Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

ReRun coming but im pulling for mike 2!

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Rerun according to the announcer, man that stinks.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Went RED... ****ty!!

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Can't help but think a DeFrank double is in the WORKS....
MB

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Why a re-run? If he went red, it would not matter if the dial was wrong, etc. should be over.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

What was the re run for?
I saw Mike stop on the track. Wow what a load of emotions for Mike!
Anyone find out please post.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

They said a flash from a camera triggered the infrared beam and caused a redlight for DeFrank and that the car had not moved.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

they said cam flash triggered first red, i would wanta see the footage!

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Be good to get to the root cause of the red eye and fix it once and for all.
DeFrank, Cotten and the fans deserve a fair race in fair conditions.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Didnt the same thing happen to Dan Mason a few years ago? I know Dan is on this forum

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

very Simple to find out what happened look at the video and see what happened .

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

But Dan Mason did not get a rerun, correct?

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Did.t he say the said nothing like that could happen. Also he had a vidio on it vould do a search. Tom

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Couldn't the photographers simply stop the flash bulbs while cars are staged waiting for the tree to come down?

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Considering how much they're trying to catch big wheelstands, I doubt that will happen.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

My apoligies for jumping the gun. I was watching it live on ESPN3 and there was no audio and all I saw was a red light for Jimmy and then the car being pushed back...

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

looks like the shaft for the out of town guy. where would find footage of the staging motion and on to the redlit?.A cam flash on a sunny day found its way into the depths of the box where the photocell is hidden from such other lite sources? I think 2 out 3 would be the only fair thing to do. mikes the real man for doing a rerun!

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Wow what good is the $50,000.00 electronics timing system is, if a simple flash of a camera can cause the red light to come on is a great question huh.?

I am wondering if this happened to any one running this race is another good question ?


Why did the car the car move forward I was watching the run on ESPN3

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

You can watch the replay on ESPN 3, it's at about 6 hours and 21 minutes. The red light on Defranks side lights on the second amber.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Video here, about the 16 min mark....

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKBIc2hWGNM"]2013 NHRA Winternationals Finals - YouTube[/ame]

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

I watch the replay on Espn 3 about 10 times you can see mike car move to light the stage light, but i didn`t see movement on Defrank car,maybe he was not stage deep enuff? They had 3 or 4 different camera angle`s on espn 3,if nhra wanted to watch replays? the replay video is better on espn 3 than the you tube video. Tom

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Worked at Suffolk the last year they were running and had a similar instance. The guy in the right lane staged so shallow that the relay in the old Chrondex box was buzzing......off on off on. The stage light was on but was flickering so fast it appeared to stay evenly lit. I waiting a little longer than usual and as soon as I activated the tree it was an instant red. That's an old system and I'm not sure how large a diameter the beam is but when we setup every weekend the receiving end had a very small hole in it and it would be a fluke for a flash to trigger it. How about going to a different light source.....infrared beam or something that sunlight or a common camera flash won't trigger.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

I have a dumb question (go easy, I'm old) where do you find ESPN3? Cox cable has more than one ESPN, we have 2 but not 3.

Btw, I staged too shallow once, but I saw the stage light flicker about the time the tree started to come down. I knew that one was on me.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Not all Internet service providers have ESPN3-I have it at home thru Cablecom but different provider at business does not.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Congratulations MIKE and Paula, great pic on dragracecentral ...

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

So, it is on the Internet, not TV?

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

On internet-search for ESPN3 or ESPNwatch then when you try to accsess programming it will inform you if your provider has it.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Congratulations to Mike Cotten and Jimmy Defrank to reach the final. It's unfortunate that the outcome of a possible timing glitch could cause a outcome like this in a final round of a National Event. There has been multiple incidents at Pomona regarding this same problem. Recently with Don Mason and another incident at the Summit Finals with a local racer from Minnesota. This same thing occurred to myself at a local racetrack in the Division 5 area in 2009. I happened to be the faster car and the stage bulb was flickering when it was then indicated I was fully staged. The tree came down on their side and when my tree started the red light occurred without the car moving. I was told that the car was shallow staged enough to remove the tire from the stage beam. This track doesn't have stage lock and could occur if the car is shallow staged. The video that I seen of the final at Pomona is identical to the elimination round that occurred to me in 2009.

I also attached a recent article that occurred last year to Jack Beckman during a Semi Final.

http://www.competitionplus.com/drag-...-not-red-light

Is stage lock setup at all National Events?

Scott Dugdale
5317 I/S

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

If it flickers, you are not in far enough.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Ed,
If you have Cox Cable and Internet you will be fine.

www.espn3.com

The replay on ESPN3 is harder for me to control but you can see the flash very low on DeFrank's car. When watching the YouTube clip best I tell I could see the flash, then the next frame the red light. The flash did appear to be low, only showing up on the bottom of the spoiler.

I thought at least at national events the lights were lasers and would not be affected by things like this. Guess I was wrong.

Bill

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Good eye! You can see the flash low on the drivers side of the front spoiler before the red. Sucks that Mike had to lose this way in a rerun but clearly the Defrank car didn't move to turn on the red light. Congrats to both drivers for getting there in the first place.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Note that the pre-stage and stage bulbs not only go out, but they STAY out, even with the car sitting there. That wasn't a flicker. How long was the camera flash?

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

If that had been me sitting there it would have been over. I wouldn't have gotten a re-run.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

i am with you ed.if that would have been me or you the race would have been over.don't get me wrong i like jimmy and his dad but if you watch the pic on the starting line when jimmy's car red lighted the stage beams go out at the same time the red light came on.mike got a raw deal on that race.they should have never re run that race.watch the vid.and you be the judge.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

Hmm, you're right, his stage beam does go out, didn't notice that when I first watched the video. I can't see the car move in the video, but that doesn't mean it didn't and just wasn't visable. I hate when this kind of crap happens and really feel bad for Mike.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

It wasn't just the stage beam (ie., rocking back out of the beams). Both the pre-stage and stage lights went out simultaneously. Consider how far and how quickly the car would've had to move in order for that to happen. It would most definitely have been visible. The redlight was obviously in error.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

I feel for Mike, but at the end of the day he still has Paula. There are far worse outcomes.

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

This is true...

Hi Kyle :cool:

Re: Mike Cotten you are the MAN!
 

My thoughts exactly Mike. I watched it about 10 times and the first thing that I noticed was that once the pre-stage and stage lights went out they never came back on. It wasn't a flash that caused it and Jimmy did not move. There was obviously an error in the timing system. Stinks for Mike but there was something out of Jimmy's control. My only problem is I have seen times where this type of annomoly has occurred and they did not re-run. Unless something showed them on the timing computer that an error had occurred? Ultimately I believe the right decision was made. I feel maybe they should have run the final at another race (so Mike didn't have to run back and do it again) Awful lot of emotion for someone to go through in 5 minutes.