A1GP

[gravel_monkey]

i feel a new thread of most embarsing moment is order. not only would it be a good laugh for everyone it tells you what not to do! what do you think?

[Doc Hollywood]

Originally Posted by mitzi dude

the race directer inrace control says when to move.and the same when to put out a flag

Why? How does he see what the person on the ground can't? How can he tell its safe or not?

[Stephen Green]

I think he may have been referring to Race Control as at large events the order often comes from there.

[Doc Hollywood]

Sorry! I didn't mean the ground crew! I understand race controls influence at big events when it comes to going trackside, although I don't always agree with it!

I meant to refere to the flags, surely yellows and blues etc are decided by the flaggers?

[Bodysnatcher]

Originally Posted by Doc Hollywood

I meant to refer to the flags, surely yellows and blues etc are decided by the flaggers?

oh ye of little FIA experience....

DTM tried it with us at Brands last year, to say that the orders to put out blue were a little premature would be putting it nicely.
I passed the request on, but I guess my flaggy was deaf.

[mitzi dude]

OK!! Doc.let me explain.this guy who is A1s race directer. sits a a bank of TV screens. 23 to be prosice. thats all he does. this guy can look at a incident on screen and say yay or nay. we were told in our breifing that no flags were to be put out unless told to do so. thats why the meeting went so well. if you disobeyed you could have been stood down. the guys that run the base sets in race control are gods. these screens show all corners, marshal posts, etc etc etc. you cant even p against the armco with out being watched. plus we run what is called a minute by minute process. any way Doc hope that clears things up for you.

[JimW]

Originally Posted by mitzi dude

. . . the guys that run the base sets in race control are gods. these screens show all corners, marshal posts, etc etc etc.

Yet another reason for my confirmed atheism. If you don't believe in the Gods then they become small gods and then fade away*.

Jim

* If all else fails get an eagle to pick them up and drop them from a great height. ((C) T. Pratchett)

[Woolley]

That explains John Watson's comment about the marshals not being able to go out to a car because they were 'waiting for the flags to come out'. That's bad enough for blues, but for anything else - yellows especially, it's a little... condescending?

Warning, what follows is a rant and does not necessarily represent the opinions of Ten-Tenths. (To be honest, it probably doesn't even represent the opinions of the poster when they aren't ranting.) I suppose it's back to holding races in places where the marshals have never seen a race car before, so they feel they have to run everything the same way. We now return you to our normal ramblings.

I've seen the Kiwi marshals on tv often enough to form the impression they've enough experience not to need their hands holding like this, and what we saw at this race showed that they knew exactly what to do when they were allowed out to a car.

And don't worry, mitzi, tell him we've performed a pratfall at some point, it's a natural hazard of the job. I'm just pleased none of mine have ever been televised!

A quick search will reveal several threads on embarrassing moments. Feel free to resurrect one of them.

[Doc Hollywood]

To be honest Mitzi if you wanna call this guy a God thats fine. I prefere to think for myself though.

To put it mildly, if thats the way things are run it's shockingly dangerous. When theres any more than a 3 second delay in putting a yellow out then it can become a very serious problem.

I wouldn't fancy having to ask if I had a full or partial track blockage to display a yellow. I marshalled at the first A1 round in Brands and I'll be back there in April, the flaggers thought for themselves then and I very much hope that will be the case again in April.

I'd happily go about the race meeting without to much divine intervention from race control, that is unless its asked for.

[Stephen Green]

It's pretty much the same as F1, there you are told when to put flags out and when not to.

[rbs]

Being told when to flag is a joke and proves that some countries are not capable of hosting major events.
One reason I do not do Gp's is being told what to do by someone who may never have held a flag in there life my 40 years of experince means nothing.

[Stephen Green]

40 years

You told me you were only 45 years old the other week

[Doc Hollywood]

Originally Posted by Stephen Green

It's pretty much the same as F1, there you are told when to put flags out and when not to.

Does that include yellows? If so it backs up the advice I've been given to NEVER apply for the British GP.

It's fairly weak when a marshal of any amount of signifigant experience can't decide what warrants a yellow flag.

[Stephen Green]

yes, yellows ae included

[Bodysnatcher]

Originally Posted by Doc Hollywood

. I marshalled at the first A1 round in Brands and I'll be back there in April, the flaggers thought for themselves then and I very much hope that will be the case again in April. .

Me too. There are many reasons why this either could'nt or won't work at Brands.

1- there are not enough radios to go round. Unless somebody decided to spend money and try and bring us up to late 20th century standards of communication.

2 - see posting no. 30 of this thread.

Scenario in that situation when meeting run by ***(*).
Ass obs (me) gets call on radio "all points blue flag to car no. .." Can't remember if all posts had radios, but it would be a damn strange day at Brands if they did.

