Originally Posted by bill dedman
Ed, I don't like beer....
Believe it or not, there are people who think more deeply than to simply accept such a cockeyed situation... "Well, here (on a red light) we disqualify the first car to create an infraction, but HERE, (on a breakout infraction) we don't..."
Where is the consistency?
I'd be too embarrassed for NHRA to simply ask the novice to just close his eyes to intelligent thought, and accept that glaring disparity in logic just because "IT'S THE RULE."
Rules owe it to their constituency to provide a logical reason why they're written the way they are. Anything less, is chaos...
Nobody can do that in this case. It's a travesty to anyone who looks at it with more than a cursory glance.
This may be a novice who can understand the lopsided situation it creates.
Some people are deep thinkers, Ed... and can see that if you're going to eliminate the first car to redlight, shouldn't you also eliminate the first car to break out?
They used to.... in the beginning of Christmas Tree handicap racing. But, at some point, early-on, someone said, "Hey; that makes NO SENSE!"
"Let's eliminate the racer who breaks out the MOST!!"
And so they did. I assume you have no problem with that.
Now, it's possible to eliminate the racer who RED LIGHTS the MOST!
No reason not to change to a system that mimics the breakout protocol.
If the novice asks me, I can't just dumb the question down to "READ THE RULEBOOK;" there's more to it than that, because it needs attention.... the novice MAY be as stupid and thick-headed as I was; it took me YEARS before somebody took me aside and explained the problems with the current system, and even THEN, I didn't really "get it." A few more weeks, and it began to dawn on me that, "Hey; this guy's got something, here."
Comparing it with the breakout situation, and how it's handled, might be the easiest way to understand why the way they've been doing it since 1963 is not consistent with the way they prosecute breakouts... and breakouts are EXACTLY LIKE REDLIGHTS... a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time... maybe by milliseconds, but nevertheless, the wrong place at the wrong time.
Same type infraction; needs to be handled the same way.
The novice is owed an explanation beyond "READ THE RULEBOOK."
I'd like to be there when he asks you why the difference in how red lights are treated, vs. breakouys and see what you tell him!!! "Read the Rulebook, sonny!!!" LOL!
You probably would...
Merry Christmas.
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