Future of local autox events???

[Vancouver Special]

Just heard that the Peru (Indiana) National Tour has already have 94 entries. The event is schedule for July 5!!! Last year there were over 60 people on the waiting list after they reached a cap of 365 drivers. The year before, they had over 50 people on the waiting list also. U.S. Nationals almost reached their cap last year and I suspect people might find themselves on the waiting list for the Nationals in the next few years.

The sport of autoxing is growing. Traditionally, what happens in the U.S. is a good indication of what will happen here in the near future. I think local clubs and organizers should start thinking about how to handle 150+ cars at an event. It might be knocking on our door sooner than we think.

Joe

[AllWheelDrift]

Agreed.

I think our biggest bottleneck currently is the venue. The layout we have at Bounday Bay just isn't capable of supporting much more than 120 drivers both in terms of pit size and course layout.

[SkinnyG]

Pool your money and buy/pave an old field.

If you build it, they will come!

Greg "Parkinglot of Dreams" Wellwood

[Audi200tq]

We could also look at different ways to host events.

1) Morning/Afternoon groups
I saw this in Everett. Actually they had 3, but I think we should do 2.
Example: Stock and SS runs the event 9 AM to 1 PM. Then SP and Mod run from 1 PM to 5PM. Within those time slots, each group has to do their sets of runs and work the course. Morning group can go home after 1PM (or hang out as long as they want). Afternoon group doesn't have to show up until 11:30 for tech and reg.

2) 2 day events
As above, but over 2 days. This is how Nationals deals with 1000 cars (except they do it over 5 days).

[AllWheelDrift]

Running seperate morning and afternoon groups would make the day shorter for competitors, but won't significanly increase capacity. It could reduce some overhead, but it also adds new overhead.

[Audi200tq]

Actually I think it would help quite a bit to ease congestion of our limitated space.

Morning cars would be required to leave at then end of their session. Anybody who wanted to stay could simply park on the access road and walk back in the gates.

Afternoon cars would be teched in the parking area outside the gates. And they won't be allowed inside the gates until the morning group is ended.

With this system, we could easily handle 150 cars. Maybe even more.

The difficulties would be in the event organization and management. There would be almost 2 times as many volunteer positions to fill. 2 drivers meetings to run, 2 COWs to organize the workers, etc etc.

However, if our participation grows, so should our pool of available volunteers. As long as we continue to encourage more people to get involved beyond just driving, and teach them the mechanics of event management, it should be no problem.

Seattle region uses this format at many (if not most) of their events. It works very well.

[Don Bourne]

Posted by Audi200tq:

Seattle region uses this format at many (if not most) of their events. It works very well.

Steve, you are forgetting to mention that the Seattle region events also limit you to only 3 runs. I think this is a major factor as to why the separate morning and afternoon sessions work and we will find that events up here will have to cut back the number of runs once we hit similar numbers of competitors. Moving to two day events may be a better choice.

I suppose though, that limiting the number of runs will help wash out those of us who find a lack of value in events with only 3 runs. One trip to Everett for a 12 hour day with 3 - 57 second (yes, I was slow) runs cured me of wanting to try that again soon.

[AllWheelDrift]

Yes, we'd have the pit space, but we'd still have the time constraint to deal with. There just aren't enough hours in the day for 150 cars to get 4 runs, and even 3 would be pushing it.

Our biggest problem it throughput. For argument's sake, assume we currently run cars at 33 second intervals. If we could get down to 22 second intervals, we could get 50% more runs in the same ammount of time.

I'm skeptical that we can design interesting courses that allow us to safely release cars at shorter intervals within the confines of Boundary Bay. If we had a more open area it would be possible to design courses that don't crossover or loop back over themselves, as I see those as the biggest dangers to running shorter intervals.

[Vancouver Special]

Originally posted by Don Bourne:

...you are forgetting to mention that the Seattle region events also limit you to only 3 runs...

3 runs or 4 runs is one issue. However, Seattle (as well as other regions) have all your runs back to back to save the "change over" time.

We used to have 3 runs only at local events. You take one run and put your car away. Then you wait til everyone to finish their first run before you bring your car up for your second run. VCMC introduced the current 2+2 format to shorten the "change over" time. Instead of lining up 3 times, you currently line up 2 times only. At U.S. events, you line up once only. This means you will save 50% of down time wasted on "change overs".

Joe

[Audi200tq]

Originally posted by AllWheelDrift:
Yes, we'd have the pit space, but we'd still have the time constraint to deal with. There just aren't enough hours in the day for 150 cars to get 4 runs, and even 3 would be pushing it.

Our biggest problem it throughput. For argument's sake, assume we currently run cars at 33 second intervals. If we could get down to 22 second intervals, we could get 50% more runs in the same ammount of time.

