Maroondah 6 Hour 2008

[The Duckmeister]

Wot ' e said! I felt similar after our team (Dragon) got badly hammered at MB in '06. Having heard so much about it, it was a real let down to end up the way we did, albeit in a different way to this one. Just remember all the good races and you'll see that it's still worthwhile.

[NigePresto]

Hey all,
Thought I should clear some air about the organisers who are taking a bit of a pelting here - yes, I was there on Saturday and Sunday too.
I feel your pain.

The Bridge Builders are good at running youth events such as concerts - but not experienced in the ways of HPV racing.
They have been meeting with other members of the VicHPV group (RACV EB, Wonny, Casey) for the past 18 months and have the groups support to make their event a success.

However, their traditional Clerk of Course (Ewan Cole) and their traditional scrutineers (Norm Stephens + others) were all unavailable / sick / called to work over that weekend and I think they 'hoped and prayed' that someone would drop in and help them out. They really didn't get onto these issues early enough and it caught them out.

I even got the call up to assist (last Thursday) with scrutineering on Saturday, but was unable to help out for the full day as I had an appointment in Kew at 2pm.
They obviously were out of their depth and really tried to pull alot together.

Their other scrutineer (Mark Fidone) was also a teacher and I think he did a great job considering the layout given to him, the lack of experience around him and the pressure he was under to check 70 vehicles. They also did not realise that 70 vehicles would take a REALLY long time and a lot of energy to check.

There are some good ideas that have come out of this weekend that I would really welcome you're thoughts (or to volunteer your services):
1/ 'Certified Scrutineers and Race Controllers'
For races in Victoria, only certain, experienced people are able to be in charge of a HPV / Hybrid race or able to complete safety checks on vehicles.
These people would also be in charge of ensuring the track is set-up safely for racing. One area where I had many concerns on Sunday.

This is the case with our timing. There are only 2 groups who are able to use the timing equipment for Vic events - Tag Heuer and Multisport Aus.
The HPV Vic group will be meeting in early September, so I will bring forward a lot of your thoughts and concerns to the table.

[Webber]

So i raced at maroondah on the weekend with geoffy and hurricane.
It was an eventful race and i dont think anybody will disagree with that. However i also think that people have over reacted a bit, not pointing any fingers, K.N.

so i agree that rules were not nearly as good at any other race ive been in, and it seems that the organisers did little homework in how races are run and have started from scratch. i think they must have wanted to be extra safe and extra proffesional. Im not sure because i havnt raced against hybrids before but because there are flimsy trikes boosting around with petrol sloshing around in them, maybe better safety rules are a good idea? i definitly know i dont want flaming petrol splashing all over my(geoffs) corflute trike!
And the infamous pits of frustration... during the race the walking speed rule seemed to become a bit relaxed, possibly somebody showed madam ice queen that in the rules it stated a speed of 15 was allowed (twice my walking speed of 7 according to the radar in the middle of the night )
also correct me if im wrong but it seemed that in my stint the full course yellow changed to localised yellow as i was behind the truck 200 metres or so and watched the marshals change from yellow to green flag as it passed them.
These seem to show that the organisers did listen to people and maybe dont deserve so much flack

Im not having a go at anybody but i know that people struggle organising things they are new at, one team manager should know that its hard to organise one team let alone a whole race, and a whole race with teams who know everything about the sport

So i think this whole thing is a little bit of an ego clash with the organisers and some teams know it allness, perhaps not being open to different rules, and being a bit stubborn.
i know that befor the race they made it very very clear that they were not going to tolerate any passing under yellow conditions, i herd that and i found it ok to stay behing slow cars even if it ment passing some up hills then dropping back and i didnt get any penalties. Im suprised that so many people had trouble with that and for my own curiosity why did u?

having said all that im still not a fan of pit bitch and i dont think less of any teams but the whole argument seems pretty one sided and i wanted to say that overall i liked the race!

also! ill stop after this i promise, i liked the tight short course so much! and some patches i assume are newly surfaced and would be made better in the future.

[erhil]

hi!
you have to remember that the flag marchells are only parents that have bee sucked in to doing it. i agree that the rules became slack after awhile they did the best that they could with a 15 min chrash course.

i was shocked at the whole pit bitch thing. i have my 4 year old cousen with me and i had no idea what to say to her when she asked be waht a pit bitch was. i mean this is meant to be a controled environment here and they pull that out. it was plain wrong.

