11/08/2008 16:23:44 adrian I am wondering what view do the committee members have on sessioned track days verses open pit lane track days? Silverstone on 8/8/8 was my first ever sessioned, and to be honest I much preferred my previous experiences of open pit. Sadly I cant find any MGOT events that are open pit.

11/08/2008 18:05:40 Stu We rarely do open pit Adrian as we prefer to try to group the cars/drivers in sessions according to the cars power and the drivers ability. This means newbies and novices can take part without feeling intimidated and can gain experience and eventually move into a more experienced group as and when they feel comfortable. Evenings are slightly different as when we are sharing an evening we often only have one session...In these situations we will state if the evening is suitable for beginners or not.. Stu

12/08/2008 09:15:59 Dave Hi Adrian, A good question. Open Pit Lane can appear to offer much more track time. Though our sessioned days offer 2+ hours a day which, to be honest, is enough to exhaust me on a day and enough for most ordinary MGs. I guess the real benefit is the flexibility for those people who prefer not to be 'regimented' into sessions. The thing is, that we are a single-marque, club-based track day organiser and have very different priorities to commercial track day organisers. Stu has given you a key factor which is the ability to session by experience to improve safety. We encourage first timers and try to make their day as safe and confidence boosting as possible. Putting them on track with some of our older hands who can lap so much faster isn't the best way of doing that. Similarly, experienced drivers welcome not having to negotiate too many slower cars in their session. Dedicated sessions are also the simplest way of sharing days with other clubs. This is something we have to do quite a lot, since there are just not enough MGs wanting to do track days to make it viable for us to run events at some circuits. Croft this weekend is a great example. Shared by three clubs, with just 15 cars each. It was a struggle for all clubs to fill these 15 places. The Midget & Sprites (for example) would not want to share track time even with some of the other MGs (we have an SV booked in for example). They only do this event because the entire session is just Spridgets. Silverstone evening last Friday was another example. The Lotus boys would not want to have shared track time with the MGs - they inevitably see the older MGs as mobile chicanes! Another factor is cost. Open Pit lane events require a careful balance between the number of cars allowed on track at any one time and the total number of cars at the event. Get this wrong and serious queues develop causing frustration. We always like to run with a smaller number of cars on track at once than commercial days - again to make it safer by reducing traffic problems. Our event in December at Brands Indy is a good example of how we could never get the same low pricing with Open Pit. We only ever run between 18 and 20 cars at Brands Indy. In the winter months it's 18. On Dec 8th we have an entire day to MGoT - a total of 54 cars. If we ran Open Pit and only allowed 18 on track at once we'd have queues. If we allowed more cars on track at once we'd compromise safety. If we reduced the number of cars in total to say 36, we'd have to charge something like £150 pre car rather than the £99 per car that we are charging. So, with our objective being to run safe, fun track days for everyday MGs at the lowest possible price, you can see that sessioned days make a lot of sense. That's not to say we won't ever run Open Pit Lane events, but just that for most circumstances sessions will be more appropriate. By the way, I should add that Silverstone on 8/8/08 was most unrepresentative of MGoT sessioned events. First, it was an evening, so track time is always going to be limited - though £89 for an hour on Silverstone GP in summer has to be worth doing! We'd never have afforded a whole day at their summer rates. We were also severely compromised by having to use the Stowe apron that evening. Normally we have full access to pit lane garages etc. I think you'd find a normal MGoT sessioned day more relaxing! But, I'm pre-judging your concerns - you haven't actually said what you think works better with Open Pit. I'd be interested in your comments. Feel free to email me directly if you wish - [EMAIL="dave@mgs-on-track.com"]dave@mgs-on-track.com[/EMAIL] Regards, Dave

