Getting Rid of Mandatory Stops?

[macdaddy]

(Tony) Cotman’s position on mandatory pit windows is as simple as it is logic: get rid of them altogether. "From a fan or spectator or a television point of view, I have had no idea what was going on with the pit windows. And if I don’t have any idea what’s going on, how do we expect the regular fan in the stands to know what’s going on? The goal is to take it out of the hands of the officials and put the onus back on the teams. There’s definitely more than one way to win a race, and if one of them happens to be one team outsmarting everybody on fuel mileage, that’s just part of racing."

Full article here.

[Kicking-back]

I 100% agree with him.

If you can manage your fuel to go non-stop for the whole race good luck to you!

If the organisers can keep needless full-course yellow periods to a minimum, together with rules that let competitors pit as and when they wish, that will be a major positive.

[Amar7605]

I always thought that fuel management is part of the strategy when you race. Having mandatory pit windows basically takes that element away. Although I understand that CC probably wants to keep everyone equal, but this isn't a way to do it. I am sure that we have seen many F1 races where pit strategy has won races.

And besides, Champ Cars can only go so many laps before refuleing anyways, so why in the heck do you need a rule saying that you have to pit at a certain lap mumber... especially when the cars need to refuel at that pit window point anyways?

It makes no sense to me.

[macdaddy]

There's more on TSN:

Another one of Cotman's priorities is to streamline the decision making process on race weekends.

"I don't plan a major overhaul, but there's a couple of things I think will help," he explains. "The way messages are relayed to people; instead of going through two or three people, messages will come directly from the (race) director. The director will make all the decisions.

"Having said that, he will be supplied information from the stewards, which he's going to have to trust because you can't go around second-guess everybody."

Cotman says he also plans to close the pits under a full course yellow.

"It's a good move, first of all safety-wise. Right now we race back to pit lane. Yes, we pick up the race leader but really there's no restriction for the race leader to slow down. So you've got guys extracting a car out of the fence, with trucks parked on the side of the track and here we are racing back to the pit lane, and I believe that's the wrong thing."

"The goal is a better show, and more green flag racing."

If they close the pits under yellow, teams may have to think twice before allowing their fuel to run down too low. You'd hate to have one lap's worth of fuel in the car, planning to come in next time by, when the yellow suddenly appears.

And... closing the pits basically mandates green-flag stops, but approaches it from a new angle.

I think it's all good.

[Amar7605]

From what it sounds like it should make for better racing. But now theres the problem of attrition. What if there is a race where there is an incident on the 30th lap where the cars need to pit soon, and the pits are closed? Then you'll see like a fourth of the field pull over because of running out of gas.

[Snrub]

I didn't know what to think of this either. Closing the pits under yellow has problems as outlined above, but it would definately remove virtually all pure fuel runs.

In my mind the worst scenerio is where everyone is cruising around @ 90% because they're trying to save fuel. That stinks. Even the old fuel nob was better because the driver would still do everything they could to go fast (usually), they just had less power. I didn't see anything in that article that suggests how to remove that problem.

[Kicking-back]

When the pits are "closed" there's nothing physically stopping you from coming in, but you'd get a stop-go once it goes green.

So no-one will run out of fuel.


And on Snrub's point - if "everyone" was cruising around trying to save fuel, at least one driver would get wise to it and up his pace - someone would have nothing to lose by going for it. So we would see excitement.

[Ac.]

Does anyone know if Champ Car mandates certain fuel tank sizes at different tracks? This would be another way to manage a race and the number of stops required.

[Amar7605]

Originally Posted by Ac.

Does anyone know if Champ Car mandates certain fuel tank sizes at different tracks? This would be another way to manage a race and the number of stops required.

I'm sure the fuel tanks remain constant throughout the season. What changed per race was the pit window. Some had the window at 20 laps, other 35 laps or whatever. It basically depended on what the track was.

[Amar7605]

BTW, I am glad that this topic was brought up because ever since they were in the rules mandatory pit stops really have ****ed me off. I hope that we can find some solutions and *maybe* CC will listen to us!

