THSCC Forums

Yeah I will be the first to say that as the first event as one of this years woorker coordinators I had a pretty poor showing for myself.

I got there way to late and may have had a few to many beverages the night before. So I would like to apologize to all for the amount of confusion at the event. It also turned out we were very short on radio's for the workers and other staff which didn't help the cause much. Add to that the fact that both Ryan and I hadn't really thouhgt about the fact that we would be in the same run groups for the entire year.

It was the first event of the year with a lot of new officers doing there jobs for the first time. So things will only get better.

Chris,

I am not picking one you, but two walks on a course that long is not enough. Did you make any walks by yourself? Of the two walks, were you chatting and joking around during them? Did you walk the course with an experienced driver?

This is a true story...three years ago (I had the Miata) I was walking the course with my ex and some friends. There was a tricky three cone offset right before the finish. We walked the course a couple of times and each time I walked right past the proper entrance to the offset. I had a DNF on my first two runs. Sure as heck, my ex pointed out where I DNF was where I was not paying attention during my walk. I thanked her for pointing it out. Then I slapped her for not telling me during the walks that I was missing it. I really did not slap her. Cause any one that knows Charlene, knows she would have decked me

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Jim Pastorius
2008 Silverado VortecMax
1992 Camaro CMC#92
2002 BMW R1150R

2009 3rd Place CMC Mid-Atlantic Championship
2009 CMC Hyperfest Winner

FYI regarding "getting lost". One of the things you will learn from experience is how to spot the likely "gotchas" when walking a course. Once you start getting a feel for what will be hard to see or follow while driving, you can use a variety of techniques to help remember where to go or conversely, where not to go.

I miss going to Laurinburg with my formula car (the site is too tough on my car even on course and any off course excursion would be extremely damaging). From the videos it looked like a great course, especially since there were no tight 180's!

FYI if the Lotus Europa driver has any questions, etc. about Europas PM me since I have "some" experience with them and so does my wife!

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Dick Rasmussen

FS 50 2018 Mustang GT

Jim,

The first walk through was done with an experienced driver. We talked a bit about lines and strategy. I did the second walk through alone.

By the end of the day I was not driving from cone to cone anymore. I was able to see things as sections, if that makes any sense, but I did not see each section in succession. I suspect that if I missed a gate it had to do with my transition between sections as I had to recalibrate everything in that transition.

I've had just as much fun going over things in my head as I did driving them at the time. This is some fun stuff!!

Uhhh..."they"??

hehe, my Scooby was under shawn's mercy all weekend. I just asked him not to break the transmission, everything else was fair game

-Tom

There was a "Hoppe's WRX" class this weekend.

Oh yeah, and the course design was easily one of the best courses that I've been to. Thanks Shawn and the everyone else involved for putting together such a great event!

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In need of car.

We arrived at 7:45 and I felt I was late as well. Especially considering I have new additional duites this season. I was very surprised to see veterans arriving at the registration table at 9:30 and wondering why the worker sheets were full.

I'd say if you're a Novice you should be there VERY early. Walk the course over and over and ask questions. Most Tarheels are more than willing to help a newbie.

Another tip is to watch the pros. If you have trouble in a particular spot in your first two runs then go out and watch the fast guys do that section. You can learn a lot from those guys/gals and apply it to your afternoon runs.

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Vincent Keene
'06 Ford Mustang GT (track rat)
'15 Dodge Charger R/T (yeah, it's got a HEMI!)
'07 Ford Fusion SE (205,000 miles and counting)
'98 Chevy Z-24 (retired)
'93 Acura Integra (Team SWB 24HOL Car)

off topic, but hey, if figure i'll add my 2 cents.

my rule of thumb, "if i can't close my eyes and run the entire course in my head, then i haven't walked it enough". (i've never DNF'd a run due to 'not knowing where the course is'.)

i also take a course map and pencil out to make notes and circle key cones.

i walked the course this weekend 3 times before i was able to run it in my head...it took me about an hour and a half

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05 MCS

I got up at 5:30, arrived at 8:00, walked the course once then did registration for an hour +. Did car prep during the drivers meeting and got it to grid while the workers were walking out. If I didn't trailer it with the race tires on it, then I'd be changing tires during the first heat...

This course was one of the easier ones to follow if looking ahead, however, I didn't go fast in the fast parts, and might have gone too slow in the slow parts. I also hit too many cones (me and a bunch of other people).

A 2nd (or more) walk would have been nice. When you are waiting in the registration line, please keep in mind what the registrar is giving up in order to make your day go well.

