Non-neha Ascutney report

[sachilles]

Just curious to hear feedback on how the event went.
Every opportunity to run a hill is a learning experience, whether it's pikes peak, PHA or some place else.
I wasn't there. Curious to know what went well, and what went poorly. Is there anything that was done differently, that might work for NEHA based events?

I was told they seeded the vehicles in terms of previous course times. I could see that helping efficiency, how did they work the line up at the bottom of the hill? Did the seeding stay the same through out the day? I can see this being a challenge to set up, but could benefit NEHA event in a few ways. It would allow control to have a better idea of who the slower cars are and adjust accordingly, rather than having it yo-yo back and forth a bit. Maybe more hassle than it's worth, but thought it was worth discussion.

Six runs were made on Sunday. What time did the first car start on course, and what time did the last vehicle head up the course? Lunch was delivered to workers on the hill, rather than having a lunch break. As a worker are you less or more inclined to work an event if lunch was served on hill? Was lunch to be consumed while vehicles went up the hill, or was there a break in the action while folks ate?

What was learned about the top part of the course? Any sections of pavement worthy of concern?

[Phillip]

Here is the Facebook page for the event, it's public so you should be able to view it. On the page, aside from the videos, are reports and results from the event, should give you an Idea on how everything went down.

http://www.facebook.com/events/476924209000979/

Overall summation:

I didn't run this weekend because of injuries, but i spectated and did a couple Fam runs with other drivers. Firstly, the top of the hill is lovely. The weather was killer, and having bikes there made for a really interesting mix of characters we don't always see. There was a decent supply of regulars there, and the mix was about 50/50 bikes to cars. Even a home-built (is there any other kind?) Sidecar came up.


-They used stage-rally timing, with timed starts on the 1:00 minute mark, and time cards. It made for a few minor timing issues but those were corrected on Sunday. It seemed to be a MUCH easier way to set everything up, and aside from no start light, it seemed just as effective. Having never done a rally, i was a bit confused at first as to how times were recorded, but that was just a learning curve thing.

-Workers ate lunch on the hill, and the cars ran during lunch times, right through the day. The workers meeting was at 7, and FAM runs started at 7:10. Drivers were asked to get in line before the start of the morning meeting, so instead of everyone running back to their campsites, it was a "Ok good? lets go" kind of thing. The hill ran until around 4:45, but don't quote me on that, I didn't have my watch with me. Pretty much everyone took lunch breaks midway through the day. It seemed like the workers enjoyed it that way.

The running of the whole hill, and especially the upper section, was received well by all. The top section smooths out considerably from the upper third of the traditional course, and the "closed in" feel made for a very interesting experience. I for one was a huge fan.

One thing that I did not like, was on bring-downs, the workers put out cones to make the road 2-way-traffic. through the course of the weekend i could never quite figure out what the purpose of this was. What I do know, however, is that a rookie Miata went wide on the bring-down and had a head on collision with a rental van coming back up the hill around the corner, which i assume was carrying workers or supplies. Nobody seemed to be badly hurt or anything, but If the bring-down just waited for the Van to finish before coming back down, it would have avoided the issue. It seems like a risky solution for the sake of efficiency.

Overall, It seemed extremely well run, and it's hard to argue with 6 runs a day, even with the wrecker having to go up at least twice.

[Robevo]

that was the problem then. I thought he just went off.
Sad situation, but the event was nicely orgenized and smooth . I loved it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lrVy8s-JCg

[sachilles]

Because I'm a bit of nerd. I thought I'd break out a spreadsheet and see if seeding cars by previous course times would save any time. I thought for sure it would. I was kind of surprised by the result.
Best case scenario is we could save a total of 58 seconds total between both run groups. On average it is closer to a savings of 25 seconds total. Not really worth it. I used Ascutney 1 as my source of data.
Ultimately what I figured out was that the way we do start absorbs the time differential for the most part. What I also found is if the slowest car is significantly slower than most of the group, it makes more sense to have them be any other car than the last one in the group.
I ran the cars fastest to slowest, slowest to fastest and a few times I randomized the start order.
That is all I got.

I do like the idea of having the cars ready prior to the driver meeting.

