what's curious about the end of yesterday's ALMS race is I know there are giant Gehl cranes all over that track to move cars quickly. driver was out of the car, it was deep into the runoff area...should have been time to clean that up. of course the X-factor is the really long pace laps at RA. agree 100% on the gwc with USCR. "overtime"!
agree, solid run by them (and IIRC the first race they've actually finished!) if that car was in P2 instead of P1 it would be a very serious threat. which is probably why it isn't.
At one point when it was leading the race I was pumped and then stepped away to eat lunch and when I returned it had dropped to 7th I believe? The car definitely has great top speed but its cornering is still suffering in the tighter turns. I wish ALMS had more races because I love this series.
totally agree! don't forget that RA is 4 effen miles a loop!!! the france family racing model coming to a road course and imsa event near you
I've asked a couple of sources in ALMS/IMSA about the use of yellows (which we're more used to seeing in NASCAR and GrandAM) for a harmless spin or mechanical situation and they've not responded. The 900lb gorilla just gets bigger it seems. Any opportunity to throw a perfectly good race off the rails is used to create manufactured drama by flying a full course caution for the least little off is beyond reason, Daytonner's hand is already at play it seems. How is it in F-1, they can have a car removed from the track in 30 seconds or less but here in the U.S. it takes a crew of a dozen people all standing around talking on their radios over ten minutes to load a stranded car onto a flatbed? What was really surprising at the time the Porsche went into the barriers with eight minutes remaining was how the announcers got all revved up, "This is going to be a fantastic finish!" while I was yelling at the TV and scaring the dog, "This race is over you *******s!". If it took the crew ten plus minutes to load up the X-treme P-2 car onto a flatbed and the Risi Ferrari nearly that long to get out of the kitty litter, how did these guys figure they could extricate the Porsche from the barrier, and repair the tire wall in less than eight minutes? Why aren't these tracks using F-1 model of removing stranded cars and using local yellows so they're not constantly interrupting the flow of the race? It ruined what was otherwise an enjoyable race to watch. BHW
It isn't an IMSA thing. It's been going on at RA for about 20 years; I recently discovered a copy of a letter I sent to RA about an Indycar race in the early '90s where it was 25% full course caution. I also remember a crash at Canada Corner(TransAM?) during the same era where it seemed the 1st arriving crew couldn't do anything until supervisors arrived. RE GWC: A GrandAM guy talking about the merged series at RA's PorschePlatz was hopeful that wouldn't happen. He said NASCAR owned the dumb-downed racing space...Honest.
I agree on FCY's at RA, hard to do anything that doesn't result in a 3 or 4 lap, 20 minute FCY. I do think that they could be better about local yellows though. GrandAm is owned by NASCAR, which is "owned" by GM , so I expect to see lots of Corvette Corrals next year and nothing for Porsche, BMW, Ferrari, etc
How about this idea what if they quit counting yellow flag laps? I mean they are not racing and cannot pass under yellow.
Indeed it would be and I know the drivers and teams despise finishing under yellow. I was enjoying the race except for the extended amount of time it took to remove vehicles and did not even watch the finish. I believe this issue could be resolved or at least improved if more cranes were invested in and strategically placed around the tracks. Heck instead of owning the cranes they could be rented for the weekend.
Goossens could not have had a tighter death grip on that steering wheel as he kept his car pointed dead straight as much as he could on that last lap under yellow. If had been a green finish he most likely would have run out of gas. Not sure why it was taking so long for them to clear those cars and I'm not a fan of FCY's at RA.
How long before they're all like NASCAR and say "Oh, it rained yesterday, we need to throw a 'competition caution' 20 minutes into the race"? It's getting so absurd now, it takes all the fun out of watching the races. In F-1, the only way they dispatch the safety car is if there is a massive down pour like we see in Malaysia or Spa or a huge shut where the cars are in precarious positions and carbon fibre strewn all over the place. BHW
local yellows have always been used in scca and imsa events. this full course garbage on a course as long as Road America is NASCARian. pcb
Hmmm...full course cautions have been used at RA in every series I've attended for a long time. Are you saying ALMS races elsewhere are using/have used local yellows?
