An observation

[gordon]

An Observation

Having just spent the better part of the day working on slot cars, some thoughts passed through my mind with respect to the relationship between damage to cars and success in races. You may ask what the two have to do with each other, so let me try to explain my thoughts.

I've noticed that the cars which sustain the most damage (aside from open-wheeled cars which are delicate by their nature) tend to be the non-high-impact cars running with little or no magnets. We all know that winning in these classes requires working particularly hard at going as fast as possible while staying in the slot as much as possible. Achieving this requires more skill than driving cars glued to the track with powerful magnets like our modified classes. With those cars the magnets do half the driving. With the low/no magnet cars, drivers tend to run fewer laps without crashing, thus the propensity for damage to these cars. Clearly, the drivers who crash less often will get better results, hence the relationship I spoke about above.

So where am I going with this? I'm trying to make each of us think about improving our skill set so that we achieve two things - improve our results and limit damage to the cars we drive (whether our own or, more importantly, those lent to us by someone else). I love winning and leading the points in any class I drive, so why should I be concerned about others' improving their abilities? Well it's because we all need to rise to the challenge if we want success in this hobby and when everyone is more competitive, I too must raise my game if I hope to keep up. It's a win-win situation.

And I'll have fewer damaged cars to repair.

Gordon

[Luke]

I agree and this is what I was kind of talking "writing" about... Reply to Race Report No.108

When next you are doing track maintenance could you invite the guys to help or even do/have PRACTICE SESSIONS..?

Luke

[gordon]

Most definitely.

[steveaca]

I agree Gordon. I also think that the most damaging crashes are not the ones which can be considered normal racing incidents , but the ones where a driver has deslotted and another driver, instead of stopping at the accident site or even maybe gently 'nudging' the deslotted car out of the way, barges into it , either intentionally or through sheer lack of observation.

[gordon]

Yes Steve, those are the worst ones for the cars. Drivers need to be more observant, deslotters need to call "track!" as per our requirements and when approaching a deslotted car we all need to slow down and if possible, lightly nudge it aside (or stop till the lane is cleared) rather than go barging through at high speed.