I'm skeptical that we can design interesting courses that allow us to safely release cars at shorter intervals within the confines of Boundary Bay. If we had a more open area it would be possible to design courses that don't crossover or loop back over themselves, as I see those as the biggest dangers to running shorter intervals.

Those are good points.

The question becomes: can we run an event with 75 cars in 4 hours? I think we can.

Last fall we had an event with 75 cars. We had a 60-65 second course. We got 9 runs and it took 8 hours. So in theory we should be able to do 4 runs in 4 hours. Also, that event was 4+3+2 format; we had 3 complete sets of turnovers.

Bruno, you are absolutely right about how overlap relates to the loops and crossovers of the course.

I think some of the clubs should consider trying this format at the Club Practice Events (at some clubs aka Closed Club). Then we can get some direct experience and feedback to determine if we can try it at a regional event when the numbers justify it.

[Tess d]

Originally posted by Phantom:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Don Bourne:

...you are forgetting to mention that the Seattle region events also limit you to only 3 runs...

3 runs or 4 runs is one issue. However, Seattle (as well as other regions) have all your runs back to back to save the "change over" time.

We used to have 3 runs only at local events. You take one run and put your car away. Then you wait til everyone to finish their first run before you bring your car up for your second run. VCMC introduced the current 2+2 format to shorten the "change over" time. Instead of lining up 3 times, you currently line up 2 times only. At U.S. events, you line up once only. This means you will save 50% of down time wasted on "change overs".

Joe </font>[/QUOTE]Here in Calgary we run the 2+2 format as well and people like that. One time last summer we had a late start at one event and we decided to do 3 runs in a row like the US Tours.....the savings in time was readily noticeable. However also noted was the number of complaints that people in the first run group could not see others run the course. :^(

With all the lots we currently use, there is no problem laying out a one kilometer or so course (50-70 sec. courses) without loops which is convenient for us.

We have experimented with cars spaced as close as 20 seconds but then there i the problem of workers not able to run and replace cones quickly enough. Therefore we relax a bit and typically send cars out at 30 second intervals on average with the occassional concentrated effort of 25 second intervals which seems to be the fastest and most efficient all things considered.

With the 25 second interval we have managed to push through 70+ cars in 3 hrs. and 15 min. at our best. Why would we want to do that? We have quite a few Wed. nite events at the south roadcourse of Race City where there are no lights! Starting at 6 pm, it is a good idea to be finished by 9:30 pmish before we run out of light.

With loop(s) in the course design, the loop(s) would obviously have to be carefully designed so that overlaps do not cause accidents and that it is possible to pick up cones in between. That would be challenging indeed.

Reijo

[swiftdb1]

At National Tour and National events, they have a well trained crew to do timing and scoring and we were trying to send out cars every 21 to 25 seconds. Any faster, as Reijo mentioned, ended up being slower because course workers could not reset the course which resulted in red flags and re-runs.

Alex

[AllWheelDrift]

Good point about the workers needing time to reset the course... So there is a limit of how high we can get the throughput, and there's only so much overhead we can eliminate. I don't think we're close to these limits yet, but they mean as we grow, eventually we have to move to fewer runs and/or multi day events.

Another concern with running more than two runs back to back with large numbers of competitors is the length of time workers will be out on course without a break.

[Tess d]

Originally posted by AllWheelDrift:
Good point about the workers needing time to reset the course... So there is a limit of how high we can get the throughput, and there's only so much overhead we can eliminate. I don't think we're close to these limits yet, but they mean as we grow, eventually we have to move to fewer runs and/or multi day events.

Another concern with running more than two runs back to back with large numbers of competitors is the length of time workers will be out on course without a break.

With three runs in Bremerton, I didn't find the length time too onerous.....and once you were done, that was it!

Another thought just occurred to me regarding time between vehicles. As Alex pointed out the present optimum is around 21-25 seconds. I wonder if anyone has tried to have say 25 second gaps for the first and possibly second run and then speeding it up to, say, 15 second intervals. This would account for people "cleaning" up their runs, the course getting stickier, cars generally hitting less cones as the day wears on and course workers figuring out which cones are most often hit and being more prepared/placed for those particular ones....

Reijo

[swiftdb1]

Reijo,

We were doing as you suggested and started off at 25 seconds. We brought it down to around 21 seconds as the run group got familiar with the course. At 21 seconds, everyone in the timing vehicle had to be sharp because it was easy to fall behind recoding the times and cone counts, especially when there are 3 to 4 cars on course at any given time. Keep in mind that at National events, all times and penalties are recorded in 3 separate forms with audits in between. With a fully electronic system with automatic time entry, it might be possible but I think course safety might start to come in play.

Alex