Now days there are not many home bulit bikes that are out there. 2 of the primary bikes that i compete with have been entirely bulit by hand. mind you it was hard work on me as it was early mornings and late nights to get it done. its so good to as i duilt this and then to see a team that got theres built by profesionals is horrid. i cant stand them when they say "I built this" when they didnt. i dont mind that people get help but to do none of the work your self is wrong.

I have been involved wiht the RACV Energy challenge both as a rider and crew for 10 years this year and i dont know how people can live with them selves then they say that.

On the topic og Trisled i think the the DQ was a bit harsh. imean that there were many others out there that should have been the same for there conduct as well. many other bike were seen and not reported.

[Khye]

I agree with you, And its always great to see hand biult trikes doing well, it really is, but the fact is, some people like winning, or having a good chance at winning, others have the money but not the resources to actully biuld a veichle, so buyig one is the way to go.

[The Duckmeister]

One of the guys on the BV Forum had a young bloke racing with the EVO VII team (the orange shark-fin looking car), and has been following my links over here. He did a marshalling stint during the day, and confirmed what Webber thought; the full-course yellow rule did get relaxed, although there were still some out there who were a little flag-happy. He tells me that the full-course yellow was not even in the marshalls' instructions! WHAT THE???
Curiously, he also reports of at least three violations for "abusive language towards other riders" against TriSled heard over the marshalls' radio, although he did not observe any such behaviour himself. Nor did I.

D & C has always been a strange thing. It appears to be highly subjective on the part of the judges, and without fail throws up some surprising results, regardless of how well the race is conducted.


I've raced with hybrids before (Maroondah '06), and aside from the fact that they can be a bit irritating 'cos you pass them, then they pull the string to start the motor & come fanging back past you, they don't really require any different action on the part of either officials or other competitors to deal with them safely.

And finally, her attitude aside, having an official labelled "Pit Bitch", regardless of the context in which they mean it, is thoroughly unprofessional.

[jazzyjeff]

One of the guys on the BV Forum had a young bloke racing with the EVO VII team (the orange shark-fin looking car), and has been following my links over here. He did a marshalling stint during the day, and confirmed what Webber thought; the full-course yellow rule did get relaxed, although there were still some out there who were a little flag-happy. He tells me that the full-course yellow was not even in the marshalls' instructions! WHAT THE???
Curiously, he also reports of at least three violations for "abusive language towards other riders" against TriSled heard over the marshalls' radio, although he did not observe any such behaviour himself. Nor did I.

I'm only only going to talk about this. A trisled rider was reported for abusive language towards MARSHALL'S. I found out what time this had happened and spoke to the rider in private he assured me that he didn't swear and was trying to find out why he was been given a blue flag and a yellow flag at the same time he was clearly frustrated by the flag marshalls but maintains that he did not use abusive language.

I'll give you an example from a couple of years ago the horn in our bike was loud but not loud enough and i was being told by everyone to use it which pushed me over the edge as i was using it and i could it hear. I said to one flag marshall "im using my horn cant you hear it" when i finshing my stint we had a warning for abusive language i almost spat the dummy first my horn which was working then im swearing i thought get stuffed. Ewan came over and wanted to talk to me about it as he couldn't beleave that i would say or abuse marshalls. (i'll had hear that i've known Ewan quite well for a fair time) any how i said the only comments i made were "im using my horn cant you here it" Ewan straight away realised what had happened the marshall heard it like this "IM USING MY HORN C#@T!!!!!!"

so u can see how something can be taken the wrong way if we had someone on our team who was going out there and clearing doing the wrong thing the first person with there foot up his bum would be ben followed closely by myself.

