gums

Trackmasters, back here in the east, has an open track format, and many of us flock to it for testing and quality track time. It's not fully open passing, you're supposed to limit it to striaghts, and it's understood which straights are NOT included. Still, it eliminates the annoying bottlenecks and ruined flow of a DE, and I suppose it's a lot safer.
I see the PCA DE's out here spending more time teaching how to point by than how to drive properly!

DrJupeman

Bull's comments echo my experience. I passed all over the place at Tracquest and never was talked to.

richard glickel.

There are a couple of events that come to mind that permit passing w/out a point-bye. I think there's an event at WGI next week - FTT ("fast track times") that uses this format, although there are certain "no passing allowed" sections of the track.

Both Kojote & FTT require experienced drivers.

The license concept is probably a good way to limit participation to the advanced drivers you seek. I'd imagine that you would accept drivers who hold valid competition licenses from clubs, e.g., PCA club race license, or other sanctioning groups, e.g., NASA, EMRA, etc.

The last time I participated in a TracQuest event (at VIR), those drivers who preferred that they not be passed until they gave a point-bye were asked to tape an "X" onto their car's rear bumper. It seemed to work well.

Good luck with this program.

amaist

From my experience at Trackmasters they do require pointy bys. I got a stern talking to for allegedly passing without one (I thought I did get one but someone thought I didn't).

The lack of trains at Trackmasters open lapping group is explained by the higher quality of drivers and not by procedure.

If people can't handle and issue point bys properly imagine if you were allowed to pass without them. It would at best be a mess and worst there would be bent sheetmetal.
PCA does the right thing in teaching point bys. For a beginning driver it enforces track awareness as one has to constantly check their mirrors.

I don't think anyone here is advocating eliminating point bys for beginning drivers. More experienced guys and many racers are aware enough on the track to do away with that procedure but a beginner will just cause trouble. Here in Montreal we have a group that runs lapping events without point bys for all groups. It's a destruction derby. It usually takes half a season for the worst morons to be weeded out in a darwinian fashion through crashes until it settles down.

amaist

This is why the organizers must be on the ball and have the good judgement to toss out idiots. But if the organizers are idiots (I do know one organization like that) then it turns into a zoo.