I heard from a few people that I screwed up registration, if so, I apologize, however, to my knowledge, I did have all the people in the classes they asked to be in. I just might not have had the right car listed for that class (which makes no difference in the final results)... It's also possible they didn't ask to be in the right class (more evidence that we need fewer classes).

If you weren't allowed to walk the course from 8:30 to 9:30, how prepared would you be? If you were working in the bus during that time, trying to remember the course based on one walk, also wondering about getting your car prepped, how precise would you be at doing your work assignment?

Just food for thought.

Scott -longing for the days when he had to "work" the course.

Trust me, you can get a clean, no cones, no DNF run even when you spin. Of course, there's the fugly 93.x second run time by your name.

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Has no responsibility whatsoever.

So true for that position as well as most of the officers. Another reason for folks to use PayPal...to help out your friendly registrar.

Thanks Scott for all your hard work and to all the others who make the necessary sacrifices for the masses to come and play.

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Vincent Keene
'06 Ford Mustang GT (track rat)
'15 Dodge Charger R/T (yeah, it's got a HEMI!)
'07 Ford Fusion SE (205,000 miles and counting)
'98 Chevy Z-24 (retired)
'93 Acura Integra (Team SWB 24HOL Car)

First, let me say I had a GREAT time and thought that the course was really fun to drive! I thought the event went pretty well.

Some good stuff I saw going on…

* I know Adam was being hard on himself regarding first time worker coordinator, but hey, I saw him walking around and checking on stations to make sure people were being relieved.

* On the back half of the course when we had people clobbering cones and dragging them with them, it was nice to see someone have the initiate to bring/shuttle the cones back to the various stations without being asked.


I also have some what I hope are constructive comments that should NOT be viewed as being directed at this particular event but are stuff I have seen over the past year or so....

* Worker station positions and numbers need to be listed on course map. I personally find it helpful if the Worker Stations are marked on the maps and are numbered. It really helps when you are assigned to a station. Or if you are working and you see a problem somewhere and need to mention it by name over the radio (i.e. “Can someone at Station 3 check the course, it looks like you have a cone down and haven’t fixed it.”)

* Assigned worker stations. I know it is probably a nightmare to try to do, but if when we signed up for our work assignment that it was listed at that time what station we would be at. I think this would help the worker coordinator keep track of who is out at specific stations and when they will be relieved.

* Periodic radio checks. Sometimes at a station you wonder if they are hearing you back at the bus. They usually do a GREAT job of repeating back a call on a cone. But at other times you are just not sure if they hear you or not.

* Extra run in the morning vs. afternoon???? This is just an idea. Don't know if it would work or not. As the day goes on more and more people pack up and leave. So it always seems harder and harder to find workers later in the day. On top of that it is the afternoons in which we put in the extra runs. I know we may not know until after the two morning runs if we will have time for extra timed runs in the afternoon, but what happens is that we have a struggle to find workers, fewer workers at stations and people working much longer in the afternoon. Maybe the solution is that you just get in earlier enough to sign up for 1/2 vs. 3/4 and those that show up late get the shaft.

* Stop the event and embarrass those who are supposed to be working, but are not. Do we just leave people out working for a long time until someone eventually relieves them or should we stop the event to expose the problem of people not showing up to work when they should? Should we us the PA to start announcing names of those who are not checked off, but are supposed to be working?

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Richard Casto
1972 Porsche 914
2013 Honda Fit Sport
2015 Honda Fit EX
http://motorsport.zyyz.com
Money can't buy happiness, but somehow it's more comfortable to cry in a Porsche than a Kia.

Vincent is right. The tech guys, the Novice coordinators, the registrars, event chairs, etc all get very few looks at the course unless they are there for setup and/or at the site by 7:30 AM (not always possible to do all of that).

Cathie Taylor was also in the bus all morning, while she did registration, Gordon was setting up the timing equipment.

This brings up another interesting issue (that is on topic). A large portion of the experienced autocrossers are doing their work assignments before the event starts, or are doing administrative jobs during the day (timing and scoring, worker coordinators, etc) which means a larger percentage of the course workers are inexperienced. This is something that the club is aware of, however, we've not been able to work out a good solution yet.

Scott

Great course, flowed really well, super easy to follow if looking ahead. Only walked it once, but rode with Aaron once & Christine once, which also helped a bit.

Any novice or whoever wants somebody to take a ride with them or needs help during course walks, come see me - silver Subaru coupe with "STS/PRO 1" on the side.

I worked timing during the 3rd heat and had problems with workers calling cones and DNF's. I could tell there were novices at several worker stations because they weren't sure about DNF's