Google Scott Tucker. As much as I dislike him, the decision to give the Ferrari the win was correct. I just have a tough time rooting for that team.
Isn't he tied into predatory/payday loans (i.e. the ones that have been deemed illegal in many states)? Scott Tucker is the "he" behind Level5. I remember there was a big deal about it on F-Chat, but don't recall the whole story
Pretty sure it's illegal federally, but he aligned himself with Indian reservations to get around usury laws and either has or had pending litigation against him for it. He also did some time on fraud charges a while back iirc.
Back to the racing and IMSA.... 1) The correction of that penalty was the right thing to do. Good for them doing it. 2) the underlying "issues" that resulted in the last FCC and the initial decision itself need to be part of a "learning moment" for IMSA 3) IMSA and the series (Tudor, Continental) need to get a grip on what they are doing. The 2014 rules and process were a joke. DP vs. P2, all stacked for DP. In Conti, the GM cars run 427 cu in engines, the Porsches are limited to 3.8 (and almost won anyway!) 4) Many teams (and manufacturers) fled to Pirelli WC (which was dying), as WC smartly adopted the standardized GT3 specs for their GT class. MB, McLaren, Audi, even Lambo are heading to PWC vs. IMSA. Porsche had to create a specific "GT America" car just for Tudor. (to wit, there was no real need to come up with their own "GTD" class; they could have done GTLM = GTE/GT2, and GTD = GT3 - would have kept it simple, cost the teams less and attracted more entries). 4)Daytona and Sebring are truly global events, as is Petit. What remains to be seen is how the other races this year go....
Credit to the stewards for havin the guts to rescind the call after Audi had already made their victory speeches. Almost makes me feel bad for them. The only thing the Ferrari could have done was lift there and he likely would have spun if he did and taken both cars out.
Common sense prevails! They need to look at the yellow flag situation though, what's the point in racing hard for 24 hours only to have the race artificially bunched up at the last gasp?
D0uche Bag used to enter himself in 2 cars at the same time (out of 4 racing in class in ALMS) so he would be insured the points championship.
That system seems better but the problem I guess is that Le Mans and Nurburgring are a lot longer courses so gaps can be maintained where as at Daytona laps are much shorter. Could someone explain the Yellow wave by?
Thank God! What a bad decision that was. Anybody that has raced at Daytona and gone thru the kink knows that there is no room for 2 cars side by side without someone letting off. The Audi did a great job trying though. Good race.
Kudos triple nickel! Should we bump this thread... http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/other-racing/362588-put-fork-level-5-a.html
Simply, when under a full course caution, in the on-track lineup behind the safety car, if a car has track position that has them physically ahead of of the class leader can get a "point by" around the safety car and rejoin the field behind their class leader. NASCAR tactic to "improve restarts by having the leaders up front". Also gets people who are a lap down off the hook As you can tell I am not a fan of this rule
so basically it's the NASCAR lucky dog rule. I'm not a fan either...goes against the spirit of endurance racing, and makes simple cautions (tow ins, clearing debris, etc) last forever.
IMSA vice president Scot Elkins addresses controversy at Rolex 24 at Daytona Series awards Level 5 Motorsports victory in GTD class after reversing decision to penalize team By: Mike Pryson on January 27, 2014 IMSA vice president Scot Elkins addresses controversy at Rolex 24 at Daytona - Autoweek It was a busy Sunday afternoon and early evening at Daytona International Speedway for Scot Elkins, IMSA vice president of competition and technical regulations. Elkins was in the middle of a decision to penalize the Level 5 Motorsports Ferrari team for avoidable contact in the final minute of the race. The decision, which was later overturned, sent Level 5 Motorsports to fourth place before the penalty was rescinded and the team was declared the winner. Elkins explained the penalty and IMSA's decision-making process on Sunday in Daytona. Here's what he had to say: IMSA: At the podium now, at the table, Scot Elkins, IMSA vice president of competition and technical regulations. He will be speaking after a statement is made on behalf of IMSA. A full postrace review of the incident on the last lap of the 52nd Rolex 24 at Daytona was completed by IMSA supervisory officials. The decision has been made to reverse the decision by the race director, rescind the penalty against the No. 555 Level 5 Motorsports Ferrari 458 Italia team, and reinstate drivers Scott Tucker, Bill Sweedler, Townsend Bell, Jeff Segal and Alessandro Pier Guidi as the GT Daytona class winners. We regret the confusion following the race and appreciate the patience by our fans, drivers, teams and the media, so we could properly review and subsequently report this decision. With that I will let Scot make quick remarks and then we'll open it up. SCOT ELKINS: Thanks, everybody, for sticking around and having a chance to hear about this. Our rule book is very clear in regards to this type of a situation. There is a section in the rule book in many, many