A Flag Marshal's Journey

Friday, 13 June 2014

GRM Open Day 31st May 2014

Always good when Race Teams have an open day at their workshops and this Time it was at Garry Rogers Motorsports Team Volvo. The Best thing about this one is its only 20 min from home.Was a great day with many other cars on display our Flag Team VFT had a promotions stand to make the most of the opportunity to catch people who may be interested in Marshaling. Great to see the drivers like Scott Mclaughlin just causally walking around with their fans signing anything and everything a very relaxed atmosphere. A good turn out of Fans with plenty to look at even doing pit stop challenge, with all parts of the workshop open with demos of what they do and plenty of staff on hand to talk to about the cars and engines.

Sunday, 25 May 2014

Historic Winton 2014 24th & 25th May

Well another Race meet done and dusted Historic Winton was the first time I have done this event as it clashes with other events each year and so I have missed it but never again this was a great w/end of old classic cars and bikes. This w/end Winton used the short Track and I was assigned post 2.0 which is 4.0 on the long track for those who know Winton, two up on each point worked with Brad on Sat and Russel on Sun. Good fields of Cars and Bikes which included the following,
Firstly bikes into 4 groups 1: All Vintage class c 125's,P3 250's and P3 250's. 2: All Sidecars, 3: P3 500's & unlimited P5 up to 600's, 4: P4 unlimited & P5 unlimited. Some of these Bikes dating back to 1926.
Cars. Regularity, Formula Ford, M&O Racing, Lb Sports & Racing, Q&R Sports & Racing, J&K, Group Sa,Sb,Sc, Group Nb,Nc.
Some Brief explanation of classes.
J - Vintage up to 31/12/30
K - Post Vintage 01/01/31 - 31/12/04
L - Historic Cars      01/01/41 - 31/12/60
M - Historic Cars    01/01/61 - and before 31/12/65
Nb - Classic Saloon Cars         to 1965
Nc - Touring Cars                    Prior to 1973
O - Racing & Sports                1966 - 1969
P - Formula 5000 Cars             Pre 1978
Q - Racing & Sports                1970 - 1977
R - Racing & Sports                1978 - 1987
Sa - Production Sports             01/01/41 - 31/12/60
Sb - Production Sports             01/01/61 - 31/12/69
Sc - Production Sports             01/01/70 - 31/12/77
The Sidecars always a bit of a worry out of 4 events three of those pillions fell off one serious accident on the Saturday when one of the sidecars hit Tyre barrier at turn one. one of the riders sustained some fractures to his leg and had to be flown to Melbourne he should recover fine but scarey to see. Otherwise apart from some spins and the usual push and shove when you have 36 N class cars trying to get round turn 1 we only had to write three reports. Stay safe have fun till next time. Paul

Where we meet for Briefing

Post 2.0 short track or 4.0 long track

Officials Gifts

Some of the Cars

View from My Point

Sunday, 18 May 2014

Sandown Vscrc round 2 May 17 & 18 2014

Another great w/end of motor racing at Sandown Raceway. Vscrc r2 categories included the following MG & Invited,Imp Production,944 Porsche,Saloon cars,Sports cars,Sports Sedans,Formula Vees,Formula Fords 1600,HQs and Historic Touring Cars. I was on post 10.0 under Jim Beam Bridge on Black flag relay worked with 7 different team members over the two days we rotated from yellow flag to green to black flag radio and observer our coms man was Norm from MG club did a great Job. Also on point was Lloyd,Alan and Steve on Sat and Ian,Paul M and Ash on Sunday great teams both days. Whole w/end went well with no major incidents we were on a straight between 9.0 and 11.0 so apart from the odd car pulling over to the side of the track we were incident free. Next round for me is Winton Historics on May 24 & 25 stay safe till next time.

Monday, 21 April 2014

Bathurst Easter Motor Festival 2014

Well who could of asked for a more wonderful w/end the weather was fantastic with cool mornings and beautiful sunny days. This was a three day event with Regularity, Sports Cars, N class classics, Touring cars and F3. The F3 class Set a new Track Record of 2m02.6701s. I was working at 10.5 at top of Mountain Friday we had Practice and Qualifying with a good day and not to much happening, Saturday saw a big pile up on the first lap of a 10 lap race of the sport cars right in front of our point a car spun coming out of 10.0 with most of the field behind him we ended up we multiple contacts bringing out the Safety Car but in the end the first car was the worst being towed away with the rest able to drive off on their own. On the restart we had A Porsche end up in the sand trap bring out the Safety Car again I think in the end they only made one lap out of ten without Safety Car. Sunday morning fairly quiet but the afternoon saw a Subaru WRX dumping oil from 9.8 all across top of mountain down to the bottom where he stopped but before we could bring race under control another car spun on the oil at 10.0 hitting the wall and causing substantial damage and this was in the Regularity so after a big clean up which took over 1/2 hour we were back on track. Sports Cars had a 1 hour race to Finish the day with a good first 1/2 hour things started to go wrong after driver change and Safety Car again took up most of second part of race, with a one lap sprint for the finish we ended up with a two car roll over at the end of the chase 22.0. Top w/end with great friends and most of all the drivers of all incidents came out OK.

Flag 10.5

Looking down to 11.0

Looking back to 10.0

View down to Race control and paddock

Speaks for itself

Tuesday, 8 April 2014

Winton 400 April 2014

Another w/end done and dusted this time V8 Supercars at Winton and what a w/end to be track-side with some of the best racing I have seen for a while and to see the team I follow FPR get 2nd in race 8 and 1st in race 9. And to see History in the making with Erebus getting their first win in race 8 good on ya Betty.
Friday I was on flag point 1.0 pit exit with two others looking after flags,blend line and stationary blue for cars exiting pit lane so even though not much happened at our point we were still were kept busy with Practice for all categories today. We had showers for about an hour in the afternoon but day was mostly fine.
W/end I was assigned to flag point 5.0 with Steve Becker this is on a small straight before a sweeping left turn also a good spot to see it all going bad from Start round to turn 4.0 you can see almost 100% of the track from this point. Again nothing big happened at our point a few cars going wide and a sport sedan pulling up next to us for a visit but a great w/end heaps of fun.
Next event Bathurst Easter Motor Festival.