Staging light error caught on film & Div. Director's respons

[Racin Mason]

NHRA's staging system malfunctioned in Pomona causing the red light to come on in my lane wihtout the car moving, but luckily someone caught it on tape and posted it to Classracer a little while back. I sent the following e-mail to Division 7 Director Mike Rice last week:

Hi Mike. I have a GT/BA orange Camaro car #7026 and you probably recall the problems we had with the staging lights in round 1 at the Winter Nationals. At the time, the ruling was that I had rocked out of the beams and it was a shallow stage red light. This same issue actually occurred in Vegas as well under virtually identical conditions. Luckily, someone was videotaping the whole thing in Pomona and we can now see exactly what happened.

Here's the link to the video and the run is right at 19:00:


If you watch the video you can clearly see what happens. The tree starts to come down, on the second amber BOTH the pre-stage and stage lights go off and the red light comes on. Exactly three seconds later the red light goes off and BOTH the pre-stage and stage lights come back on. It is clear that the car does not move at all and this is why BOTH lights turn back on when the red light goes off. If it did rock out of the beams, it certainly wouldn't have turned off both pre-stage and stage lights. Even if it did somehow rock the 12" or so between the two beams, the two lights would not have turned right back on again after the red light turns off. They should both be out if the car moved and this is clearly not what happened.

Please watch the video and I think you will agree that there was clearly a malfunction in the timing system. NHRA has used videotape in the past to rectify errors where a win was given to the incorrect driver. Let me know once you review and we can discuss options on how to make this right. Thanks.

--Mike Rice then sent the following response:

It is too hard to see in the video. The shallow stage deal is very real, especially without the StageLoc program. The car doesn’t have to move, just the change in tire pressure when on the brake or two step can be enough to rock out of the beams. There is no doubt in my mind that this is what happened to you at Pomona. You may not physically see or feel car move, but the beams are so sensitive that it happens. You are not the first that it has happened too and certainly won’t be the last.

When the system red-lights, it locks our both the pre-stage and stage beams, which is why both go out. When system resets, it allows them to come back on.

Mike

Am I wrong here? Has anyone else experienced this?