[Brock]

in relation to the 'abuse' incident from trisled rider, that was all one big misunderstanding.
and none of it was towards other riders, we were aware of these incidents and the truth was that it was just the big canadian fella yelling towards the marshals not other riders
and there was a misinterpretation between the two, the somewhat questionable rule with the yellow flag was extremely confusing, and canada (chris) was confused at the time as to whether he could go or not as he didnt know if it was green or yellow flag at the time.
he yelled out "what flag is it" and this in a trike while moving, along with his accent i believe lead to misunderstanding.

the full course yellow was more relaxed towards the end of the race but confusing reporting of vehicles for unknown reasons did not, as i was marshalling towards the end also and expats were being pulled in for use of duck tape, marshals were claiming that it was holding the trike together or something on the radio and we were frantically trying to explain over radio that it was only to hold the canopy shut and yet they were pulled in any ways.
i feel this example somewhat sums up the accuracy of marshaling, enforcing of rules and punishment throughout and after the event.

[Khye]

Geoffs race report...
Maroondah 08


Wow what a weekend and even before I start I'm recommending no one return in the future!..

After returning from Casey in April with a faulty steering system, damaged fairing and a dented enthusiasm much had to be done!! Trike done, team semi organised and insurance sorted we looked set to do well and have a fun time. After picking up Ducky from Trublu we now had 6 awesome riders a great improvement on Casey.



Upon leaving from all our destinations (Adelaide and Mt Gambier) an hour late we set sail for our destination for Friday night Ballarat. After less than 50km to our Amusement our NAVMAN was telling us to get on a road even though we were, while we thought this was funny it would later come back to haunt us... Upon arriving at our caravan park we worked hard to convince the owners that 5 people under 19 weren't going to wreak the place, and thanks to Khye staying there on the way home from Thaggi we were in, and things were really starting to look like they were going to end badly. With the trike readied for scrutineering in the rain little things began to ring alarm bells, a mirror and the brake adjusting barrel was missing, little things that had to be dealt with but somehow slipped our minds. With the trike done the guys decided to go for a drive and upon going down the wrong road Khye attempted a u turn and managed to get bogged! Not only bogged but up to his lights, and with no good rope and missing car keys things were looking bad. After finding the keys and eventually towing him out he discovered that he'd left the handbrake on while being towed out.




After a good night's sleep we woke up an set of for Melbourne late though after running on SA time, with only one street directory between the two cars it was always going to prove tricky to navigate and after getting lost we eventually made it to the track. Driving in and seeing 5 attractive chicks dancing was making this look like it was going to be a good weekend, well that was till we encounted pit bitch!! After driving only metres we had been abused and threatened with penalties and found out that the pits were tiny!! Pits were set up, final preparations made to the trike and after meeting our star recruit Ducky we were off to scrutineering and after many delays were through and ready to ride the practice session that to our amazement was untimed!




After a wet and sleepless night the team arose to finish everything, graphics put on, new chain and a drink bottle holder and we were set and ready to go, with Khye starting we knew he'd work hard and set us up for the race. And not only did he does this he created some excitement for the day, after being in position 20th he did what happens at other race's and accelerates as the parade car does so. But to his surprise he was the only one and to the teams surprise starting the race first, this was to lead to our first encounter for the day with pit bitch. Within 30minutes we had not only been handed 12penalties but also a 10min penalty and a very official warning for jumping the start. Soon after an angry Khye came running into our pits not only carrying his shoes but the crank!! The crank had come off at the hair pin yet he'd been made to run around, with the tools needed to fix it we were off, the crank replaced but somehow we'd somehow left Khye's shoe in the pits, with that quickly got, we'd lost our rhythm and 20min, knowing that this had properly worn Khye out we got Daniel ready to ride, with Khye in after being out for a total of 80min and being in 17th Daniel our youngest rider being only 15 was sent out still managed to ride some very nice quick competitive laps, 50min later he was in the yellow flags taking the toll on his legs. Ducky was ready and sent out with the goal of riding consistently for over an hour and that he did, 70min later he was in and we were up the order. Jenna was in for her turn and was ready to ride and do her bit, after a quick stint she was in for a repositioning of her foam that helped sort her neck problems out but unfortunately created what we believe was a bad seating position an 4laps later was in with a cramp. Web was in, and after a great stint that included a battle with an expats and a altication wif a St Margerats Trike and a bottle neck on the track taht sent trieks of the road, in hopped team manager Geoff. After hearing the praise of the vehicle compared to Casey he was restless to go out and see for himself. After 55min he was back in the pits, quite proud of the vehicle and his stint that included a miscalculated over taking move on the right of a vehicle that sent him into pit lane at a rapid pace. With Khye in for the last position things were looking good and indeed they were. After a quick 30 something minute stint, and khye being confused as reading "6 hours 5 minutes" on the clock ands till racing, we crossed line 10th overall, with khye and jeff exchanging two wheel wars, and jeff obviously winning, as our body was too low



