Notes for New Racers

The great thing about our club is that we're always ready to help each other out or answer a new racer's questions, but sometimes the first thing is knowing what questions to ask.  Something that N.A.S.C.A.R. has historically lacked is a crash course (pardon the pun) for new racers, to shorten their learning curve when they join us at the track. Hopefully this page can develop into something that can fill that particular void. If you have any pointers that would be helpful for a new racer, please submit such to the Webmaster in the Contacts page.

Radios Off In The Pits
The only time your transmitter should be on is when you're actually on the drivers' stand driving your car on the track. Forgetting does happen sometimes, but it not only costs you battery time it can also cost someone else a good qualifier, main race performance, or even expensive car parts. So try to keep an eye on your tranmitter just to be sure. While you're at it, politely keeping an eye out in the pits for transmitters errantly left on wouldn't hurt either.
Also, you shouldn't be driving your car outside of the prescribed qualifying heats, main races, or designated practice times.

Transponders
Returning: If you're making use of a rental transponder, please be sure to return it to its spot in the charge cradle when you're done your qualifier or main race, so that if another racer has to use it, they don't have to hunt you down with extreme prejudice. Also, make sure you don't go home with one - that might even be worse.
Mounting: Make sure you have a safe and secure mounting system on your car. This is primariliy to keep the transponder safe from impacts, but also to be sure that it doesn't come loose during a race and cost you your best qualifier of the event. In the case of Touring Cars, we prefer that our rental transponders be mounted in your car's front windshield - it's safe there, and it or its absence can be spotted at a glance.
Carrying: Don't drop the transponder. If you retrieve one for another racer, don't toss it to them. They contain sensitive electronics, and are pretty darned expensive to replace when they fail. So handle them accordingly.

Drivers' Stand
Don't cross in front of the drivers' stand when a qualifier or main race is running - you run the risk of interfering with someone's line of sight and getting yelled at.

Slow Is Fast
This is the least-often believed bit of racing advice, yet absolutely the most truthful. Corners on an r/c race track come up very quickly, and the quickest way around them is to slow down so you can turn your car through them, instead of flying past and bouncing off the boards, or worse yet a competitor's car. By slowing down, you'll learn more quickly how to control your car on a racetrack, and your laptimes will shorten that much sooner. Besides that, you'll likely break your car less often too.
Trust us, we've been there, we know of what we speak.

Copyright (C) 2002 N.A.S.C.A.R.