Pirelli World Challenge GT Round 20: Laguna Seca

[jjvincent]

Here's what I don't get. When I watch on my laptop, I can watch the race live. If I'm at something like a soccer game and want to watch the race on my iPhone live, I can't (unless I start paying $5/month to do so).

PWC is completely to blame for what happened on the last lap. The last race of the year with championship implications and you throw the green with one lap to go. What do you expect to happen? Everyone to get in single file for the last lap, be complete gentlemen and not push the issue? This is the kind of stuff NASCAR used to do.

I would have told the teams before the race that it just might go an extra 10 minutes if this situation happens. So, make sure you have enough fuel to make it to the end (which everyone can because the 25 minutes of yellow that happened anyway). If you look at the schedule, there were 20 minutes of VIP rides that could have been canceled or just cut to 10 minutes instead. Plus, for the few cars that had to run the Sprint-X race, 10 minutes less prep is not going to mean anything in reality.

[carbsmith]

Originally Posted by Mechanic Z

Johnny O has been penalized 2.1 seconds, or basically moved to just behind Long.
http://files.world-challenge.com/eve...-GTC_FINAL.pdf

Is it's PWC's directive to be as bush league as possible?

First off, just before the braking zone Long is not that far ahead. The Cadillac's nose is still around the Porsche's A-pillar to door. So at this point we've established O'Connell didn't come from completely nowhere or anything, although it might be a bit further than would be etiquette.


Long starts braking.


O'Connell starts braking an instant later. This will become more blatant in a moment but Long has already turned left even though they're nowhere near the corner yet.


Verstappen mid-braking defense mode engaged, O'Connell is being forced to pinch his line which will make it hard to make the apex.


Long thinks about "standing it up" for a moment because of the Cadillac's aggressive braking point then decides he's not going to give up the apex and turns in anyways. At this point O'Connell has no escape option.


Very much a "you can't have one but not the other" kind of deal to me, penalties are whatever depending on the kind of racing the series wants, but specifically putting O'Connell behind Long like the latter was completely innocent is ridiculous, that's more insulting than if he got something like 15 seconds.

Just for reference where the two guys behind them were on the track at that braking board.

[Coach Ep]

Yes, Long should have/could have let O'Connell back by (Johnny had just put 2 wheels in the dirt on the previous turn to let Long having a go at him for the lead) knowing who he was up against and what was at stake but I suspect he was cautious about giving up too much time and/or compromising his exit too much in/outta T5 to prevent Parente having a run on him going up the hill all the way towards the Corkscrew potentially resulting in a championship deciding move there. When he realized what was going on, it was too late...

Of course the series isn't to blame for this, it's classic racing behavior when the stakes gets high. It's as old as racing itself and it won't be the last time. 2 pro drivers going for the same spot with everything/the final victory of the year on the line, wasn't it always gonna end in tears?

[nasportscar]

Originally Posted by jjvincent

Here's what I don't get. When I watch on my laptop, I can watch the race live. If I'm at something like a soccer game and want to watch the race on my iPhone live, I can't (unless I start paying $5/month to do so).

Maybe it's different on iPhone, but can't you still watch at world-challenge.com and use their streaming site? That's what I've done multiple times this season when I'm away from home.

[Ephaeton]

Originally Posted by nasportscar

Maybe it's different on iPhone, but can't you still watch at world-challenge.com and use their streaming site? That's what I've done multiple times this season when I'm away from home.

I understood his point being that for other sports, you have to pay to watch it live and get it for free after the fact, whereas for PWC, it's the other way around. Other series (Blancpain, ADAC GT Masters, ELMS, ...) follow a model of "free live, free afterwards", which is what one ought to do, IMHO, to broaden the audience.

[jjvincent]

Originally Posted by Ephaeton

I understood his point being that for other sports, you have to pay to watch it live and get it for free after the fact, whereas for PWC, it's the other way around. Other series (Blancpain, ADAC GT Masters, ELMS, ...) follow a model of "free live, free afterwards", which is what one ought to do, IMHO, to broaden the audience.

It is odd the way PWC does it but up until this race, I was able to watch it on my iPhone. Now it just sends me to the Motor Trend no matter what. Does the same on the iPad too. Plus, on the computer, it now does not do like it did before (the page is different than before) but you can still watch it for free. Someone changed something somewhere because it's not what it used to be.

Point being, if I can't figure it out, I doubt any casual fan just tuning in for the afternoon can either. There's probably some trick to it but that's not really something most people will muster through. Maybe PWC is going only to pay no matter what. If that's the case, I don't see that helping at all. It's bad enough for what IMSA does (at least everything but the WT series is live everywhere for free).

One other thing I noticed is that for one of the races, they stopped partway through the race and played a few ads.

I still don't understand why they just don't skip the TV broadcast and do a live stream for free with ads and then have it available for watching right afterwards (with ads). Using CBS Sports Network for a week late program is pretty much useless. Same thing like IMSA does when they show something a week late on Fox Sports Whatever.