[sdwarf36]

It doesnt really work-not with 1 run group anyways. If you are at the front of the line, when do you gas up? Or check out that noise you heard on the bringdown? I'm supposed to be behind #33-hes not there-now who i go after?Only advantage was keeping the slow cars + bikes to the back. The reason for alot of runs is run groups getting smaller + smaller as the day goes on=same with us. Everyone WANTS 6-8 -10 runs a day-but only 30% take them.
The top of the hill is smoother than the minefield-but not smooth. Its very technical-and narrow.

""One thing that I did not like, was on bring-downs, the workers put out cones to make the road 2-way-traffic. through the course of the weekend i could never quite figure out what the purpose of this was. What I do know, however, is that a rookie Miata went wide on the bring-down and had a head on collision with a rental van coming back up the hill around the corner, which i assume was carrying workers or supplies. Nobody seemed to be badly hurt or anything, but If the bring-down just waited for the Van to finish before coming back down, it would have avoided the issue. It seems like a risky solution for the sake of efficiency. ""

No-the van was carrying an old man, 2 teenagers and a dog on a hi speed joy ride. Yes-the van going slow at the time-and the MIata turned into his lane-but there was ZERO reason to have 2 way traffic. The MIata lost BAD-it happened 150 ft in front of me. Thank god it wasn't a bike.

[mtwils]

The facebook page http://www.facebook.com/events/476924209000979/ is great but it is also hard for me to follow for a complete picture.

It was a great event and a success for Max BMW Motorsport. I had a great time, and the spectators were still talking about it at 8 PM Sunday. Joe Warner, Max and Ben Stratton and a host of others worked very hard to pull this off and their hard work gave the 58 drivers and riders 6 runs on Saturday and 6 runs on Sunday.

The 1 minute gap format and almost-fixed run order worked well. It depended on people not really caring if they missed a run - something that the organizers specifically mentioned at the Saturday drivers meeting. It was also semi-flexible. Paul Tingaud often ran mid-field in the car group. Did it save time? Almost certainly yes. Cars start about once per 1.5 minutes (3 minutes per run, car start and finish about the same time) at a NEHA ascutney, and they started usually once per minute here. They could save a minute per run on Sunday with me first in line, because I am ready faster than anyone else. That was OK on Saturday. I did even have time to go back to the pits to get my anti-viral drugs without missing my place in line. I do not know if the workers were OK with it, nor do I know if there is really more risk of multi-vehicle incidents.

Time results are here with the fastest run for each competitor, with an error at overall position 9:
http://www.nasarallysport.com//results/ ... astest.htm
My GTR is actually a stock awd car, complete with original run-flats. The race awd class was for the 911 turbo.
Greg Roumiantsev is the driver of the EVO in 9th overall, Klim was the co-driver who did a 3:58. That is from facebook not the results website.
There was a driver from Taiwan whose name I did not catch, but sounded like a USA native.
I am sure there is a story about Brad Nellie's boyfriend, but nobody told me. Maybe there will be another report.
The sidecar guys kept at it, despite the road roughness.

The course was essentialy the same as the long course used by SCCNH NEHA in 1995, 2003 and 2004. My estimate is that the finish line was 50 or 100 feet down the mountain*, resulting in a course that was about 1 second faster. This meant that I did not have to lift for the finish line in either the GT-R or the 911 Turbo. Also it appears that for the fastest cars it is about 40 seconds from the traditional finish to this finish. Maybe 43-45 seconds for me. Only about 5 of us had previously driven the full course - me, Charlie North who did rookie orientation, Ed Mooers in the Charlie North built orange Subaru, Jimi Heyder and Sherman Baumann.

There was a lot of attrition - a lot more than at a normal NEHA event. 12 runs may be part of the reason. Phil Brown did not finish his first run on his motorcycle. He slid out at the normal top-of-course crash corner and did serious damage to the bike and himself - scapula, rib and vertebrae injuries as well as an exhaust system burn. TJ Jarrett also endo-ed on his first run but finished, and then decided to work the rest of the weekend. Charlie North broke a tie rod end on his POS Mitsubushi, never finishing a run, and the VW "pickup" broke a ball joint. I believe one of the SAABs went straight twice in one run on Sunday, once just before the bridge and once just before the aforementioned crash corner. And that does not mention 10 of the 12 people who drove Saturday but not Sunday.

