questions concerning christmas tree

[Ed Fernandez]

Originally Posted by John Kelley

ANOTHER RIPOFF !!!

Car#-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET-- Speed-----Car#-Driver(Opp'nt)-RT-----ET-- Speed
7511 Ted Seipel .......... 7312 George Stassi
E1 -0.005 11.325 114.31 ...... ****WINNER**** -0.032 10.116 130.42
SS/KA Dial: 11.31 (+/-): 0.015 ...... SS/HA Dial: 10.01 (+/-): 0.106
Qualified: #64 11.283 -0.267 ..... #30 10.012 -0.888

Ouch! Seipel goes red by -0.005 to give the win to Stassi.

Rip off???????? You're nuts.Must be something in the air in the Texas,Arkansas area.

[bill dedman]

If that had been a breakout instead of a red light (with those numbers), the other guy would have won.

Tell me, Ed, why there should be this opposite result for what is basically the same situation?

Show me some of that NEW YAWK "logic" that will explain away this totally different result from one instance wherein the worse infraction gets the loss (breakout), but in the other (first red light) , the worse infraction gets the win.

That's with today's antiquated rules....

I need to hear the NEW YAWK logic of that to understand your comment about Texas/Arkansas...

[Signman]

{why there should be this opposite result for what is basically the same situation?}

If you're going to use this logic, do some further analysis adding margin of victory into the equation:

In a double breakout situation was the racer further under his dial and also through the finish line first?
If so the racer broke out first AND broke out by more.
Therefore first and worst.

In the races I have lost on a double breakout I have taken the stripe

[K Stubbs]

Lets look at the FACTS; If you are complaining about this rule then, therefore, you must be loosing enough races by redlight to do so, right? Isnt that why you are arguing this point? If so, then you are redlighting too much! Look and see how many times you have lost in a year by redlight and ask yourself if the rule was different, would I have won? If you have to ask yourself that, its too many times. If you are loosing enough races to want this rule changed then you need to fix your problem. There is your legitimate argument.

[bill dedman]

Originally Posted by K Stubbs

Lets look at the FACTS; If you are complaining about this rule then, therefore, you must be loosing enough races by redlight to do so, right? Isnt that why you are arguing this point? If so, then you are redlighting too much! Look and see how many times you have lost in a year by redlight and ask yourself if the rule was different, would I have won? If you have to ask yourself that, its too many times. If you are loosing enough races to want this rule changed then you need to fix your problem. There is your legitimate argument.

No, Kevin, I have never lost a race due to this first red light rule.

Believe it or not, there are people in this world who have reasons for wanting things that are not necessarily beneficial to THEM. Because this rule potentially affects every handicap race that's run (every round), the number of people over the last 36 years who have lost races because they were the first to leave (something they had no control over), and red lighted, thereby depriving the second car to leave of HIS chance to red light, must be staggering. This can happen to an O/SA car racing a N/SA, as easily as it can an A/SA car running against a B/SA car.

In no way, is it the playground of the V/SA and W/SA cars; nobody (except the AA cars) is exempt.

AND, WHEN AND IF it ever gets into usage, (which I doubt), all it will do to the AA cars is put them in the same red light jeopardy that the rest of the cars have always been in. That is, they will now have a chance to red light (even though the slower car alreday bulbed), whereas, as things stand now, the only way they're EVER in redlight jeopardy, is if the first car to leave goes green.... and, they're ALWAYS the second to leave.

I have been a fan of drag racing since 1955, and it took me until about 2004, and to have some guy a lot smarter than I was, (and, that's not hard at all...) to explain this worse red light system to me, before I could grasp the significance of it. It took me awhile (weeks) to really understand exactly what was going on. I was so used to it being the way it was, I just wasn't equipped to really absorb what it all meant... but after a (long) while, I did have the light above my head tun on....

I love drag racing; always have.... and this FIRST red light system has been a carbunkle on the playing field, in my perception, anyway, ever since I finally "got it", after years and years of accepting it the way it was....

I'd like to see it fixed for everybody's benefit.... not just mine. I don't race that much....

[Alan Roehrich]

Bill, once again, it is your perception. Further you want it "fixed for everybody's benefit", but you absolutely and adamantly refuse to consider that others do not want it "fixed" at all, and not all of them drive faster cars, either.

The point was made earlier that if it was a really big deal, and any problem at all for that matter, to the guys running slower cars, they'd have all written letters to NHRA by now. Evidently they have not. Has another "light bulb" come on in your head yet?

[Ed Fernandez]

It came to him in a dream.

[bill dedman]

Originally Posted by Alan Roehrich

Bill, once again, it is your perception. Further you want it "fixed for everybody's benefit", but you absolutely and adamantly refuse to consider that others do not want it "fixed" at all, and not all of them drive faster cars, either.

The point was made earlier that if it was a really big deal, and any problem at all for that matter, to the guys running slower cars, they'd have all written letters to NHRA by now. Evidently they have not. Has another "light bulb" come on in your head yet?

Alan,

Many people who race don't comprehend the way this rule plays favorites, so they don't complain. They accept it because they've never known anything else; it's the "norm," and it's "the way it's always been."
That alone, gives it tremendous inertia and acceptance, but when you closely examine what it actually DOES, it's not a good thing. What's good about giving the faster car a free ride to the next round, and removing them from red light jeopardy just because the first car (which had no choice, but to leave first, when he pulled up to stage) left a thousandth (or more) too soon?????????

Your contention would make sense (that everybody would be complaining, writing letters to NHRA, etc.), if everybody understood, IN DEPTH, how this FIRST RED LIGHT system works, but, they don't. I know I didn't, for years and years...

