Ok- I know this is a Honda Board but to be honest most of us know it is really a good place for some very dedicated racers, no matter what they drive to discuss the races.

Anyway- I sent this email to NHRA regarding the e-town event. It was a great event, had a blast. But there are a few things that need to be addressed. Here is the email, agree or disagree?

Anthony

Hello Everyone-

I was looking over the results on your web site for the Hot Rod class qualifying and eliminations from the Englishtown event this past weekend and notice that you left your #10 qualifier, Kevin Black's round information out of the updates.

Kevin Black was your #10 qualifier and advanced through the first round of eliminations on a solo 10.0@140mph pass as J.J. Olson was unable to make first round and none of the alternates were inserted in J.J.'s place. Kevin faced Marty Ladwig in the second round and cut a very impressive .028 reaction time in a loosing 10.5@139MPH effort against Marty's record setting pass. Kevin only appears in the qualifying field and none of the round to round updates, not sure how that happened. It would be nice to read more about Marty's record pass on that run against Kevin as well.

I am not sure if any of you are responsible for the updates on that page but I don't know who else to address this to. If Kevin was left out of the updates as a result of me assisting him through the weekend then that is not fair to him and his personal accomplishments.

I understand I have said some unfavorable things towards the NHRA sport compact series and some of the previous decisions that have been made. I stand by those, they are my beliefs but that is all they are, MY BELIEFS, no others and I am the only one responsible for them. I only want to make sure that rules are applied fairly and enforced equally among all racers even if it would be detrimental to me I would stand by the decision as long as it was fair. It would also be nice to see a few more things written more clearly in the rule book. Mainly at want point is someone declared a winner through a no show of their opponent for that round? Can we have that stated more clearly?

I may be reading into things a little too much, not sure, maybe it is just a coincidence that Kevin's round results and numbers were not posted, either way, it would be nice to see his numbers posted up on the page so people can see HIS accomplishments from the event.

Also, another thing from the event, 9 car ladders? In two of your classes there were only 9 cars that tried to qualify for what is normally a 16 car field, this was All Motor and the Sport FWD class. I am a fair person and seeing how the ladders were made it really hurt the #1 and #2 qualifiers in those classes. You know I don't favor Ken Scheepers much but the fact that he was the #2 qualifier and had to face Leslie Durst the #1 qualifier in the semi-final round was not fair to him, especially in such a tight points race for the class. When someone qualify's #1 and #2 they earn the right to go through the elimination ladder to face each other in the final round if they can get through the rest of the field. It was pretty hard to see the #3 qualifier in both those classes get the bye run into the finals while the #1 and #2 qualifier had to battle to face the lower qualified car. Scott Mohler broke on his bye run, would that have happend if he had faced one of the other qualifiers, who knows but either way he should have been staged against one of the other two cars on that pass. I know there are other ways that ladder could have been made to have given the top two qualifiers an oppurtunity to face in the finals as I was just playing around with the possibilities. Not sure if you will ever face that situation again but if you do please do the right thing and make the ladder so that we have the oppurtunity to see a #1 and #2 race in the finals and not the semi-final round, it is only fair to those racers that fight so hard to get those two spots for points and the fans that want to see them in the finals.

 

nice write up anthony.

 

Jim replied to me regarding my issues from Sunday. here is the reply he sent to maybe help deflect some eamails for him.

Hi Anthony,

I'll check into the round by round coverage of Hot Rod. Fastnews does our round by rounds, and they are usually on top of everything.

As for "anyone helping anyone else" ever having something to do with racing............ I can't even comment on that. Doesn't happen with NHRA, your feelings about Etown last year not withstanding. Message boards and freedom of speech are some of the things you defend when you're out on patrol with the Coast Guard.

The Compulink computer automatically does ladders, we don't have any input into that. Compulink tries to do a couple of things when laddering. First, it wants 1 & 2 to be on opposite sides. Second, it give the number one qualifier the first "opportunity" for the first bye run. It gives number two the second "opportunity" for a bye run, and so forth. However, with a 9 car ladder (and 18, 19, 21, 36 and several other combinations), if 1 & 2 are separated, number 1 gets first bye, but number 2 gets a bye in the second AND third rounds. That's sort of a "first or worst" scenario, so the lesser of two evils is to put 1 & 2 on the same side.

I felt bad for Ken also, he can't seem to catch a break coming down to the wire. But it could have just as easily been Scott in the number 2 position.

Hope that answers some of your concerns. Sorry to be brief, but I've got a bunch of these to answer!

Take care,

Jim