The club just needs to get with the times and go electronic. Supply all of the regions with a Microsoft surfaces (or something similar) and log everything in there of every driver. Instances with contact, and add all driver statements, corner worker statements, etc. That way, the next weekend...when the same idiot goes and stacks some else up, the stewards already know this guy is a problem. Adopting the NASA rule where all drivers with contact are impounded is SO easy to implement. Literally just send an email to the chiefs to do it...its that simple. You cant expect the stewards to know what happened in prior weekends at different tracks of the country so they probably handle all of these situations as the driver's first times. Stewards can look at their fancy MS Surfaces and be like, "Hey corner workers, keep a close eye on that Jim Drago #2 car. He has been stackin shit up a lot lately." And its that simple, just pull the trigger.
Yeah yeah ... there are points on licenses... but if they treat them like its their first incident every time...they wont have any. And don't tell me the club doesn't have money to do it, cause that is BS too. Maybe not all of the regions have $$ to throw around ... but the club as a whole has plenty for a NFP. Hell, maybe adopt it at the majors/Super tour first. So that way they only have to buy a few iPads/Surfaces and it just travels with majors staff to new tracks.
This concept (incident tracking across events) has been tried a number of times. The generic name is 'Red Book'. It invariably founders, for one or more of the following reasons:
1. The person(s) pushing the implementation (usually the Executive Steward or the Chairman of the Stewards Program) cycles out after their term of office, and the new person has no interest in pursuing the initiative.
2. Resistance from event officials (i.e. older/old-line stewards), who simply chose not to participate. There is (presently) no real sanction against this sort of behavior (see also: Florida).
3. The sheer volume of incidents at larger/more ‘eventful’ events overwhelms the process. (Operating stewards are often on a very tight operating schedule.)
4. Lack of consistency across events/stewards. One steward’s ‘contact’ is another steward’s ‘racing incident’.
5. There are real questions of fairness, and of concern about painting targets on individuals.
It is not so much a technology problem as it is an organizational problem. This lack of consistency and paper trail across events is an artifact of Club Racing’s history, culture, and lack of a real and consistent central authority.
I am not trying to rain on anyone’s parade. I think that this would be an excellent idea. It has worked for limited spans of time and under local conditions. We do this informally at Summit Point (i.e. track particular actors). The problem is that incidents elsewhere are invisible to us.
This is an excellent concept. There are really significant implementation challenges.