Someone else will have to write about the over-4 group, except ... James Moncrief brought a street 1997 Mercedes SL600, I believe on ordinary tires. This is a non-turbo v12 (the 2003 on up are turbo v12). He did a 4:18 with overheating issues - the shock absorber fluid for the active suspension was overheating. Shades of the Peugeot 205 Turbo 16s at Dakar**.

The under-4 crowd in more detail (and other notes):

Paul Tingaud's v6 turbo Audi-powered tube frame, the Super Chicken (about halfway down on this page http://www.facebook.com/MAXBMWMotorcycles ) won the event with a 3:19.4 , a few tenths slower than Dan Rutan's 2003 German Buick time of 3:19.09, despite not having to travel quite as far. Apparently he broke his oilpan Saturday and fixed it for Sunday. Jamie Melhuish, originally from New Zealand, drove the vastly underpowered (compared to the rest of the fast cars) BMW M3 to a 3:25. We had talked about the top section Friday night. After the first run he said - the crest is flat-out. Not for me; I am not that good. Charlie Gerry drove his winter beater Subaru wagon with a turbo motor ("no it does not have a lot of power") to a 3:34.4 on Sunday. The car was pissing coolant at the top and he backed off on his later runs. Good driving.

On Saturday I did a 3:34 in the 911 turbo, 4 seconds faster than my 2004 time of 3:38, but with VASTLY more power and the aforementioned 1 second advantage. But the car tried to push the right front strut through the hood on the bringdown after the 5th run on Saturday. The washer is bigger than the strut tower access hole, so the hood survived, but the driving was done for the day. I got the car ramp-trucked home (thanks again Ed Mooers). I returned Sunday with my completely stock GT-R on the original run-flats. The 5 runs were 3:38, 3:40, 3:38, 3:36 with a passenger and 3:39 with a passenger, leaving me 4th. I slept at home for 6 hours to help my health**** and injuries recover, so I had missed the first run Sunday. Based on times and never going by the "tree of fear" flat-out I am probably still 3-5 seconds slower than I was in 2009 when I did a 2:14 at Okemo or 2010 when I did a 2:43 short course at Ascutney, both in a stock GT-R. That may never come back, but the fun did. Neither car has any extra safety equipment beyond a fire extinguisher.

Fifth was relative newcomer but regular NEHA competitor Mike Ruggiero in his blue Eclipse. He only drove 5 runs Sunday and rode with me on the 6th. Rob Martai had a rally EVO with his wife as navigator for the 3:41 and 6th, the first non-NEHA driver. Jude DeMeis took advantage of the same rules as I did and brought his street uncaged Z06 Corvette instead of his rally Subaru and took 7th with a 3:45. He started out slowly on Saturday, probably to ensure that he did not crash. Some of us never figured out the slow start part. 8th at a 3:47 was the road race BMW 1000 of Robbie Nigl and Peach Pit racing. He claimed to have 200 wheel hp, making his combination even better power/weight than my 911 (650 wheel hp and 3500 lbs) or Paul's Super Chicken at (guessing) 500 hp and 2500 pounds. Robbie was also the fastest motorcycle, a strong accomplishment on the bumpy and crowned road.

I do not know Greg Roumiantsev in the EVO who did a 3:49 for 9th, but I believe he said it was stock except for an exhaust and tarmack rally tires. Again no cage, and taking the same advantage of the rules as me and Jude. The aforementioned Ed Mooers did a 3:50 in the super-subaru before breaking I believe an axle. Chris duBois did a 3:53 in a 4 cylinder non-turbo Honda S2000.

Now for some interesting history. In 1995 son and father Dan and Bill Rutan did 3:51 and 3:54. Based on the class listing, this is the naturally aspirated Rabbit that Bill built. And they had to go 1 second further. (And on the same day I did a 3:45 in my 1987 corvette, similar to Jude's time.) The hill may have been smoother, but we were all rookies at the top then, not just most of us. Not to take away from Chris duBois' time and driving.

