatever we need to do to keep things on time -e.g. last second changes, etc.. When the club is charged money, this money isn't filtered down to the riders, the non-profit club eats it. Moreover, what happens if not every rider is rounded up for the rider's meeting? Do we employ another strategy to gather everybody up for an already-changed process? My point is, there's a slippery slope developing and by definition, there will always be exceptions. Also, at what point do we have a rider's meeting? We can't do it while riders are on the track. If a race is finishing, do we wait for all the riders to come in, undress, and then try to individually hunt them down with the limited resources that we have? If you've noticed, if there are occasional changes to the schedule (e.g. early lunch), someone is usually riding up and down every path of the pits yelling out the change. This takes time as well. Unfortunately, not everybody listens -I've had people run up to me and repeat what I just yelled out 3 feet from their face because they were exchanging banter with someone.

During each monthly exec meeting, the exec addresses issues from the previous rounds and look on ways to improve them. The idea of a quick rider's meeting has been suggested before, but the following question is always asked which nobody has an answer to: "Why is it that the majority of the grid knew about the changes and only a small number did not?" At some point in time, it seems a little excessive to change things or create special processes for the small exception because, at what point do we stop? Can we safely and confidently assume that there will always be exceptions? We know race rounds will never run out of ways to challenge the exec, race control, and the volunteers, so does calling a rider's meeting fix one specific instance in time or is it extendable as a sure-fire solution? Once we call a rider's meeting, another issue is that riders will assume that if there is no meeting, there are no changes. So, do we call several rider's meetings in a single race round wherein the time required to stop the racing, gather all racers, and make the announcement totals somewhere between 10-15 minutes? If you have enough of those in a day and we'll be an hour behind schedule.

So, at some point, riders are expected to meet race control half-way to keep themselves informed because at what point is this process deemed "spoon feeding"? I am speaking solely from the perspective that any process that the exec employs will never reach out to everybody (say someone goes to the concession for a burger and then nobody tells that person when he gets back). The idea behind the question is to not place blame, but with limited volunteer resources, time constraints, noise from the drag strip, and unplanned events (crashes, pickups, etc., etc.).

To keep yourself informed with the most current information, if riders have questions they are encouraged to go up to a rider's rep or to the gate worker to ask them if any changes have been made. The logic behind my last sentence can be summed up as follows: Does it make more sense to have a few people run up to 100 people thereby possibly missing some people or would it be easier to have those 100 people ask the few if any changes have been made?

It might help as well to identify some of the exec for others reading this:
Ian (president) and Trish (exec) are almost always seen either at their pit or running around. Dana (exec) is pitted right beside them and is busy teching people's bikes. Brian (exec) is always pitted at the front by the track entrance and is alway wondering around the fron. Dave Kendal (exec) and Justin Knapik (vp) are always with the Empire tent at the front and are happy to help out. Shane Fraser (exec) is either at his pit or running around helping someone out. Jon Bullee always pits in front of Scott Para's trailer up front and can always be found doing something for someone. Aleks and myself can be found if not in our pits then either in the tower (which doesn't help you in this case) or at the gate. There is someone *always* at the gate -that person is always 100% informed with the current changes so I reckon that would be your best bet to keep informed if you don't have a radio. So, if you don't have a radio, there are people to ask.

I hope my explanation doesn't sound like a scrambling excuse. Unfortunately, there are too many factors that creep into a day that requires the exec and volunteers to reconcile the time we have left to make the best of what we have for to good of the riders. A riders' meeting might keep some people informed, but at the end of it all, there will always still be exceptions, but we cannot risk going late at the expense of the exceptions. With our volunteer and exec resources tapped each round, we're doing the best we can but a little help from the racers to keep themselves informed would go a long way to the few people we have on the front lines at the gate and pits.

I hope you don't take offense to any of this. Just too much to write and proof read lol

(holy shit that was a long post)
 
Last edited:

the_fornicator

Active Member
What might be useful is a whiteboard up at the gate with a list of changes. Maybe posted up in Scott's tent or something.

We'll bring it up at the next exec meeting.
 

Goatse

Active Member
What about instead of wondering what class the horn blasts where just for set up something like this http://www.proacousticsusa.com/productdetail.php?pId=15837 in the middle of the pits to announce the warnings and for what class. Yes we still have the dragstrip to cut off the announcement but if half of us hear that's half as much confusion. Just throwing the idea out there.


Thank you for the link.

One of the topics to be spoken about at the executive meeting tonight is actually looking into a louder speaker than what we have. Half of our PA system crapped out last round, but it was actually a blessing in disguise as it forced me to come up with a more simpler setup solution. So moving forward, the FM transmitter sound quality should be better, and we just need something a bit louder than the one single speaker we were left with after the amp for the larger 2 (that sat on the podium) bit the dust.
 

blam

Administrator
hey Dana,

I have a decent PA speaker I can bring out next round you guys can borrow for the weekend and that should give you guys some more time to figure something out for next year.
 

teejay

Member
Lol I have a very small attention spam, so I skimmed that. Thanks Dana for the summary as well. Def understandable there are tons of what ifs in the sport. This was more so specific to last round, other rounds have been no problem. The only issue with this past round is because of the big crashes in the morning, the entire schedule had changed and not to everyone's knowledge. And if someone has no knowledge of any schedule changes they are under the impression that everything is normal, no thought to ask about something they don't know. It's deff difficult scenario and you guys have a tough job especially racing, and trying to run the day smoothly. I do like the idea of a update/changes board though, somewhere in the grid tent where people are frequently checking.
 

Fireman

Well-Known Member
The changes were announced via the fm transmitter and also on the PA system.

If you or your track mates do not already own a fm radio for the track I suggest getting one. If your RV has outside speakers, help everyone by turning them on.

Communication at Castrol is a difficulty. Let's try and work together to help one another out.
 

M87

Active Member
I know the exec are doing the best they can on this issue and I am probably re-hashing a discussion they already had, but I don't think that the FM radio is the answer to everything.
If you walk around the pit's the noise from generators can make it impossible to hear either the FM or the PA in places and that's without including the noise from the drag strip or the drag pits. There have been times when I have had to get in my truck to hear what was going on.
I think that we need a single point that we can go to and get the latest information easily without bothering anyone.
I like the whiteboard idea. We could write the days schedule on it and when the track worker comes out to blow the 2 minute horn they could just wipe off the race that is exiting the track.
Any changes could also be made on this board and the only time racers would have to talk to riders reps is for clarification.
 

M87

Active Member
I would also like to see full size stand up cut outs of the exec, arms extended, pointing at said white board. :D
 

fast316

EMRA Executive Member
The only change made to the schedule was combining the Sportsman/ lightweight SBK race with Novice race two.

Apart from that one change the only other changes (and these aren't schedule changes) was an early lunch while we all waited for an ambulance transfer and we cut lap from each race.

As the day went on we became closer and closer to the scheduled times and managed to finish on the dot on time, thanks largely to the hard work of all the volunteers.
 
The only change made to the schedule was combining the Sportsman/ lightweight SBK race with Novice race two.

On that note, as I was not looking forward to it I was really surprised. That race went really well and was a ton of fun. Us little SBK and Sportsman racers got to see the fast novice riders and even battle a bit in the corners. it made the race fun and was not just cutting laps to a checkered flag. I talked to most of the other riders on track and they agreed. I would be for doing this in future rounds to 1- save time, 2- make the racing more interesting and 3- give some of the faster novices some experience in passing and running lines.
 
Top