F & C Corner

Submitted by Sandy Sanders

Well folks, the season is underway. We’ve dusted off the uniforms and flags, asked ourselves “why?” for the ten thousandth time and proceeded to drive, fly or walk to the first event of the year.

The drivers school at Beaverun is done and many lessons were learned by workers as well as drivers. What to wear, what changes were made during the off season, what we need to teach and what the old and newbies need to remember were the mantra’s of the weekend. All that under our hats we commenced to start the first weekend of the year at a new track and try our darnedest to stay warm, focused at have fun. After many conversations with Jack Frost and the coffee/hot chocolate runs by the Glen Van, I think we succeeded.

Changes are not really changes for this year since the Northeast is a benchmark for the rest of SCCA. Waving on the paving, stationary off the track is still the standard. We will define changes or technical approaches to how each flag is displayed at each track and each event this year but basically put: if you are the station with the incident and you are requested to be double yellow, you will have one flag waving and one flag stationary: White flags and blue flags are not to be waved although they may be shown aggressively (see your FM for a demonstration): Black flags will be stationary as well but may also be aggressively shown, not waved: Information flags are used at the stations captains’ discretion (surface flag, waving or stationary for a spin and continue, blue). Direction flags are always called from “control” any and all drivers that ignore these flags need to be called in. Consistency in flagging this year are the Flag Chiefs goals and the Northeast is already leading the way in what we do and how we do it, let’s keep it to national standards and keep ourselves top in our specialty. Written flag meetings will be a Glen standard again this year and clipboards will have evaluation forms for all personnel on station as well as hand signals sheets and captains briefing sheets. Evaluation sheets are optional but will assist the Flag Chiefs in training and retraining issues.

Glen region events of interest for flagging personnel are as follows:

May 15^th, 5pm at Seneca Lodge – Specialty Chiefs meeting (a good time to come ask questions and learn more about other specialties)

July 10&11 – Glen Nationals at Watkins Glen

July 24 & 25 – Glen Regional at Watkins Glen

August 7 &8 Finger Lakes Regional at Nelson Ledges

August 14 & 15 Glen Regional at Adirondack International

September 18 & 19 FLR Regional at Watkins Glen “Fun One”

September 20-26 Runoffs at Mid Ohio

October 1 -3 Mini Indy at Williamsport, PA

October 15-17 Drivers School and Regional at Watkins Glen

The regional race at Adirondack will be confirmed in June and there are many more events on the race schedule check out the schedule on the SCCA website and contact the region hosting to find out more about each event. SCCA and the Glen region encourage all workers to visit and work and other venues and any assistance that we can give to get you to a person at your venue of choice will be provided.

Please consider coming out and working downtown at the Vintage Grand Prix in September as well, you will see many of the cars that raced at historic Watkins Glen during the Road Racing Years and have the opportunity to meet and greet some of the racing greats. Contact me if you are interested in working, the hours are 2pm – 6:30 pm on Friday and then come to the track on Saturday and Sunday and enjoy.

No promises but this Flag Chief would like to keep this going for the season so if you have any suggestions or topics you would like covered please email me edcsanders@htva.net .