Throughout this discussion, I have asked you pointed questions that you have ignored, choosing, instead, to comment on things that are completely removed from the question at hand. You seem to like to divert attention away from questions I have asked you by commenting on things that have nothing to do with a worse red light rule; for instance:

Alan said,

1. "How about we change the rules so that if the fast car spins, you have to rerun the race? Or, if the track is marginal, the slower car has to put WD-40 all over his slicks?"

If that was an attempt at humor, it was lost on me....


2. "It's not a "software problem", it's a "problem" in YOUR perception."


And, I am responding:
"No, the reality is, it is what it is, regardless of my opinion about it. And, that you don't see a system that rewards a percentage of the cars at the expense of others, as a problem, then I think that that situation may be responsible for the over-long discussion we've had, here."

Alan said,
3. ""Ask Fred Suiter, I pulled up and told him he ran a great race and he kicked my red lighting ***. I took my loss like a man, and like a racer, and tried to do better the next time."

If that had been a heads-up race, I'd commend you on your great attitude and exemplary sportsmanship!

But, if it was a handicapped race in which you had to leave before him, and thereby deprive him of his own red-light jeopardy by bulbing FIRST, then I'd say you were screwed by the system, unnecessarily. What if he had bulbed worse than you? Don't you think you deserved to win that round, just as if you had broken out less than him, on the big end???

Would you like to return to "The first car to break out loses"??? It was that way, for awhile, and if everybody thought like you do, it would STILL be that way. No difference in a red light and a breakout; they're both just cases of poor judgment placing your car at the wrong place at the wrong time. Samo/Samo...



I wrote,
"Hope you'll think about this, and if you can think of any rational, logical, legitimate, reason that it wouldn't be an improvement in the "level playing field" aspect of handicapped drag racing. please tell me; I'm all ears!!!

The silence was deafening....



I wrote, "What doesn't "work" about the current system is, that it prevents EQUALred light "jeopardy." The second car to leave is no longer in jeopardy of a red light, if the first car bulbs. Where is the other side of that coin???

You never answered, I assume, because there is no "other side".... It's ALWAYS beneficial to the second car to leave. Always...

4. You also wrote, "Beware the law of unintended consequences."

But, even after I asked just what might be even ONE of these "unintended consequences," you never even attempted to answer the question. I'm still wondering what one might be.... if, in fact, there could be any.


I wrote:

"For example, you don't need a statistical analysis to conclude that Ellis Buth's W/SA wagon is on the wrong end of this system (virtually, always leaving first), or that the new, 9-second Mustangs are on the "right" end of it.

The Mustangs enjoy an immunity from red lights IF their opponent bulbs.
Ellis's Pinto NEVER enjoys such an advantage in handicapped racing.

I asked, "Where is the other side of that coin" relative to the fact that the quicker car sometimes enjoys this advantage, but there is none.
THAT is an "inexcusable inequity," in my book, because it is unnecessary, now, and accomplishes nothing.

Can you show me the other side of that coin?


5. You wrote,"Again, you ignore the law of unintended consequences simply because it is easy, convenient, and suits your agenda"

No, Alan, I ignore it because I can't think of a single thing that could result from a worse red light rule change that would qualify as a (negative) unintended consequence. Apparently, you can't, either...


If you CAN think of one, even at this late date, I would be VERY INTERESTED in hearing what it might be.. Enlighten me....


6. At some point, you wrote, "And then neither will see the red light, because the tree is behind them, because both cars have launched and then the computer makes up its mind after the fact. MAYBE one or both drivers will see a win light come on, or maybe they won't."

And, this will affect the race how??? I asked at the time, but, you never responded.....


In all your verbiage, you still have not come up with one single reason NOT to change it... none. Even YOU can't logically defend keeping this lopsided rule in effect.


7. Finally, you wrote, "Bill, it doesn't matter what anyone says. You want the rule changed, and nothing else will satisfy you."

Au contraire, mon ami.... if ANYBODY can show me that this rule change is a bad idea, will change racing for the worse, or, will have dire, "unintended consequences," I will clam up like a mobster in front of a Senate, organized crime investigating committee, and apologize for wasting everybodys' time!

I will!!!

But, so far, that hasn't happened.

[Ed Fernandez]

Originally Posted by bill dedman

If that had been a breakout instead of a red light (with those numbers), the other guy would have won.

Tell me, Ed, why there should be this opposite result for what is basically the same situation?

Show me some of that NEW YAWK "logic" that will explain away this totally different result from one instance wherein the worse infraction gets the loss (breakout), but in the other (first red light) , the worse infraction gets the win.

That's with today's antiquated rules....

I need to hear the NEW YAWK logic of that to understand your comment about Texas/Arkansas...

What K Stubbs said,for starters.If enough S/SS racers wanted the rule changed they would flood NHRA with requests,accompanied by their S/SS comp. number.That would disqualify non competitors and
wannabes.
You Live in Ark. and Mr Kelly lives in Texas,get the connection?You both seem to be obsessive/compulsive on this matter.Maybe some more time at the senior center will cure that.

[John Kelley]

Originally Posted by ed fernandez

what k stubbs said,for starters.if enough s/ss racers wanted the rule changed they would flood nhra with requests,accompanied by their s/ss comp. Number.that would disqualify non competitors and
wannabes.
You live in ark. And mr kelly lives in texas,get the connection?you both seem to be obsessive/compulsive on this matter.maybe some more time at the senior center will cure that.

You don't have a legitimate reason not to change it and make it right so you mount a personal attack ???
So...so Nu Joisy......