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Question To Track Call (TC) / Yellow Flag (YF) during racing or not?
#1

To Track Call (TC) / Yellow Flag (YF) during racing or not?

I've never given this any thought as my track came with the Track Call Button therefor I thought it was a natural part of racing and this is utilised in two tracks in our group, therefor I have learnt and been taught to use this by the veterans in the small group I am in, however recently I've found out that this is a contentious topic/issue.

I hand it over to you for a friendly discussion, not looking for cranky debates or nasty comments, just an interesting discussion about this and if you do or don't utilise this on your home or commercial track and how you do or don't utilise this during your race meets.


What do you utilise on your tracks and race events?
All four tracks we race on, we utilise Race Coordinator (RC) and the Track Call / Yellow Flag feature (on the 4-lane tracks more so) to pause the racing when a car deslots, which are getting fewer every week as us rookies learn to race correctly, well some weeks there are less but some weeks it seems we just go out to cause chaos  Rofl

Our small group is extremely lucky, we have two small 2-Lane tracks very similar to each other and two large 4-Lane tracks much different, each week we rotate the racing on the tracks, we race small, large, small, large.

We don't always utilise the TCB when a car deslots, if the car deslots in front of us and we can reslot it fast without interrupting the racing then we do, even on the 4LT's we do this, so the TCB doesn't need to be used all the time, though the TCB can save a pileup collision of four cars, that has occurred a handful of times and is rare to happen, this is where the TCB comes into play.

We currently have six people in our group and at times we may have four, five or six (full attendance) racers, so this dictates some weeks where and how we race. There have been many weeks where we ran on the two small tracks due to only having four people in attendance, two racing and two marshals.

On the 4-lane tracks we can and do race with a minimum of five, we do this by knocking one lane out of the four (feature of RC, thanks Dave) giving us three racing, two marshals and Track Call button.
With a full attendance we race four lanes with two marshals. Having and utilising the Track Call buttons on the 4-lane tracks is absolutely crucial, my track there is a 2 second delay (adjustable) from the time the track call button is pressed to the time the track power is cut, this delay is your penalty for deslotting, this 2 second delay is enough where you can gain a lap under yellow by coasting under the S/F gantry or at least make a considerable distance on the track, especially on straights.

I agree deslotting can be frustrating for the veterans but we all have to learn somewhere and somehow, even the veterans had to learn to race somewhere and somehow. I think I have personally come a long way since really getting into racing scene with our small group, even veterans deslot when they are pushing too hard.

We have, what I would call, veteran racers, two guys and they are in a race with each other, Best Lap Times etc. so they do have each other to race against while us rookies race the four of us, though past few months the rookies have been grabbing the leaderboards and podiums over the veteran racers.

The track call and yellow flag are necessary as they reduce car (and finger) damage especially the faster cars such as Revo's and BRM's, though as in 1:1 racing a yellow flag can and usually does cause more yellow flags. I am aware every race to back off and to not deslot if I can so the veterans can have an uninterrupted race, which they deserve, everyone deserves that also, but this is life and life isn't perfect.

Thank you to the guys (and their partners) for being so welcoming and inviting me into their homes and race group. I know I have come a long way with racing and car repair which would not have been possible without you all and I know that I still have a long way to go.


Cheers for now
Johnno


[+] 1 member Likes Johnno's post
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#2

At LSC Lodon, track calls have always been severely restricted. 
Track calls ruin the flow of the race and are only permitted when a car is stranded under the bridge or hits the floor in the other hard -to-reach parts of the track. The track is well designed so Offs requiring track calls are very very rare..

Drivers learn to be patient, marshals are quick but clinical. No cars are slammed back on the track after an off. 

Certainly, drivers handling each others cars during a race night must be minimised in current times. 

Alan.
[+] 1 member Likes Nonfractal's post
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#3

A track call / yellow flag can be really useful, especially in small-group racing. Ultimately, it's what suits your group or club - and that may change over time too. There's no right way or wrong way if you're all having fun.


Typically, I race with 20-30 people - both HO analogue and 1/32 scale digital. We always have plenty of marshals and so we have no custom of using a track call. The only time we stop a heat is if there is a technical problem with the track (rather than a car problem or a driver forgetting to plug in their controller). Our racers accept that 'things happen' and bad luck is part of racing - especially with less experienced racers on the track. We don't 'seed' heats, so there's always plenty going on. That's just the culture of our club...

   

In our digital racing we also have a culture of 'no contact' racing - that puts responsibility on drivers to avoid crashing into de-slotted cars. Race control very rarely has to warn drivers of 'no contact' infringements, although I did yellow flag an endurance race once to calm things down.

The no contact culture in our digital racing and no track calls in analogue does mean we tend to keep our eyes on the track ahead of our car - and are ready to slow or stop if there is a hazard. I think that is different to some clubs where drivers race flat-out and 'blind' - with the assumption their lane is always clear.


A regular summer activity for a few years was some smaller-group racing on my HO bullring oval - anything from 4 to 12 people...

   

If we had six or more - four racing & two marshals - we'd run without track calls. If we were 4 or 5, we'd run with track calls - but with a twist. Each driver would have three cards. Each time they caused a track call (by de-slotting), they threw away a card. If they threw away all 3 cards, the next time they de-slotted it was 'crash & burn' and they were out of that heat. It was a different way of racing and a different challenge. I also added a short delay on the track call (using TrackMate) for an extra penalty. Only the first car to de-slot had to throw in a card.

Although we only used the card system when we didn't have enough marshals, we did routinely run short 'crash & burn' races as part of the evening schedule, irrespective of the number of racers and marshals. I guess that suggests that any group can use a mix of different formats successfully.
[+] 1 member Likes woodcote's post
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#4

Track Call is very useful if there are insufficient marshals available, but if one driver is constantly causing the track calls then it becomes tedious so the "three strikes and you're out" approach that Andy mentions is a good concept.

Leo

Forum Precepts:  Don't hijack or divert topics - create a new one.   Don't feed the Troll.    http://www.scuderiaturini.com
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#5

Well that would have canned yesterdays racing with us all been thrown out  Rofl thankfully we don't have a track call button on the small two lane tracks so there is considerable penalty for deslotting straight up with delays covering those listed below
  • marshal not noticing the deslotted car, this inattention happens every race and isn't a joke no more  Tappingfoot
  • marshals putting the car back in the slot, the simplest one seems the hardest
  • marshals putting the car in the slot backwards, and 
  • marshals putting the car in the wrong lane and backwards,  Tappingfoot
  • marshals slamming the car back in the slot bloody hard..
  • marshals on their phone, checking the screen for lap time or just chatting and not watching their corner, 

all points above are occurring way too much of recent, and I admit my part at times with deslotting such as yesterday, it was straight up a shocking day for me and I do hope I've gotten the deslot bug out of my system for next weeks race.

We use coloured lane dots on all tracks including the two lane tracks where marshals still stuff it, when the marshals take their sweet arse time reslotting, we call these out as a full valve grind and polish among other things, it is a dig but is also in jest and we especially say out loud when one person is prone to a simple panic urgency with marshalling, don't come off around this marshals' area as he is the main culprit.

Regardless deslotting and reslotting sucks, we all do it, even the veteran racers, as occurred yesterday for those two in our group, we do take it all in as racing incidents and throw out in-jest remarks.

I'm slowly getting people to call 'track' when they deslot so marshals and racers are aware of wayward cars. I even say that I have the tyre cleaning cloth/board on track just to avoid finger and car impacts and others are starting to say the same.


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