With the race over we were 10th and done 85% of Trisleds laps which was a fantastic result and a huge improvement on Casey. We'd also had few issues and no roll overs or crashes. At this stage the team had put the negatives behind its self and were planning to return next year with possibly with more than one team. This all changed when we saw in our eyes ones of the worst things we'd seen in HPV racing. With the events that happened this moved us up to 9th overall, however we strongly disagree with this and believe that we finished 10th. Ben and his team were in our eyes targeted wrongly and we did not see them do anything wrong. We can also near guarantee we won't be returning.



With the vehicles packed we were of in to the unknown, driving in Melbourne in the dark! With the route known we set off and after a few wrong turns and a quick trip on the city link we were back on track until we got to the western ring road when we missed the turn and 20km later and closer to Geelong we realised something was up. Having no clue where we were the decision was made to follow the NAVMAN (this would come back to haunt us) as the scenery quickly turned from city to country and the roads from highways to country back roads and being directed down nonexistent, we became extremely worried! After some guestimated turns we were back on the highway and after 4hrs 2hrs longer than it should have taken we were back a tour cabin for the night.



After a nice sleep in and nice drive to Ararat for breakfast the two groups departed after having spent and awesome weekend together that as you may have noticed we experienced a lot of bad luck that we thought at this stage was over. As the Mt Gambier crew headed home a lot of fun was made as the NAVMAN continuously told us to turn into rivers! After 1000km of driving for the weekend Geoff had the worst luck only 30km from home was pulled over for doing 113 in a 100zone as a p plater towing a tandem trailer, yet somehow the luck gods rained upon us and he was let off with a caution.


Overall the race was a disappointment, we will almost defiantly not be returning.

We'd like to thanks our sponsors and the people who have helped us.


From L to R: Duckmeister, Geoff, Daniel, Jenna, Webber, Khye (AKA Noodles)

[michael m]

Hell all.
I dont normally use this forum much, but i feel compelled to after the race on the weekend.
I'm not here to dump on the organisers, but i would like to express a few thoughts on the event.

For a start, not a good idea to have the chief pit marshall referred to as the "pit bitch", who turned out to be just that!
I also think that not allowing a team to start the race because their mirrors are deemed too small, is a bit of a joke, considering that there was two minutes to go before the race started.

When we got into the race, we were constantly abused by the pit lady, for offences that we knew nothing about.
we were being penalised for passing under yellow flags and not using our horn all of the time, which we had no idea we were doing this, or intention to do this.

After the flag had been dropped, we were considering whether it would be worth returning the following year, when we attended the awards ceremony and listened to the announcer, (who was also the chief marshall) tell the whole congregation, that trisled had been disqualified for "unsportsmanlike behavior".

I was shocked that someone could stand up there, that knows nothing about hpv racing and degrade ben and his crew for miniscule incidents that wouldnt even be looked at at any other event.
I have a huge amount of respect for Ben, and what he does for the sport.
People dont realise that he could be out earning much more money as an engineer in industry, but he choses to help teams and events to be successful by passing on the knowledge that he has.

So finally, i have decided that i have learned two things from the weekend.

1) Kojaks are great durable tyres

2) gaffa tape on coreflute bodies is "not structural", but tape on a kevlar door is.

[Khye]

maybe next year they would have ironed out the creases...

[Beno]

Hey all

Just like to say thanks on behalf of both me and the Tri-Sled racing team for the kind words of support many have put up. It's been a rough week recovering from this one and I'm pretty keen to move on from the whole experiance.

Cheers,

Beno

[roverjack]

Having read many comments on this forum about the recent Maroondah event I feel compelled to add my thoughts to the discussion.

