Katie Kelly wrote:
> I think the scales are SCCA property, but I could be mistaken, and they
travel around from Tour to Tour,
> Pro to Pro. Someone please correct me if I am wrong. At any rate, chances
are, they bounce around a lot,
> and are dead wrong, as they were at this event. This is pretty obvious. I
think rather than pointing fingers at
> SFR shouting conspiracy, I think there's got to be a way to protest the
scales or something.
There *IS* a way to protest the scales. I did, when I was found (initially)
9 pounds underweight after the first day at Nationals in 1993. A protest
was filed against me by the chief of protest (the guy who drives an FP 240Z
from Texas ... tall guy ... can't think of his name right now). He HAD to
do that, it's in the rules. Didn't make me feel any better though.
Then it went to the protest committee, who weighed the car (with me in it,
this is CM) every which way from Sunday. Forward, backwards, etc. They
also used test weights, 300 pounds worth (6 50 pound weights, testing each
of the 4 pads). Two of the pads were shown to weigh slightly low, and with
a correction, the best we came out was 3 pounds underweight (but never more
than that initial 9 pounds). During this process, lots of other folks
suggested that I drink a ton of water, but that was discouraged by the
protest committee (and hey, I really was apparently underweight.)
Oh well, that was the end of my ability to claim that the equipment was
faulty.
Since there are lots and lots of weighs to LEGALLY make sure you are
overweight, such as adding fuel before your last run, it's obvious there's
no malicious intent here (not like some protests with clearly illegal parts,
etc). I know that Charlie Davis was on that protest committee, so he can
chime in on how this worked.
Short story: protest committee, at that time, had a philosophy of "no
illegal car can finish in front of a legal car", so they made me tied for
last place (36th, if memory serves), which was a whopping 15.2 second
penalty (and this was just a one-day penalty!)
Naturally, I appealed. My appeal was based on two major points:
1) 3 pounds (or even 9) could not possibly equate to 15+ seconds. I'll
stipulate that maybe it might even be a whole second (though I doubt it) and
offered that they should double that and make it a 2-second penalty. Or:
2) The whole wording of the weight rules is bogus. After all, the car is
supposed to be weighed as the car comes of course, but with two drivers like
we had, the car comes of course *6 times*. In addition, the two drivers
weigh different amounts, and I was lighter, so every time I drove, I put
ballast into the car. We remove it for my co-driver. I also put the
ballast in when I get on the scales, of course. Clearly anyone can cheat at
this -- I literally modify my weight ON THE SCALES by adding ballast -- who
is to say I used that same ballast on my runs? Any of them? I was also the
first driver ... perhaps my co-driver used those last 3 pounds of fuel on
his last run. Maybe when the car came off the course with me in it, it was
legal! It almost certainly would have been overweight had we weighed it
after my first run, and therefore, at least the first run should have stood.
Of course, we'll never know.
The whole appeal was laughed out of Kansas. Oh well. I did make up a few
spots the second day and finished 31st (instead of 3rd). And the rules have
never changed in any way.
Josh
PS: Back on topic, Katie is right, of course. There's no conspiracy,
everyone plays by the same bogus scale rules, and Frank (and John and Pat,
and me, and everyone else who runs in or who has ever run in a "weight
class") should have known how to make sure he'd be fine when he got to
impound (which really means, he should have weighed first on those scales on
that day, *and* had a larger safety margin to account for the likelihood
that the scales might have a large variance when he goes back during
impound.)
----- Original Message -----
From: "Kelly, Katie" <kkelly@spss.com>
To: <Kevin_Stevens@pursued-with.net>; "Dennis Hale" <dhale_510@yahoo.com>
Cc: <ba-autox@autox.team.net>
Sent: Thursday, May 09, 2002 3:08 PM
Subject: RE: pros and tours
> You know what's weird? If only knew them by e-mail, and you changed the
name Dennis Hale with Paul Foster, it's almost as if they were the SAME
PERSON. Far out.
>
> National Tours are actually run by SCCA, chaired by members of the local
region. I'm not an expert on this by any means, but it's just what I've
seen. There's a traveling staff of the same core group of people, like
Howard Duncan, Paula Whitney, and so on. They are usually very well run, and
a great opportunity to get to know the nationals staff, and meet some
"national caliber" drivers.
>
> I should also state that "national caliber" REALLY means you go to
national events. It doesn't matter where you finish. If you go to the event,
you're running with the best, you're opening yourself up to huge
improvements, so you should feel good about attending, period. It's a great
step. It's like your ticket to competing at the Olympic Trials. Hey, if
someone told me I could, I would in a second just to be around all that
talent. It wouldn't matter to me where I finished. Just to say I warmed up
in the same POOL would be enough. Here's your chance to drive in the same
parking lot with the Janet Evanses and Carl Lewises of autocross. Why miss
it?
>
> Enough of that. The only reason why I'm going on here is because I worry
that there are new people who have no idea who Dennis is, and might
actually, yikes, BELIEVE him and think that SCCA is as scary and evil as he
says. Just to assuage any fears, every year at the Solo II Nationals in
Topeka, they have a Talent Show, where people get up on stage and sing and
dance, sometimes well, and sometimes not. How can anyone call that evil, I
don't know, but it seems to really be the heart and soul of what all this is
about: having fun. National Tours are no different.
>
>
> Again, this post is not really for Dennis, or even to Dennis, but for the
others out there who are reading his conspiracy theories and are feeling
confused and/or depressed wondering what all that is about. Please come run
our events, ESPECIALLY the Tours and Pros, and judge for yourself. I think
you'll have fun.
>
> Katie
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kevin Stevens [mailto:Kevin_Stevens@pursued-with.net]
> Sent: Thursday, May 09, 2002 10:50 AM
> To: Dennis Hale
> Cc: ba-autox@autox.team.net
> Subject: Re: pros and tours
>
>
> On Thu, 9 May 2002, Dennis Hale wrote:
>
> > >The scales person was not an SFR member, but from
> > another state. Please choose your targets more
> > carefully, Dennis.
> > - --Pat K
> >
> > Oh, that makes a difference? It was the SFR Tour,
> > right? Who do you think was responsible? Who do you
> > think should have worried about the problem? The RE of
> > the Arizona region?
>
> Well, but you do need at least a TARGET for the conspiracy, Dennis. Is it
> the (new) SFR chief? Is it the guy running the scales, from the East
> Coast? Is it whoever was chief of protest? The national office? The
> PAC? The rulebook? If you have a specific issue, bring it up.
> Otherwise this nebulous hinting and posturing is starting to get really
> old.
>
> KeS
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