The remaining 3 sub-4 people were all on motorcycles, Fletcher Rood on a KTM, Tom Bergh from Maine (my one rookie student) and Jimi Heyder who set his fast time on a run where he caught the SAAB that was in front of him. Maybe Jimi wanted someone to chase. He did not manage to equal that on his next run.

And the incident. One thing Max, Ben, Joe et al. were trying to do was make this a worker and spectator friendly event. They were moving spectators and workers around between runs. The shuttle would drive up after the last vehicle. To keep the time loss down they decided to have the bringdowns be 2-way traffic. If the shuttles got to the top before the bringdown started, it would be declared to be one-way traffic. So after the 4th run on Sunday it was 2 way traffic, but one driver spaced out and there was a crash between the Miata of Kip Moncrief (James' nephew) and the shuttle van. Kip was limping but otherwise nobody seemed injured; the same could not be said of the cars.

There have been several opinions about this. Some were attributing this to the 2 different ways that bringdowns were done. There was some talk about the speed of the shuttle van. I talked briefly to Kip at the bottom afterwards and he said more-or-less: I had decided it was my last run and was thinking about packing up. I turned the steering wheel and then all I saw was the grill of the mini-van. My conclusion is that too many drivers suffer from the Roy Hopkins One Lap track departure syndrome*** to be safe driving down in 2 way traffic. The only solutions are to either have 1 way traffic or enforce a train with a slow leader, and do not let anyone down who misses the train. I prefer solution 1 way traffic.

Kip admitted and accepted blame, but that is not enough. Other drivers will probably do the same in similar circumstances. But similarly blaming the organizers is not accurate either. How were they to know about the mental issue for some drivers? And if you must always do things the way others have done in the past, then there is no progress. And the people movement was essential to the MaxBMWMotorsports vision. The only way I see is to add the few minutes of always doing a one-way bringdown (probably after the shuttle gets to the top, but maybe not), and keep public and open the reasons why so other organizers of similar events can make informed decisions.

The organizers decided to continue. The 5th and 6th runs happened in rapid succession because it seemed as if only about 1/4 of the field decided to take those runs. Jimi and I would drive all night but maybe not everyone else has the same attitude. And why did nobody tell Arlo Cota about the all-the-runs-you-could want?

One feature or drawback (depending on your attitude) of the format is the lack of pit time for the faster cars. Between the end of the drivers meeting Saturday and the broken strut top, I spent maybe 20 minutes at the bottom of the hill. Fine for those of us whose cars are normally reliable, but Paul for example had to start mid-field in order to get gas or whatever. The organizers did give him a two minute gap instead of the normal one minute gap, but there was not a lot of service time. The flip side of that is that most drivers did not take all the runs offered anyway, so it becomes almost a non-issue.


Michael Wilson
Car #6 Porsche 911 Turbo saturday
Car #6 Nissan GTR sunday

*I believe the finish line was under the power lines where the brush had been cut back. This had a uniform uphill slope leading away from the road on the left. Kevin Gale set up finish in a spot where he could have a table and 2 chairs on relatively level ground above the road, which would be at the start of the right hand bend rather than the end of the left.

**At Paris-Dakar some years ago, Ari Vataanen was not willing to drive over 135 mph through the desert. His 2 teammates left him behind, but their cars caught fire and burned to the ground due to overheated shock absorbers. I forget who won.

***I have been told that after a few near-crashes, Adrienne Hughes would never let Roy Hopkins start a transit leg from a race track on the one-lap of america. Apparently he would not look for other traffic. He would be fine after about half an hour. My guess is that Kip did this. Either we have to form a religion about this or we have to keep this reason around in front of us or we will have to repeat this crash in other forms. I prefer solution 2 here which is to keep this reason written and in our memories.

****cancer, pulmonary embolisms, ECMO, stage 4 pressure ulcer, broken hip, broken scapula, who remembers what else?

[Chief Geek]

A had an amazing illustration of how small the world can be.

I've gotten to know the owner of a food truck that serves the industrial park where I work. At lunch time a couple of weeks ago, I met her dad who rides a BMW adventure bike. Being friendly, I told him about Max's Ascutney event. On a different day, I mentioned the event to the chef's younger brothers who also work at the food truck.

