TRANSPONDERS IN GP'S

[Mark]

BSI and FIM trialed transponders on the bikes at Horsens last weekend.   The article I read said authoroties may decide to allow riders to pick the best gates at the GP based on the fastest practise times from Friday.   This is going down the Motor GP route.  How boring is that sport.     What is the gain for spectators in giving the fastest bike the best gate in the heats.   We want close racing not follow the leader. 

 

[OveFundinFan]

I do agree with you there is no gain for spectators giving best gate to fastest riders, I would like to think you just heard a rumour.

I disagree with you that MotoGP is boring, probably you didn't see the MotoGP from Assen last Sunday.

[Mark]

10 minutes ago, OveFundinFan said:

I do agree with you there is no gain for spectators giving best gate to fastest riders, I would like to think you just heard a rumour.

I disagree with you that MotoGP is boring, probably you didn't see the MotoGP from Assen last Sunday.

Its in the Star so its no rumour.     But plenty of water to go under a bridge before its formally brought in.     Assen passed me by as all motor GP's do. 

[severnsider]

On the coverage it said Zagar was fastest in practice. As he scored poorly shows big difference between racing and speed

As for motogp most are pretty boring. Assen was good though 

[Mark]

9 minutes ago, severnsider said:

On the coverage it said Zagar was fastest in practice. As he scored poorly shows big difference between racing and speed

As for motogp most are pretty boring. Assen was good though 

Quickest in practise but he didn't have gate choice.      Woud agree conditions could be completely different on race day.

[bruno]

4 hours ago, Mark said:

Its in the Star so its no rumour.     But plenty of water to go under a bridge before its formally brought in.     Assen passed me by as all motor GP's do. 

Watch this one, fantastic race

[f-s-p]

I could allow the fastest in practise to choose his riding number,  but not each gate. Sounds daft.

EDIT: also the fastest of friday rarely is the fastest come saturday night.

Edited July 6, 2018 by f-s-p

[diamond@heart]

Could they not use this to determine the draw order for the meeting, adds a bit of spice to practice, but then I suppose even that will lead to some form of manipulation.  They could make fastest rider in practice is award an additional GP point, worth potentially 10 points over the season!!

 

[steve69]

Transponders were used at Heerenveen for the last round of the FIM Ice Gladiators series. As each rider finished a lap their times came up on the scoreboard. This is interesting when 2 riders were recorded with the same time at the finish of one race. I think It was recorded to 1000th of a second.

But I have been saying for a long time that practice should mean something!!. Either give a GP point to the fastest rider or allow the fastest rider to choose the riding number for the meeting.

They do a bahnrekord for the Longtracks. Or they used to.

 

[Humphrey Appleby]

Astonishing that speedway is years behind even the most grassroots of motorsports in using transponders. Ridiculous that it's still relying on starting gates, stopwatch and someone watching the finish line (who's not even always in line) to judge false starts and finishing positions.

However, speedway is not a speed trial and times shouldn't be used to decide starting positions. There's a perfectly acceptable formula for deciding gate positions, and whilst I suppose times could be used to decide riding positions, it's not very practical in terms of terms of publishing the race programme in advance.

[diamond@heart]

23 minutes ago, Humphrey Appleby said:

Astonishing that speedway is years behind even the most grassroots of motorsports in using transponders. Ridiculous that it's still relying on starting gates, stopwatch and someone watching the finish line (who's not even always in line) to judge false starts and finishing positions.

However, speedway is not a speed trial and times shouldn't be used to decide starting positions. There's a perfectly acceptable formula for deciding gate positions, and whilst I suppose times could be used to decide riding positions, it's not very practical in terms of terms of publishing the race programme in advance.

But Grand Prix programme/race cards are usually blank and you have to fill them in based on the draw which takes place after the programme is printed, so don't see an issue.

I think it is about time we moved into the modern era and embrace technology and use transponders and other technological advancements, potentially doing away with taped starts, must be a more efficient system by now!!

Hang on speedway and efficiency.  

[IainB]

It's good to see Speedway being LGBTQ friendly 

[Ghostwalker]

Transponders is in my opinion a complement to tapes and a replacement. It should be used to detect if a rider moves to early, and also possibly to determine dead heats.

[Mark]

1 hour ago, Ghostwalker said:

Transponders is in my opinion a complement to tapes and a replacement. It should be used to detect if a rider moves to early, and also possibly to determine dead heats.

good idea.         I also like the idea of a rider picking his riding number.      Maybe reverse order fastest to slowest get a choice.     Doubt that it's much advantage bar not having number 1 when you ride all heats after watering.

[kraftwerk]

On 7/5/2018 at 6:09 PM, Mark said:

BSI and FIM trialed transponders on the bikes at Horsens last weekend.   The article I read said authoroties may decide to allow riders to pick the best gates at the GP based on the fastest practise times from Friday.   This is going down the Motor GP route.  How boring is that sport.     What is the gain for spectators in giving the fastest bike the best gate in the heats.   We want close racing not follow the leader. 

 

share the article please.

[OveFundinFan]

Fastest in practice picks his gates - rubbish, at the best he picks his race number.

Fastest in practice gets rewarded somehow - nah. Some riders chose not to do practice, as race days can be so different to practice day. 

I recall the 1976 world final in Katowice.... Peter Collins won.  He said he did practice but didn't use the whole power of his bike, nor show his true pace.... he saved it all for race day, didn't want his opponents to see what he had till they were eating his dirt.

[Mark]

3 hours ago, kraftwerk said:

share the article please.

went in the bin ages ago sorry

Edited September 3, 2018 by Mark

[PHILIPRISING]

2 hours ago, kraftwerk said:

share the article please.

TRANSPONDERS are being introduced along with photo finishes but unsure whether they will be involved in picking riding numbers

[teaboy279]

I think transponders are a big step forward, I like stats and track records etc so to have transponders would give the numbers a lot more credence, rather then someone sat in the box with a stopwatch. 

I don't think you can take away tapes at the start of a speedway race, it's all part of it. But there is nothing to stop transponders being used to detect jump starts etc.

I like the idea of seeing people's times in practice, but let's not forget it Is exactly that. It's for riders to get a feel for things it's not a competition and should have no bearing on the following days gp at all. That's not to say you couldn't give a watch, or a trophy or a small token to the fastest lap time in practice. 

The biggest thing with transponders is, it should irradicate riders making the perfect start getting pulled back needlessly.

Edited September 6, 2018 by teaboy279

[IronScorpion]

Last night the announcer/timekeeper at Belle Vue gave a time of 61.02 for heat 8 then immediately apologised if we had filled in our programmes as it was wrong. He then gave a time of 62.69. Where 61.02 came from I have no idea as wasn't a time of a previous race. Do they just make them up?

Edited September 6, 2018 by IronScorpion