Yes, file a proper protest so we can take a closer look at it. We certainly do not see all instances of contact so many may be slipping past.

I do track this. Many drivers are on me "Watch List" and are watched closely by all stewards. Others may not be watched as closely because of lack of protests, and because of this things may slip through easier with their mistakes.

Post-race penalties are not announced publicly, but they happen. If you look at the results of a race a few days later you may see some changes from time to time. Still, I try to "coach" before penalizing so you may not always see an out-right penalty.

Certainly file the protest so we can look at them. It is the responsibility of the car attempting the pass, so yes they may need a little help to correct the poor driving.

For the most part, contact in our races are due simply to someone stepping over the limits of his own skill-set. They are called "accidents" and will happen no matter what. Some people do seem to have larger targets on their cars then others.

Yes Rob, a difficult subject indeed, contact. I have repeatedly stated how happy I am with the Lap 1 punt rule, it has helped enormously. Besides that blessed rule however, it is an extremely difficult thing to police-- in sim racing as in real life racing. In some series of real life, even the most innocent of contacts (especially from behind) earns you a drive through or a stop-go. Most of the incidents that happen in our beatiful world of r2p sim racing, go unpunished. But we also have to be realistic: most real life racing events, have several corner marshals at each corner, plus at least a couple of other officials, plus the Grand Pooba Grand Marshal whose wrath all drivers try to avoid. As far as I know, most r2p events are marshaled by one steward or maybe two, who has to keep an eye on every corner and every event and every driver. We have a tool (the protest method) that allows us to lodge a complaint to our Grand Pooba, and since our Grand Pooba has replays he can review our voice will always be heard. True, by then a race might be ruined but that's really life and racing. Rather than a contact-rank if you will, if a driver is a menace several events in a row, often causes contact, is darting left and right as if he's got cayenne pepper in his underwear, *and other drivers protest to the authority* then the driver should be punished after a proper review. Period. There I agree completely with you that a driver should not show up at a race track for an event and cringe when he sees Mr X entering the server, because he knows Mr X-- though fast-- has an infallible attraction to contact. You are right, as a paying driver I do not want some sod to repeatedly send me in the sand dunes unpunished. I have a method however, and that's to protest. Personally, every time I see Tim McArthur's name popping in the server I think my money is well spent (that's the second time I am kissing his Majesty's California behind today...) Seriously, I know the steward will do his best and then I even have recourse. I don't agree with you that if you protest you will get placed under the microscope, perhaps I don't understand. I do agree with you though that penalties issued after the race are rare and publicized little (I can think of only one related to on track stuff) and this unfortunately does not help. Mr X should be told that either he cools down or he goes on probation. And then, well, sorry. I just have an issue with ranking contacts and giving contact points if you will, because it is extremely difficult to police. Which brings me to my initial point.
[Edit: I submitted while Tim submitted his. I agree completely with everything he said-- there I had to get a third time in!] ;-)

I understand that it would require more than one or two stewards monitoring an event -- which means you gotta hire someone to do that, which means increasing fees, etc.

I wouldn't mind a fee increase to accomplish this (hire another helping hand to go thru the contact at each event), but I also understand that might reduce (or it might increase) the turn out -- it's double edge sword in terms of membership.

But I also realize that a replay can't establish the degree of contact -- as in how hard one is hit -- partly due to limitation of the physics and issues around latency and network play.

I also realize that most of the contact (not all) is NOT intentional, it's just a mistake. However, without any type of penalty (other than protesting) for contact, it usually means after lap 1, the gloves go off. I don't want folks to leave the series either espeically considering most of the fast folks are fun to have a battle with, but these same folks I can't race with because it'll almost always results in contact.

But I think what I'm trying to get at, even if a penalty is issued after a protest, that doesn't really do much for the driver that got punted and doesn't have any long term affect on the driver who did the punting. I guess I trying to discover a way on how to get the drivers thinking about what their contact could do to their ability to participate in future races -- now that might just be enough of an incentive to deter the contact.

You could also have races where there is no max contact restriction so that the folks that have a higher level of contact will be racing with other folks that have a higher level of contact. Contact will never be eliminated, but I do feel as it stands now, something needs to happen to reduce it beyond the 1st lap rule.