Cheers, macdaddy

[JohnSSC]

Anything that promotes racing and on-track action is a good thing. I was never able to figure out what the "pit window" thing was supposed to accomplish.

More importantly they have realized this and eliminated it.

[macdaddy]

Y'all probably know that I'm not overly-aware of any form of motorsport outside CART/ChampCar. And thus I ask this question: Would "we" become the first major series to close the pits under yellow? Is this uncharted territory?

[Amar7605]

NASCAR kind of closes the pits under yellow flags, but not for the entire period. I have observed that they open them after a couple of caution laps. Then they let those who are on the lead lap pit first, followed by everyone else.

[Ac.]

Originally Posted by Amar7605

NASCAR kind of closes the pits under yellow flags, but not for the entire period. I have observed that they open them after a couple of caution laps. Then they let those who are on the lead lap pit first, followed by everyone else.

It's part of their "manufactured" racing formula. I'm always amazed how a yellow for "debris" on the track comes out just laps before scheduled stops if there has been a long period of green and the field is spread out.

[Snrub]

Champ Car has closed the pits under yellows, but never for the whole yellow, I think CC might be the first as Macdaddy suggested.

If you're going to run out of fuel and you run into the pits when you're not allowed to because you were going to run out of fuel, how do they adjust for that? Do you get a penalty? How do they know that you were being honest? What if you were lying and just wanted to fill up on the yellow?

As for teams/drivers taking advantage of everyone running @ 90%, I'm exagerating slightly, but we have had that scenerio play out a number of times. Take this imaginary situation, a fuel load lasts 35 laps and time it takes in pitlane to fill up and go in/out is 40 seconds. Driver #1 drives 1 second a lap slower than he is capable of, acheives 37 laps on his fuel and has to do one fewer stop. Driver #2 drives at his normal pace which is 1 second a lap faster than Driver #1's slow pace and acheives 35 laps on his fuel but has to do an extra stop. Driver #2 would finish behind driver #1. Not only that, but if driver #2 will likely have difficulty passing other drivers lapping at Driver #1's pace and his lap times are going to be seriously compromised. Obviously Driver #1 will come out ahead.

Often it's not that simple, but it's simply that they cannot easily get by a car that is infront of them. The solution is to save fuel to: 1. Last an extra lap and get out ahead of the guy in front. 2. Hope for a yellow that you can take advantage of, but you competitors may not be able to take advantage of. 3. Use the extra fuel to run fast laps once the slower car has moved out of your way in the hopes of catching other competitors.

[macdaddy]

Snrub:
If you're going to run out of fuel and you run into the pits when you're not allowed to because you were going to run out of fuel, how do they adjust for that?

Yours truly:
If they close the pits under yellow, teams may have to think twice before allowing their fuel to run down too low. You'd hate to have one lap's worth of fuel in the car, planning to come in next time by, when the yellow suddenly appears.

Trying to stretch your fuel to the very end of the fuel-load will become a calculated risk for the teams. They'll have to rethink their strategies and come into the pit, under green, when they still have a few laps left in the tank. (But it sounds like everybody will have to pit under green anyway). Besides, they'd rather pit a lap or two before the yellow, than have to pit on the restart.

[JohnSSC]

The bottom line is that the tension created over pit stop strategy will be dictated by the flow of the race and the choices the teams make regarding pace, etc - not an artificial construct like the "pit window" concept was.

No pit windows = a good thing.

[drewdawg727]

Someone mentioned something about the overusage of full course yellows....

Sometimes i think a full course yellow is a good way to bring the field back together. I sometimes find a race pointless to watch if the leader is 30 seconds ahead of the field and the second place guy has a good car to pass, but not to catch up with. If the spotters don't want to throw a full course yellow out, then theres probably no likelihood of there being a fight for the finish if the guy is ahead by so much.

</off topic>

[Kicking-back]

Originally Posted by drewdawg727

Sometimes i think a full course yellow is a good way to bring the field back together. I sometimes find a race pointless to watch if the leader is 30 seconds ahead of the field and the second place guy has a good car to pass, but not to catch up with.
</off topic>

I'm absolutely astonished.