Here's something else that makes no sense. I tested out whether I could stream a live IMSA race on my phone while I was standing on a glacier in Iceland. That seems to work perfectly fine and came right up. You'd think being on an island in the North Atlantic standing on a glacier would be "That ain't happening" type of situation.

[Ephaeton]

Oh. I now remember not being able to watch a PWC live somewhen during the season from one sample of my (computer, operating system, browser) array. I could watch the season finale GTS & GT races on my ARMv7/linux/chromium box though.

As to the final line, jjvincent, geoblocking simply is braindead and I can only assume it's related to bad negotiations on IMSA's behalf with a TV broadcaster who wants "exclusivity" on "their" soil (even though one must assume there can always be a non-regional hop on your internet route, no matter how many CDNs and what-not you add, i.e., no matter how much you as a content provider try to get "your" server as geographically close as possible to your customer, there's a multitude of reasons why that doesn't always work and/or doesn't always put "your" server into the same set of borders as "your customers" are, "you" being IMSA in this case)

[Rcz]

I just want to watch the PWC and not some clip show with Greg Crammer shouting "THIS IS THE GREATEST THING EVAR".

I have things to do, like work and therefore can't watch it live at most times. So put it on YouTube already.

[gert]

Originally Posted by Mechanic Z

Here you go:
http://sportscar365.com/gt/world-cha...-lap-incident/

Some hurt feelings after this one.

Classless act, Mr Johnny O., if that's really what he said.

[gert]

Originally Posted by carbsmith

Is it's PWC's directive to be as bush league as possible?

First off, just before the braking zone Long is not that far ahead. The Cadillac's nose is still around the Porsche's A-pillar to door. So at this point we've established O'Connell didn't come from completely nowhere or anything, although it might be a bit further than would be etiquette.
...
Verstappen mid-braking defense mode engaged, O'Connell is being forced to pinch his line which will make it hard to make the apex.

etc...

Long was overtaking O'Connell, not defending a position, so all references to Verstappen-esque moves are pointless.

--

The Cadillac's nose is still around the Porsche's A-pillar to door. So at this point we've established Long has moved in front of OConnell.

[schmidder]

I would agree that long pinched him a bit, but he had moved in front of johnny. Not suprised really at the gm guys doing this kind of thing. Saw it years ago when they were battling audi in wc..brought an extra car for the weekend to try and take pts and it ended up taking out one of the audi drivers in the second corner....rs6s if I recall.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using Tapatalk

[DeezPutz]

Originally Posted by nasportscar

Maybe it's different on iPhone, but can't you still watch at world-challenge.com and use their streaming site? That's what I've done multiple times this season when I'm away from home.

Yes, it works just fine on all iOS devices. He's being difficult or purposely obtuse.

[carbsmith]

Originally Posted by gert

Long was overtaking O'Connell, not defending a position, so all references to Verstappen-esque moves are pointless.

--

The Cadillac's nose is still around the Porsche's A-pillar to door. So at this point we've established Long has moved in front of OConnell.

If he's ahead at the end of the straight then he's in a position to defend. Is this a gentleman's race where you're going to penalize anyone for not giving up the corner if they aren't door to door or a full attack sprint series? That's up to the SCCA to decide. But if it's the former then trying to crowd people off the road isn't reasonable either.

Then you have the official reasoning for the avoidable contact penalty, which has literally zero grounding in reality

"The stewards looked at various angles of the incident and determined that Johnny had two wheels off the track and came back onto the track, making contact with Patrick.

He dropped two wheels onto the curb when the car snapped sideways from the contact, he was nowhere even close to being off track before it. How did they come to that conclusion after several hours of review?

For what it's worth if Long had ducked in and bumpered O'Connell on exit in response I wouldn't even have a problem with it, I just think he bet his season on a very risky defensive move and paid the expected price. The blame shouldn't be laid 100% on someone else for it and the penalty definitely shouldn't be completely nonsensical. By doing things this way they've given GM and Johnny legitimate reason to be mad because they've been given an overly specific penalty for something that never happened.

[Matt]

Originally Posted by carbsmith

If he's ahead at the end of the straight then he's in a position to defend. Is this a gentleman's race where you're going to penalize anyone for not giving up the corner if they aren't door to door or a full attack sprint series? That's up to the SCCA to decide. But if it's the former then trying to crowd people off the road isn't reasonable either.

Then you have the official reasoning for the avoidable contact penalty, which has literally zero grounding in reality

He dropped two wheels onto the curb when the car snapped sideways from the contact, he was nowhere even close to being off track before it. How did they come to that conclusion after several hours of review?

For what it's worth if Long had ducked in and bumpered O'Connell on exit in response I wouldn't even have a problem with it, I just think he bet his season on a very risky defensive move and paid the expected price. The blame shouldn't be laid 100% on someone else for it and the penalty definitely shouldn't be completely nonsensical. By doing things this way they've given GM and Johnny legitimate reason to be mad because they've been given an overly specific penalty for something that never happened.

this

[nasportscar]

I don't blame either driver for how they raced in that situation. If Long slows, Alvaro either gets around him or is on his back bumper. He goes to the outside he could have gotten hit or had it pay off. Obviously it didn't. I don't think there's many drivers out there that wouldn't go for that exact same move. I also don't really blame Johnny for ceding the position just because he went wide at T4. I can't think of many drivers that just give up that position there.