Guess who Max's passengers were in the minivan.

I don't know what it was like for competitors, but as a worker, I didn't like it at all. I won't work at an event with those safety and road control procedures or events without a break-out/cage rule again. In general, not a safe event, IMHO.

Paul

PS No break for lunch is a drag as a worker.

[Mopar 151w2]

In reference to seed order, only 1 run group (no A/B), lunch break or not, start and stop times, and the like, Kevin and I (mostly Kevin....) have run numbers and/or collected data on most possible scenarios, and it's kinda how we have gotten to our current state of the art. Thing of it is, you get tired of explaining this stuff to people who would a) rather argue than learn b)prefer anecdotes to organized facts c) have to tell you that what you propose can't possibly work, even as it's working.
I'm more than willing to answer reasonable questions, and I'm sure Kevin is as well. The particular expertise we both bring to this is in machine and automation programming, setup, and timing. It's all about constraints, dependent and independent events, and correct utilisation of resources.

[Kiwi]

I raced the event and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Racing to the top of the hill (Long course) was fantastic! Getting six runs on race day was fantastic! I would like all events at Ascutney to be run on the Long course. This is my favorite hill after Mt Washington.

As this was Max's first attempt at running a hillclimb event, I think he did an outstanding job. However there is definitely room for improvement after learning what worked and what did not.

I agree that the seeding order was not that instrumental in getting lots of runs, and it did not provide time for the first few cars in line (Tingaud, myself, Wilson, etc.) to make any changes – add fuel, check tire pressures, change wheels, whatever. However Max was flexible and the fast cars could insert themselves into the middle of the pack if they did some work on the car.

Bring-downs on New England hills should be one-way only. Running the minivan up after the last competitor was OK, it only took a minute or two longer at holding before cars would be released. Likewise bringing the van down did not hold up the start of the next run.

I do think that a 1/2 hour lunch break for workers (and drivers) would be feasible and not impact the number of runs by much.

The rally timing worked fine. The start was like any other NEHA event, except you had to go on the exact minute, and a clock (plus two people as starters - only need one) instead of the traffic light.

To Paul / Chief Geek: would you please provide more description of your concerns about safety at the Max BMW event? I believe one issue you mentioned was not calling cars as they went by the check points. Is that right?

I was not concerned about (my) safety. We had most checkpoints staffed (but not Check 5, and I'm not sure check 5 is really needed.) I would be more concerned if the race control "lost cars on the hill", i.e., didn't know where they were if one went off.

But here is a personal opinion. I think that safety would be improved by a larger margin if we somehow persuaded competitors to be more careful and drive more in control. Crashes are unsafe. You might get hurt; you could die. Many of us have crashed (to some degree). I see more frequent and more serious crashes at NEHA events than I ever did in hillclimbing for 6 years in New Zealand. I think we (drivers/organizers) could possibly provide better information or more support or other procedures that help persuade drivers to understand the risks and be more careful. I don't support making many new rules to force drivers into something, rather some kind of support system as needed. Fewer crashes would mean more runs on the hill and lower likelihood of serious consequences.

Thoughts anyone?
Jamie

BTW, I don't hold negative opinions about anyone who crashes. I'm pushing hard and it could happen big to me one day.

[sdwarf36]

I tried to like the 1 min. interval -if i was in line, i knew how long till i ran-that part was good (easy for me to say-i was 3rd from last.) The problem i see with it- while it may work in a rally situation where most of the cars are pretty close in times-and the drivers are more seasoned veterans-but with a hill, we have a much wider swing in times-and a rookie may pick up 30 seconds over the weekend. 1 min may be 2 checks with a slow car, it may not be with the fast ones.
6 runs-lets not forget to mention that the workers were on the hill by 6:45am. Workers meeting was at 6:30. The Fam was at 7 am. Besides being pretty un-realistic with the normal crowd, Ascutney is the only hill without neighbors within earshot.- And again-the diminishing number of cars+ bikes running in the later part of the day.
While I have never rallied, I feel this hill + Mt. Wash. operate in pretty much the same manner-you're on your own for the most part. At the NEHA hillclimbs I feel very secure knowing that everyone on the mt. knows where/what is going on at all points + time.