This raises eyebrows, car x is still 1/2 to 1/3 of lap ahead of leading car.
I confer with my more learned no 1 observer.
We decide to take the proper course of action and inform our blue flag marshal. A man of many years experience and responsibility.
He took the appropriate action.
He nearly hit me for making such a suggestion.

Race control can pass on much useful information by seeing the bigger picture on multiple TV or data screens. But conversely TV cameras only give a focussed view and are slow to respond to rapidly changing conditions.
I think...if I was at a race meeting where the majority of my functions had been abrogated by a tyrant in front of a TV, I'd realise my usefulness was over and go home.

So, sorry Mitzi, looks like I won't be planning on a working holiday at A1GP in NZ.

(PS - currently the 2 or 3 most common radio controllers I have to interact with are all good guys)

As I keep saying - work together

[Woolley]

I have basically a real problem with this whole sequence. Firstly, organizers of major meetings happily go to places where there is no experience without recognizing how important and useful that experience is. Secondly, they then come up with questionable procedures to get round the fact that there is experience. Then they go somewhere that has experience, and impose those procedures. The next thing you hear is that they don't need us.

If you want it doing properly and safely, you do need experienced marshals, and you should value them when available, and consider it when considering the venue - they should be considered part of the infrastructure. I'm concerned that before long death or serious injury will occur either as a result of the lack of experience or the procedures that result. I find it shocking that you have the FIA preaching all kinds of safety without giving much thought to the most basic part of it, the people who are on the scene.

Put it another way, if Mika Hakkinen had his Australia accident now, either in one of the new countries on the GP scene, or where the marshals actually did what Race Control say, would he have survived?

[TwoSheds]

Originally Posted by Stephen Green

It's pretty much the same as F1, there you are told when to put flags out and when not to.

Not quite true.

At last years British GP we were allowed to use our own judgement however radio messages were still used to inform us (blue) flaggies when back markers were being caught by the leaders. Yes we are all experienced flaggies at the British GP but the FIA seem to have a system that they want used worldwide so we get given the messages even though we are aware of what is happening. If race control believe that a back marker isn't allowing the leaders to lap them then specific instructions can be passed to specific posts to display blue flags, thus potentially leading to a driver penalty if they continue to ignore the blue flags and impede the leaders.

With the yellow flag we are again allowed to use our experience although quite often we are asked to withdraw a yellow earlier than we would normally. It can also be the case that we are requested to display yellows for an incident further down the track we can't see to give extra warning to the drivers. F.ex. at Club Out last year we were requested to display double yellows for an incident at Farm!

But this is getting off topic so I'll stop now...

[Mike Kelly 1]

I marshalled at the first A1GP round of this season in Zandvoort late last year. All the flaggies made their own judgement on when to put blue / yellow / etc flags out and were not on radios. The only radios that were used were for Incident reporting. It sounds as if Taupo works on a slightly F1 orientated system.

[rbs]

Originally Posted by Stephen Green

40 years

You told me you were only 45 years old the other week

I do not remember that,I most probably said I will not see 45 again, any way
you are still older than me.

[mitzi dude]

man this is good. you know I only tell you guys what I saw. I spose some A1 tracks are different.and he race director we had was belgian, one of the worst ones they have apparantly.and that was his way of running it.Army style. so you can imagine when all was over and back to normal flagging where one could make his/ her own calls what a releif. Im sorry if I opened up a can of worms. ROB........

[Dutch chap]

Originally Posted by mitzi dude

and he race director we had was belgian, one of the worst ones they have apparantly

Roland de Bruynserade I presume? He and his stupid attitude are the main reason for me to not marshal DTM and other high profile events at Zandvoort. He is THE DTM race director and seems to be regarded as one of the top guns by the FIA. I'm sure Eddy V could tell us alot more about him, but don't bother Eddy. Roland is just a fact of life.

[Woolley]

Explains a lot if so. Sorry you had to endure that in NZs return to the big time of motor racing. Oh, well, now you know what we've all had to put up with for years!

[Dutch chap]

Must have been him. He's the only Belgian that travels abroad acting as race director AFAIK. I really can't stand this guy with his attitude towards safety and marshals. And, knowing that he himself was a chief marshal once, it gives you something to think about, how people can change....

[Woolley]

However, we really are getting way off topic now (I know, I'm as bad), so a quick nudge to the left, if I may!

[Dutch chap]

You're right. Ok, so it's sending a form to Mildred to volunteer for the A1GP at Brands. I will be there (if permitted) if only my funds aren't needed for my own racing. Racing costs money, but travelling to the UK from Holland isn't as cheap as it once used to be. I'm meeting my sponsor (for the racing that is, haven't found a sponsor for marshalling abroad yet ) this weekend, so I hope to know where I stand after that. Wouldn't want to miss it though!