[Matt]

Seriously, it's the last race of the year and Johnny wants to win it. It's not like they were racing for 13th. Who cares if the guy you're racing is contending for the championship, that shouldn't mean you treat them like a special snowflake.

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by Matt

Seriously, it's the last race of the year and Johnny wants to win it. It's not like they were racing for 13th. Who cares if the guy you're racing is contending for the championship, that shouldn't mean you treat them like a special snowflake.

This is completely correct, IMO. It's a race. If it was just meant to be the title contenders then why did everyone else bother turning up?

Although I do think the move was quite poor. The corner was lost and he dived in knowing he'd make contact or lose the position. Pointless move.

[Matt]

Pat turned down into him when Johnny was at his A-pillar way early. I'd have done the same thing in his position. It's like Senna/Prost in '89? He knew there'd be contact and hoped Johnny would back off.

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by Matt

Pat turned down into him when Johnny was at his A-pillar way early. I'd have done the same thing in his position. It's like Senna/Prost in '89? He knew there'd be contact and hoped Johnny would back off.

Hmmm, not sure I understand the analogy.

In 1989, Senna kept his foot down and drove into the side of Prost, knowing the resulting accident would win him the title.

Using that analogy, Johnny kept his foot in and deliberately caused an accident? If so, that means the penalty is justified? Sorry.I'm not following (that's not sarcasm - I know we're used to it on this board recently, but I'm not being difficult, just not following what you mean).

IMO, the corner was lost for Johnny. He dived in knowing he didn't have the momentum and was behind the Porsche now. But I also think it was a bit of an overreaction on this forum. I didn't see it live, but from the posts here I pictured much worse. I imagined some Jason Plato BTCC type pushing.

[Matt]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

Hmmm, not sure I understand the analogy.

In 1989, Senna kept his foot down and drove into the side of Prost, knowing the resulting accident would win him the title.

Using that analogy, Johnny kept his foot in and deliberately caused an accident? If so, that means the penalty is justified? Sorry.I'm not following (that's not sarcasm - I know we're used to it on this board recently, but I'm not being difficult, just not following what you mean).

IMO, the corner was lost for Johnny. He dived in knowing he didn't have the momentum and was behind the Porsche now. But I also think it was a bit of an overreaction on this forum. I didn't see it live, but from the posts here I pictured much worse. I imagined some Jason Plato BTCC type pushing.

That was 1990.

'89 was the incident at the chicane where Prost turned down crazy early knowing they'd collide.

[Akrapovic]

You're right. I had that in my head as 88. Might explain why I didn't understand the analogy lol. I see what you're saying. I guess the reason I see it the other way is because I see 89 as Prost turned in to cause the accident so he'd win the title. Long was different as he was taking the position rather than defending.

I see what you're saying though. Its a fair point.

[jjvincent]

Originally Posted by DeezPutz

Yes, it works just fine on all iOS devices. He's being difficult or purposely obtuse.

I'm more of an acute type of guy.

Also, it does not wok on all iOS devices because I have two that it doesn't. So, the correct statement would be, "Yes, it works just fine on all iOS devices minus two."

[WolfsburgRS]

Originally Posted by jjvincent

I'm more of an acute type of guy.

Also, it does not wok on all iOS devices because I have two that it doesn't. So, the correct statement would be, "Yes, it works just fine on all iOS devices minus two."

Are you my high school geometry teacher? He made that joke allllll the time.


I didn't start looking for footage of the incident until today. After watching it on youtube, overall it looks like a pretty low percentage move by Johnny O, but last lap / last race / all that stuff it's not exactly surprising. It was actually less contact than I was expecting based on what I had read on Twitter and such.

It's racing, stuff happens. I'd much rather have it not happen but we're talking about fully committed career racing drivers who get paid to win, to take chances here and there, not sit back and let the other guy go first.

[jjvincent]

Again, having a one lap shootout at the end of the season on the last race with guys going after points, what do you expect? Then when a small amount of aggression or blocking results in a penalty. It's like poking a dog over and over until it bites. Then you punish it.

I think it's easy to sit back and go off on a driver in a situation like that but they have way more at stake plus they are manhandling a car at the limit that only a few on the planet can do. I would have just let them go because the situation was set up for something to go wrong anyway. Punishing someone for that is just not right.

[Mechanic Z]

CBS Sports Broadcast of the Laguna Seca race starts in half an hour, for those with Cable or Satellite.

K-PAX Racing ‏@KPAXracing 25m25 minutes ago One hour to go until you can catch the championship winning race!


World Challenge ‏@WCRacing 1h1 hour ago

What are you doing today?