[TD in DC]

Originally Posted by Kurt Mickelwait

Art, Tony, Mike, Alan, Tom. Any of you guys lurking? What gives!?

http://www.pcapotomac.org/cgi-bin/ul...&f=13&t=000859

[cmartin]

Away event or not, other groups provide more track time, equal level instruction and a laid back atmosphere. Not knocking Potomac, but there are alternatives. I will run with Potomac when it fits my schedule, but will most likely drive with other groups most of the time.

[Eli]

I agree with RL, and feel somewhat cheated. I am sure many of the participants on this board would NOT have signed up for the DE, if informed of the schedule PRIOR to signing up. Every other region that comes to SP runs at least 4, some times 5 sessions.
Many, including myself have expressed concerns about Mid-Ohio and other away events. FWIW, Schattenbaum is running at the Glen the weekend before Potomac. I'll likely cancel with Potomac and run with Schattenbaum, as at least with them, I'm pretty much guaranteed 4+ sessions a day....

[Rick Lee]

I've emailed the DE chairs at Schattenbaum, NNJR, Riesentoter and BMW NJ to see how much track time their Summit/Shenandoah DE's will include. Will report back when I hear from them. There's gotta be a better bang for the buck out there and Potomac events will fill up no matter what.

[VaSteve]

I didn't really expect a change when I signed up, but after hearing Ted talk about it, I was excited for more track time. I don't keep old schedules, so I don't recall how it was in the past, but it seems on Sunday we're wrapping a half hour earlier than usual.

I know we all have jobs and what not to go to on Monday, but the weekend is completely consumed by this event, we could certainly maximize the time on track. Mike's comments are right, there's plenty of daylight - even at 5pm in March - to go for a little while longer.

I'm not sure of the proper solution, but maybe some compression of the red/black run groups is a solution. Since those guys are well versed in pit in and out procedures, they could certainly manage a rolling on/off without compromising safety. This would shave a few minutes off to be used elsewhere. Rolling in a little early to cool off and get to the student's car is the price of being an instructor.

Since we have a few red/blacks here and I have no idea what I'm talking about maybe they can ring in.

[TD in DC]

Here is the idea I just posted on Porsche Talk:

What about rolling starts/stops the way NASA does DEs?

Could we start pitting out one run group under yellow as soon as the last run group has received the checkered flag? Maybe at some tracks we could throw the checkered flag at two locations to get the last rungroup off the track as soon as possible.

With respect to instructor assignments, I am thinking that we could stagger the groups in order to minimize the frequency of an instructor pitting in when a student is due to pit out. In the rare occasions when that happens, the instructor and student could cooperate the minimize down time (maybe by throwing a white flag to tell the instructor/student that there is only one lap left anyway so they can pit in a little early)

For example, maybe blue/white/green/black(with most black instructors assigned to blue)/red (with most red instructors assigned to green)/blue, etc . . .

[Z-man]

Originally Posted by VaSteve

Anyone know what NNJR does at their home events? Z-man? I have heard their events are just as crowded. How do they deal with the 5 run groups transitions on and off the track?

Steve:
We have no problems with 5 runs groups transitioning on/off the track. The trick is to keep the flow going - keep to the time schedule. This is especially true for events that are 'full.' Our summer Watkins Glen event last year had over 250 entrants registered. We had 5 run groups (Red, Pink, Black, White/Blue, and Yellow) and had the typical 4 sessions per run group per day, each session running about 25 minutes. With a big track like WG, you can put 50 cars out there and not have any issues. Running in Pink, I had plenty of open track throughout the weekend.

ALL NNJR DE participants have a work assignment - no exeptions. I think this plays a significant part in the amount of track time we can milk out of an event. Granted, some may think having 5 people at track out is a bit overkill, but with those numbers, there's always someone at trackout/pitout/tower ...etc. so there's no delay caused by a location being short-staffed.

At last year's NNJR Shenandoah event there were a couple of dorki's working the tech line with us - (sorry, I forgot your names...) They had the same work ethic the 'regular' NNJR techies had - willing to get there early and work hard to get all the cars teched. So that dedication is there in your members - perhaps a bit more organization and workers will help.

Personally, I think running multiple 25-30 minute sessions vs. running longer sessions is better - on the car as well as the driver, especially on a hot, muggy day.

My $0.42,
-Z-man.

[BlackTalon]

3 session or 4, it's still 80 minutes per day (although someone did mention the last session Sunday is only 25 minutes, versus the regular 30). I doubt there is anything Potomac will do to increase the 80 minutes per day.

I personally like the 3 session per day schedule, as the 20 minutes runs were used to have when we had 4 per day always seemed to end in less then 15 minutes. You would get warmed up, have a few laps to sort out traffic, get in one or two good ones, then it would already be time to come back in.

But as someone pointed out the other day, the real issue is if there are black flags, etc. leading to your session getting stopped, it really hurts your day. In the rain last year this was a big problem.

[WHS3]

As a new guy to DE, but a former instructor, the 4 shorter sessions will provide the most learning and safest conditions, especially for the Green/Blue groups. As Kurt said, most brains will go to mush after 20 min anyway.
During Navy Pilot Training, you take away the distractions and go off on a detachment (Summit Pt. is far enough away to escape the trappings of home!), close proximity to the ranges (racetrack) allows for shorter concentrated sessions that try to tackle a couple learning objectives each event. Plenty of debrief time to hit the learning points while fresh and start thinking about the next objectives. My lessons learned on fewer, longer sessions was that the students tend to have too many learning objectives per session which results in a "jack of all trades master of none" scenario, or worse an overload which leads to frustration and headwork errors that result in something safety related. Once overloaded the debrief is worthless and focus on the next session becomes a "try to fix everything" mindset because you only have a max of 2 sessions left that day.
Just my .02, V/R Walt

[Trak Ratt]

There are some good ideas floating about here. It might be time for some to join the discussion on PCA Potomac’s Porsche Talk. Why not make it official and go directly to the “man (or woman).” Any discussion here won’t actually be seen unless one of the officials stumbles across it. And I know the PCA leadership “visits” here but posting on the official site will engage more DE folk too.