13/08/2008 12:46:44 adrian [FONT=Calibri][SIZE=3]Obviously both methods have pros and cons.[/SIZE][/FONT] [FONT=Calibri][SIZE=3]The important thing is that clearly the committee has given this matter a great deal of consideration, and therefore I’m confident that it has already drawn the best conclusion.[/SIZE][/FONT] [FONT=Calibri][SIZE=3]I[/SIZE][/FONT][FONT=Calibri][SIZE=3] very much enjoyed 8/8/8. Thanks to the kind efforts of MGOT, I had the pleasure of over an hour around Silverstone GP at a very reasonable price, and met some really nice MGOT members. I’m looking forward to my next MGOT day.[/SIZE][/FONT] [FONT=Calibri][SIZE=3]My first ever track day was an open pit at brands. The paddock was absolutely packed with serious race cars. Apart from my MGF, the next slowest (and cheapest) car was probably a lotus exige! Being overtaken constantly didn’t bother me in the slightest. I enjoyed the freedom to go on track whenever I fancied, for just a couple of laps, or as a passenger in another car. During other open pit days I have even swapped cars with others for a few laps. I pitted frequently to cool my car, check it over, talk to others, and think about how to improve. Overall, I actually spent less time on track than if it was a sessioned day, but I was in control of exactly the amount I wanted.[/SIZE][/FONT] [FONT=Calibri][SIZE=3]At Silverstone 8/8/8, I was constantly aware that if I wasted any track time in an allocated session, I would not get more later. It felt like I had paid for each minute, so I should use the whole lot! This meant that after 10 mins of the 1st session, I wanted to pit and ask someone about a particular corner, but instead I felt obliged to stay out. Moments before the 2nd session I was told I might have a fluid leak, I had a quick look, but felt obliged to get out on track without the time to properly check it. Before the 3rd session, I really wanted to top up my fuel, but didn’t think I would get back in time, so I braved it out instead. After 15 mins of each session I wanted to pit to cool the engine and brakes, but stayed out the full 20 mins anyway. Similarly, I would have preferred to wait for the engine to cool a bit longer, but instead I went on track promptly with the next session.[/SIZE][/FONT] [FONT=Calibri][SIZE=3]Perhaps a restaurant buffet is a useful analogy. Customers feel they had good value for money because there is no limit on the amount of food, but any owner will confirm that surprisingly, on average the customers actually eat the same or less than ‘a la carte’. [/SIZE][/FONT]

13/08/2008 14:58:57 Steve Hill Adrian Thank you for your well considered reply. Just to give you a little more information re our normal operation. We usually run 3x20 min sessions per hour (4x15 min at Castle Combe because of their restrictions), so you would therefore have more rest/cool down time between sessions, 20 min on and 40 min off. At Silverstone last week because of the limited available time and because we were sharing with another club we chose to maximise the available track time and simply run with rotating 20 minute sessions. You are quite right that this does not give you much time to rest/cool down but it does give everyone the chance to enjoy the full GP Circuit for the most available time. We really appreciate your remarks and will keep them in mind as we plan our programme for 2009. Kind regards Steve Hill Secretary MGoT

05/10/2008 15:30:48 adrian [I]"We usually run 3x20 min sessions per hour (4x15 min at Castle Combe because of their restrictions), so you would therefore have more rest/cool down time between sessions, 20 min on and 40 min off."[/I] Many thanks for a really enjoyable day at Donington, 3rd Oct 2008. You're absolutely correct, 20 mins per hour works beautifully, and gives me and the car just enough rest between sessions. There are still various pros and cons to the two different arrangements, but I no longer feel sessions are inferior, merely different. [I] [/I]

25/02/2010 21:28:06 Steve For what it is worth as a newcomer to track days (2 times at Brands Hatch and a North Weald day) using a not far from standard road car. I find the sessions a great way to learn my way round without getting in the way of the fast cars. Watching the cars in the intermediate and expert sessions, I can see they are using better lines at a speed that I am not yet up to. My thoughts on this are, there are open pit lane sessions run at the circuits for those who feel they are being restricted by the sessions system. Only when I can keep up in the expert sessions, will I be happy entrering open pit lane track days. Until then I will be happy to use the sessioned day and thanks very much to MGOT for running them.