places where it mentions a group of supervisory officials. Those officials are named, and it's very clear that when a decision by the race director is one that the supervisory officials feel needs a review, the process exists for us to do that, and that's exactly what's happened here. It's very clearly stated, and it's something that is for cases just like this. Q: Knowing that we just completed 23 hours and 59 minutes of racing, is this something that, in retrospect, a decision could have been held until after the checkered flag to avoid having to go through this process? S.E.: You know, it's a good question. Honestly. The thing is that the group of supervisory officials aren't always present in race control, so the way it's worked, and the way it's always worked, and the way the rule book states it is that the race director is the chief executive of the competition and that his decision is the first decision, and if anything seems different or seems to need review, then we gather the group of supervisory officials and take a look at that decision. That's exactly what we did here. The uniqueness of this was that it was on the last lap of a 24-hour race, and so the race director was doing exactly what he is expected to do, which is to make a decision and try to have some finality prior to the end, and that's what he did. The process worked. If you're asking could we have done it differently, I don't think so. Q: Can you explain how many people are on this committee and how it's made up? S.E.: What we do is we list in the rule book the people that are named the supervisory officials for this season. The supervisory officials are defined by IMSA, and just because every supervisory official is listed, it doesn't mean that that's necessarily the group we use. It essentially consists of, and I'm not hiding anything, it consists of the executives of IMSA, which is Scott Atherton, myself, Ed Bennett, the series managers, because it usually the situation would apply to more of individual series. We list the names in the rule book; it's very clear. Q: Was there was a complaint filed about the decision, and is there a reason why you reviewed the incident, or was it your own decision to review it? S.E.: Yeah, it's an internal process. It's not one that is allowed for any external activity. Honestly, the rule book, I'm sorry I keep saying this, but the rule book is very clear on what items in the regulations are available for protest. As this is a race procedure, it is not an item that can actually be protested or appealed in any way. So the purpose of the supervisory official group is to allow us to have an internal review of a decision by an official, and that's how the process worked. Q: You said it has been overturned. Can you actually say why it was overturned? It was announced on the TV as avoidable contact. Clearly there was no contact. Is that why it's been overturned? S.E.: No, the avoidable contact regulation is actually quite clear in the rule book, as well. It's called avoidable contact, but contact isn't necessarily needed to invoke the penalty. The review was that in sitting down and looking at the regulations and looking at the decision that was made by the race director and looking at the situational items respective to the contact that happened in that specific area sorry, I don't mean to say contact, the incident that happened in that specific area, we came to the conclusion that, as we do many times in race control and many times during an event, that it was a racing incident, one that was not deemed a penalty. Q: There was an incident I think in the previous lap or maybe the lap before between the 555 and the 45. What was deemed from that incident, and did that play a factor into any of this? S.E.: No, every incident is judged on its own accord. I know I've spoken with you about it a number of times, I've spoken with Marshall about it a number of times. The information we have in race control is the information we have to base our decisions off of, whether people like it or not. We don't see every piece of contact that occurs on the racetrack. It's somewhat limited by the cameras that we have and the views that we have outside of race control. This was solely about this single incident. Q: And that ruling from that incident before, that was just deemed a racing incident? S.E.: Correct. Q: Can you just explain a little bit the process between what took place from the time of the checkered flag to notifying the teams? How was the notification processed? S.E.: Again, this is an internal process, as I have described, and what it was, was it was a meeting of the supervisory officials, who gave us an opportunity to sit down and look at the data that was involved in the incident. It didn't, as you guys can tell; I don't know what time it is, but I think the race finished more than a few hours ago, and what we did was, we went through that internal process and then provided a notification to the teams personally. I spoke to both of the teams and provided that information to them before we went any further.
First, double points in F1; now NASCAR takes over road racing in the US.....is this the year 'real' high level road racing died?
I was thinking that this morning...NASCAR is unwatchable, sports car is getting screwed up, F1 cars look like something from a Stanley Kubrick film, indycar keeps tripping over itself. gonna be a long season I think