I don’t wish to add to the list of negatives directed at the organisers and individuals. Certainly there was stuff to complain about as previously posted. I am in fact pleased to be part of a community who predominantly finds the public display of ‘pit bitch’ offensive! However we must remember this is a growing sport and it will need new organizations and individuals coming on board. As Nigel has posted, a couple of key experienced individuals were unavailable at the last minute. This left the running of the event to less experienced personal who need to be given some leeway and a chance to learn. It’s a huge undertaking to run an event like this. I’m sure they won’t make the same mistakes next time. We were all beginners once and we all made mistakes. Let’s give them a chance. Let’s inform them politely and look forward to a better event next time. To say we won’t be back next year is not going to advance HPV racing as we all hope.

The problems last weekend weren’t all caused by Bridge Builders or particular individuals. I think they were symptomatic of a deeper problem we have in this sport, particularly in Victoria. I refer to the lack of a single overseeing/controlling constituted body with consistent rules covering all events. From my limited experience of the SA scene they seem to have a much better system with a single controlling body with a constitution. I presume they oversee all events; a visible constitution, one set of rules, well understood and consistently applied.

Similarly the problems at Maroondah were related to the fact that they simply adopted the RACV rules and specifications. The EB is for schools, not community, and has a fundamental aim to be educative. The EB is firm in this and it’s evident in its structure; D&P, D&C, classes, specific rules etc, which are all about kids learning. As a teacher I am essentially supportive of this. The EB is not primarily designed to be a sporting competition, it’s the competitors (HPV in particular) who have made it so. The community events are more about pure HPV racing. I think it is a mistake to apply the EB rules to a community event. We must therefore work towards a consistent set of rules for both school and community teams which can be used at all events as in SA. Indeed we could even work towards national rules. The difficulty is that a consistent set of rules for all events will require all parties to give up something. Let’s get on and make it happen for the future of this great sport.

Nigel’s suggestion of 'Certified Scrutineers and Race Controllers' is a great idea but doesn’t this require a set of uniform rules and regulations to be used at all events? It also requires a lot of volunteers and that’s what Bridge Builders gave us last weekend. Let’s not lose them.

Cheers

John Taylor
WCB

[Khye]

Good point, but the event has definatly left alot of people with a sour tatse in thier mouths, let alone the public humiliation of a entire buisness front.

The reason SAs event seemt o go so well is that its a series run by the same crew, where as victorian races are independant, i think if all the victorian event were put together, as a "series" that you'd see alot more school kids make thier way out to alot more events, imagine casey and maroondah a "round one and round 2" of the "Victorian Energy Breakthrough Series"

that being said, alot of naming rights go out the window, but still, the events need to feed off of each other.

I'm willing to give the race another crack, im going to send an email to them about ways they can improve their race.

[Moz]

Ok, count me as an experienced spectator (and friend of beno, so I'm not completely disinterested).

From my visit to the event I buy the idea that there's a bit of a clash between the race teams and the "build it and see if it works" underlying nature of the event. The inexperienced organisers will hopefully get better with practice, and in some ways if a bunch of the community teams don't turn up next year that might help things along - they can practice organising on less competitive race teams. I don't mean that in a hostile way, just an observation that some of the pressure came from people who wanted to race, and a lot of the faster teams were simply not set up for the event as it was - for example their lowest gear was not low enough to ride uphill at walking pace... I'm not keen on the patronising tone from the dude on the loudspeaker, or the whole "pit bitch" thing (the jacket or the approach of the woman wearing it).

Things they could have done:
- call out for more help as soon as it was obvious they were losing key people
- ask more from people on site on the day, for anything. If a couple more helpers at scrutineering would have sped things up/made things easier, sing out. There were a lot of volunteer-able people around.
- react to what people were saying, and keep an eye out for people saying them (how much of this thread was being said on the day?)
- clarify what sort of event they want up front. If they want a "come and try" event for people who expect to struggle to keep going for 6 hours, say so. If they want an all-out race, say so. If they just need anyone willing to pay the entry fee in order to cover their costs, say that. It's bad enough having fossil fools in an eco event without being unsure of the goal (although perhaps that in itself is a bit of a tip).

Personally, if beno had rung me on Saturday and said "get down here, they are asking for more volunteers" I would have been happy to put in the Saturday arvo+Sunday helping out. Grunt labour or frantically reading the rules so I could marshal to their standards, whatever.

Next year I'm going to enter my quad... http://moz.net.nz/photo/2008/06/21-melb ... 08-moz.php (my goal is to do more laps than the truck)