If the leader is 30 seconds up the road, it's because he/his team deserve to be!

[macdaddy]

I wonder what else Cotman has up his sleeve when he mentioned,
"The goal is a better show, and more green flag racing."

ChampCar made the 2005 Rulebook available some weeks ago, but I've got a feeling that there's gonna be a revised edition before LongBeach.

[luke]

Originally Posted by Kicking-back

I'm absolutely astonished.

If the leader is 30 seconds up the road, it's because he/his team deserve to be!

I'm not, I agree with drewdawg727. Although I wouldn't find the race pointless to watch at that point.
But you rarely see Champ Car races won by that kind of distance.

Also I actuly, don't find the mandatory pit stops a bad thing.
They prevented drivers easing off to preserve fuel therefore uneventful type races.
Also winning a race was down to who could go the longest without pitting, and not nesersarly the fastest guy out on the track.
As a result of mandatory pit stops, all of this was prevented.

[JohnSSC]

No offense, but if one finds it pointless to watch if someone has a big lead isn't that negating the fact that there might be some good racing going on anyway?

I would also agree with K-B that someone being that far ahead is their achievement. For Race Control to throw a Yellow to "bunch things up" would be extremely frustrating to me as a fan and a racer. As a fan, one would hope that the racing is clean and honest. I really don't want the field "bunched-up" just to make it more "exciting." It would be like going to a football match and having the ref start handing out red cards to a team that has a big lead to "even things up."

As a racer I would have to ask: "What is the point of optimizing the setup and strategy if someone is going to wipe that out at their discretion?"

As far as the mandatory stops eliminating the economy runs I do not think that is entirely true as there are other factors such as tire wear/performance and lap times decreasing as fuel load decreases. In other words over a certain distance you are going to have to come in X number of times for tires anyway, so let the teams decide when they are going to do that rather than impose it on them.

My own philosophy here is to give 'em as much ethanol as they want, turn the boost knob to "Ludicrous" and tell them to have at it!

[JohnSSC]

A further note on those famous Caution Flags for "debris" that NASCAR loves to throw: that is a big reason why I stopped watching NASCAR. They do this all the time to "keep it close." To my way of thinking this was simple manipulation of the result. The best car/driver did not win because someone else might have been slightly better on the restarts while the guy who was too far ahead had demonstrated superiority in every other facet: handling traffic, running in clean air, overall handling and pit stop strategy.

When you do these things it stops being racing and becomes WWF.

[codename_47]

Originally Posted by JohnSSC

A further note on those famous Caution Flags for "debris" that NASCAR loves to throw: that is a big reason why I stopped watching NASCAR. They do this all the time to "keep it close." To my way of thinking this was simple manipulation of the result. The best car/driver did not win because someone else might have been slightly better on the restarts while the guy who was too far ahead had demonstrated superiority in every other facet: handling traffic, running in clean air, overall handling and pit stop strategy.

When you do these things it stops being racing and becomes WWF.

Indeed, in fact there were a few times last year when I was sure Champcar would bring out the yellows to make things tenser, but to be fair they held their hand and no yellow came out. The only example that comes to mind is at Long Beach last year, (perhaps a race that could've done with some spicing up, so if they were going to, then they would...) one car (Servia??) began smoking and eventually pulled off, and the trick with the other series and especially NASCAR would've been to throw a yellow immediatly, sigh in relief that something has finally happened to spice things up, THEN check to see if there was any oil etc.
And they would've got away with it too, there WAS a smoking car on the track and everything, but no, things remained green!

Champcar doesn't need faux Yellow periods to put on good races!

[codename_47]

.....errrr.....getting on to the topic (at last! ) I too am glad that this issue has been raised.

We need SOME form of rules that stop teams telling their drivers to conserve fuel......or at least HALF of the drivers to conserve fuel and the other half to go for it.....but even if it's just having a word with the teams saying "guys, economy runs suck, please at least let your guys run flat out...."

One of the benifits if Champcar were less gun-shy with the Yellows is at least it would change peoples strategy somewhat....

As for the fact that the "newbie" in charge is even raising this issue....well, I like him already!