29 replies to this topic

[Cheater]

New link in post 6.

[Rob Voska]

Good group of guys to follow this year.

[bbr]

Is the entire ES field going to be BL???

[Mbloes]

I'm watching this live right now (9/30 Monday nite). Pretty depressing that I see them spraying glue all over every corner. I guess this is the new chapter of glue racing.

 

Bitchin' track though.

[Rob Voska]

That's interesting because ISRA has a gluing procedure. I also saw it yesterday and thought it was just a few guys running the track in. Wonder if they glue different for BL motors?

[Cheater]

F1 1/32 qualifying

 

[Cheater]

BTT.

[bbr]

Jimmy Williams TQ for baby ES I think... but I don't know what happened in the race... because coverage is hard to get...

[Cheater]

Mike, if you go to the race YouTube channel, you can always find the live stream. Search for "TUSCANY RACING SLOT."

 

Here's the live stream for today's racing:

[Cheater]

And here's the master link to the results of the event.

 

2024 ISRA results

[Cheater]

The 1/32 F1 final will be starting soon. And American Jimmy Williams has made it into the race.

 

As I am typing this, they are just practicing. Don't know when the actual final will begin.

 

This one will likely be worth watching.

 

 

[Cheater]

[bbr]

[Cheater]

Here's the ES 1/24 Final results:

 

[Gil Aubin]

This has been fun to watch, even if some of it is confusing.  First, what is their definition of a track call?  Obviously a car on the floor, but there seems to be no consistency - a single car crash can cause a track call, but sometimes multiple cars do not - what am I missing?  Also, are the drivers allowed to speak (I am thinking back to JPVR)?  This is a great change from what I used to see, but is it rule driven or more of a European custom?  There have been several lengthy delays, maybe to allow work on a car?  I am not talking about fix the braid before returning to the slot, these have been much longer.  I thought that was verboten LOL.

 

This is all new to me, just trying to understand better, and based on the turnout I would say it is a very popular format!

[SlotCarsten]

Track call:
A car deslotting and ending up in an unmarchalled position is a track call.
The "unmarchalled positions" are indicated by the yellow flags on  the track.
So it is crystal clear. At least one guy was given a two-lap penalty for yielding "Track" when the car ended up 20 cm before the trackcall zone.
I guess this is the information you are missing.

 

Also, while a track call is in progress, you are not allowed to work on the car.
For most times a steward is watching if this is happening. Several times the "Stop working on the car" was issued.
Also at least one penalty was handed out for working on the car with tools while in lane change.

 

I think they are doing a pretty decent job of keeping everything level.

[Cheater]

As was pointed out in the live stream chat, the side walls on this new track were considerably shorter than is normally seen on slot car tracks, resulting is a lot more cars on the floor than is usually the case.

[Rob Voska]

Track call rules were changed in 2018-2019.  For both the race and qualifying.  It's in the minutes.  Infield, cars locked together and maybe under a table were the only track calls.  Brushless has contributed to track calls & accidents as they have no brakes once out of the slot and act like a pool ball crossing all lanes and bouncing off the walls and back again along with bring faster in the corners.  Also walls are now made about 1 1/4" 30mm tall putting more cars on the floor.  I left early last year because track calls penalize those on the track and reward those on the floor. When your racing against 15 other heats the track calls in all but the top classes hinder those trying to make laps and improve.  But again the cream rose to the top & the top 24 have pretty much remained unchanged.

[Gil Aubin]

Track call:
A car deslotting and ending up in an unmarchalled position is a track call.
The "unmarchalled positions" are indicated by the yellow flags on  the track.
So it is crystal clear. At least one guy was given a two-lap penalty for yielding "Track" when the car ended up 20 cm before the trackcall zone.
I guess this is the information you are missing.

 

Also, while a track call is in progress, you are not allowed to work on the car.
For most times a steward is watching if this is happening. Several times the "Stop working on the car" was issued.
Also at least one penalty was handed out for working on the car with tools while in lane change.

 

I think they are doing a pretty decent job of keeping everything level.

 

Thanks, this makes it very clear.  Never realized that there were markings on the track, I guess it makes sense.

[Gil Aubin]

The more I think about the track call rules, the more I like them. It takes away subjectivity of calls, putting it in black and white makes it easier to administer fairly.

[MSwiss]

Track call rules were changed in 2018-2019.  For both the race and qualifying.  It's in the minutes.  Infield, cars locked together and maybe under a table were the only track calls.  Brushless has contributed to track calls & accidents as they have no brakes once out of the slot and act like a pool ball crossing all lanes and bouncing off the walls and back again along with bring faster in the corners.  Also walls are now made about 1 1/4" 30mm tall putting more cars on the floor.  I left early last year because track calls penalize those on the track and reward those on the floor. When your racing against 15 other heats the track calls in all but the top classes hinder those trying to make laps and improve.  But again the cream rose to the top & the top 24 have pretty much remained unchanged.

 

Watching the Semi with Horky was really something. There was already a bunch of track calls and then there was yet another that left his car at the start of the straight.

 

As they were getting ready to resume the heat, you can see him gesture to the marshal closest to the car that his car might need a push, like his ESC wasn't quite reacting right.

 

The car took off but it stopped about a 1/3 of a lap later and you can see a clear flash on the video.

 

He got a track call for that (maybe it was in a forbidden zone??) and then in the process of replacing the board, having the car fly backwards after the replacement, and then the reswitching of the wires, and getting moving again in the right direction, there was seven track calls total, with marshals taking their time fixing the braid.

 

3:35 ran off the video while only 1:42 ran off the heat time.

 

IOW, he had an extra 1:53 to work on his car.

 

He made an incredible charge back and missed the move-up to the Main by only two laps.

 

Ironically, one of the marshals who took his time fixing the braid during a track call was the racer he almost caught for the last move-up.

 

To sum it up, brushless is not, AFAIK, giving some super-talented driver with shallow pockets a chance to compete at the top.

 

It's just quickly changing technology, with its added complexity, has the same elite racers on top, but has now added the wild card of the elite racer possibly getting eliminated if he loses IC chip Russian Roulette.

(obviously, the non-elite racer can lose, also)

 

Raivis Jansons and Horky were a couple of the losers I was made aware of.

 

Weird.

[Rob Voska]

In one of the 24ES heats I missed the first heat and there were 46 track calls in the last seven heats. Only five finished.

 

Wall rules will be changed to a minimum height. Not sure at this time what it is, but I think around 3" from track surface.  

[JHMerriman]

You're not allowed to work on the car during track calls, so he didn't gain any advantage because of that. The only advantage you get, if you're working on your car, is a chance to look at the car more and relax a bit.

There was a proposal submitted to raise the wall height, but I believe it was only 7 cm. Don't quote me on that.

I believe during the 32 Euro class, Gugu was eliminated because of an enormous number of track calls during his heat race. He drove a near perfect race, and missed out on the move-up.

I agree that there's an issue with the amount of track calls, but I'm not sure how to solve it. You could limit what the marshals fix on the cars. You could decrease the number of automatic track call zones. The majority of those are where a crossover occurs.

[Eddie Fleming]

All the experienced racers I know are all the time complaining about to many track calls, and I am one of them. I understand limited numbers of marshals. 

 

So I watch a little bit of the Worlds. With all the track marshals you could ask for, the track calls looked like Saturday night amateur racing at Atlanta Slot Car.

 

The cars and drivers were blindingly fast but I came away a bit disappointed.  

[jimht]

 Qualifying and practice on 14 volts...all races on 12 volts.