You could also use the Contact counter as a means to reduce a driver's rank and certainly have the value displayed for all to see. Example would be that Driver X won the race but had 3 contact incidents so his rank ends up actually be lower than if driver X finished 5th with no contact. I think this will not only make drivers think about contact, it would turn "NO contact" into a goal rather than I hope I don't get caught or protested.

Yes I will protest, but again I don't want to see these drivers leave either because for the most part they're great drivers. But everyone, myself included needs to seriously think about contact.

Again, contact to me is rear/rear quarter under normal driving -- anyway I'm sure you folks know what is and isn't normal driving and rubbin' vs. contact.

Rob, the only thing you can do is get faster so no one can catch you to hit you, or pay serious attention to who is around you when your racing. There are very few people here at r2p I feel comfortable racing around, most of the time if someone is around me I don't trust I'm either letting them by and waiting until they screw up or doing everything possible to make sure they have room to make a mistake without taking me out. I'm sure people have noticed when they are right up on me entering a cornering I usually move to the middle lane. I'm not doing this to block, I'm giving them room to brake too late and go past on the outside...

You are a smart man Jimmy. I do the same.

We have to also take into considerations that 1) Very, very few of us are professional race car drivers, 2) We are racing in a 2D world no matter how 3D the sim is, there still is minimal depth perception, and 3) Internet latency of even 150ms could equal a couple car lengths of reaction time lost. A gap between cars is needed even with sub-100 pings.

In the 10+ years I have been racing online in the numerous different leagues and organizations, I have never seen a system that has eliminated even a single instance of contact. Some places have very strict and harsh rules (DQ'd if you even touch someone) and guess what happens? You just have a bunch of DQ'd cars... the contacts still happened. You can go as far as to send thugs to the person house to lay down some hurt and all we would end up with is a lot of bruises, not less wrecks.

Rules have never prevented accidents. Even in real world motor sports. You simply can not regulate a person out of making simple, honest mistakes. They are not making those mistakes by choice. Motor sports, by nature, is a contest competed in the thousandths of a second. We, as the drivers, are making multiple decisions and having to react to them faster then we blink our eyes. If you miss the proper reaction by a few thousandths of a second, contact ensues. I have said this before and Im not sure how many people understand it; You have to drive a few seconds into the future. If you are driving in the "now", you are guaranteed to cause accidents. If you are not seeing what is going to happen 3-5 seconds ahead of time, you are guaranteed to get involved in someone else's accident.

Accidents in sim-racing, as well as real-racing, is just part of what we do. Surely there are some that you just say, "DUH! What were you thinking??!?!!", and those are the ones I take head on. The other 90% are just accidents and nothing will ever change that.

I used to agree with what you've said Jimmy. And in the majority of the series here that is the case. The exception being the 'extreme' series. In that case, a small handful of the faster/more consistent drivers are slowed to the point where they're going to be dealing with some drivers that are a little more prone to mistakes. This isn't a problem if you can pull away from potential trouble, the problem is it's very difficult due to horsepower differences. You can get by in the turns but are easily passed on the straights only to have to deal with the same drivers again and again. This gives the penalized drivers the feeling that they have that infamous target on their cars.

I agree with part of what Tim says - but what I'm suggesting is not a rule to DQ but a rule to instill the drive to win with as little contact as possible -- remember I'm only suggesting rear and rear quarter contact (aka the punt).

Keeping contact counter gives those drivers an opportunity to enter an event that suits the agression level.

I disagree with Jimmy, I've lead a few races and won a few and being fastest does NOT ensure any less likelihood of contact. In this particular (one of many) instances I was hammered by a GT driver in qual on my hot lap and the damage prevented a good ngt qual position. Working thru that contact issue I moved into the race and had made a clean pass as drive x had run wide (aka waiting for my opportunity) and a lap later it was most likely red mist that caused the contact and my punt.

But the story is more or less the same from race to race. Why I decided to bring this up, is that it seems to be happening way to frequently and I'm not talking to just me. Sure accidents happen - but are you folks suggesting drivers can't regulate this and hence is futile?

What I'm suggesting with the contact counter is not to prevent racing it's just another filtering/classification number that can be used by everyone - I'm not trying to eliminate anyone NOR have a long list of DQs.

But I can assure you that contact can be reduced with the right incentives - I know when I do and online public server race I'm way more aggressive (and hence more contact) than an R2P race - so something is registering in my brain.

Hey, Im open to any ideas you may have even if it causes only one less contact per week. I'm willing to listen at least, but implementing and enforcing something is very different.