2017 Races

[shafeeq]

WTF is up with people not running wheel covers, especially in un-faired wheels? Buggy speed is about the sum of a lot of tiny improvements. I saw multiple orgs moving in the wrong direction on this element. Most of the sigs (epp and nu) and a few others as well.

Clearly those people have other priorities than buggy speed. Some of the wheel covers that were run looked pretty shoddy when stationary.

It also showed that the men's buggy trap speeds are about 1 mph quicker than the women's buggy trap times. I suspect smaller humans generate less of an initial velocity for the freeroll. This is closer than I would have guessed based on historical free roll times.

I think the historical times are a bit distorted because the talent level in the women's field has been ramping up to match the men's, and presumably lighter pushers are helped more by the drop in buggy weights. In the last 30 years, the men's record has dropped 4 seconds, the women's 15. Spirit's '88 men would still make today's A teams, but their women might not make SDC A.

Can somebody explain exactly where this speed trap was located?

At the downhill edge of the monument - the spot where an observer on Flagstaff Hill would see the buggy emerge from behind the monument.
About 130 feet uphill from the lamppost that is the "traditional" chute flagging spot.

[Pope on a Rope]

Women's finals trap times.

buggy MPH ft/sec rank
SDC A 35.67 52.31 1
CIA a 34.81 51.05 2
Fringe A 34.53 50.65 3
PKA A 34.43 50.5 4
Fringe B 34.02 49.9 5
Fringe C 33.09 48.53 6
Sig Epp 32.29 47.36 7
Apex C 31.49 46.18 8
Phi Delt 29.84 43.77 9
Apex A 29.67 43.52 10

[shafeeq]

Note CIA B appears to be quicker then CIA A.

Also note that CIA B failed drops. So had they used it as A, the PiKA heat would've gotten very interesting very quickly when the driver went to tap the brakes and found nothing there...

[Pope on a Rope]

that is why drivers wear gloves.....

[Pope on a Rope]

that is why drivers wear gloves.....

[mkaplan]

So either I had a thumb malfunction or PiKA saved all the good wheels for Men's A

Don't forget PiKA men's B -- I doubt that roll lacked the good stuff

That roll was a 54.6, slowest of all finals other than CIA following them.
CIA was <53 in prelims & reroll, with pushers no better than PiKA B, and PiKA A <52.

hmmm.... I was a bit drunk when I wrote that, I think that was my insecurity of B teams killing my A team coming out

- Learning just how badly I lost the game of sneaking things past the safety chair.

Now that's an interesting thing to say... Is there some rumor of this year's mechanics that I haven't heard?

[Elmo Zoneball]

Elmo - trap was set up @ downhill edge of the monument 'wall', so not quite, but close to Vmax location @ or around most organizations typical 'chute' flag location. Ben is senior Pike so references the original 'chute' name for the straight speed section of the course, ahead of 'the turn' which has adopted the chute name.

Here?

https://www.dropbox.com/s/knzjpeoe70egv ... t.png?dl=0

Yellow line.

That's quite a distance from vmax.

As an aside; that location is coincidentally almost exactly where the buggy photo of Intrepid was taken in my avatar photo on my posts here.

[Pope on a Rope]

That's quite a distance from vmax.

yep, technically, they probably go a hair faster another 60-80 feet down the hill, but this location is out of the way of the flaggers and buggies trying to turn and since they are all measured from the same spot, still useful.

[Pope on a Rope]

i will add the the Spirit women's A team had a trap time of 36.13 MPH which is faster than the already very fast SDC women's trap time on Friday. It would have been interesting to see them in the mix. Her turn was too tight early and that was the end of that.

[Jmohin]

I'm curious to see the speed trap data from prelims.