the ideas behind the numbers

[V8moz]

Why did Garth Tander use the number 427 instead of #34 at Sandown? Is there a story behind it?
And are there any other ideas behind other numbers? I know of the 05-thing of Brocky, but I was wodnering why LP always uses 11, the SBR cars 4+9 and so on.
Is it like in NASCAR where a team "owns" the numbers?

[Armco Bender]

Team Kiwi use #021 & #027 because they are the dailing codes for Vodaphone in NZ one of their main sponsors.

[racer69]

I think GRM used 427 rather than #34 as some reference to winning the Bathurst 24 hours in the #427 Holden Monaro.

Not sure why Larry chose number 11, but ever since he started running his own team in 1986 he has been #11, except in 1988 he was #10 at the end of the year whilst running the factory HSV team, then in 1989 he was #16 at Sandown and Bathurst, but apart from that always 11.

I'm not sure the team's own the numbers, but it seems that the numbering system used (unwritten law though) is kind of a mix between the USA and Europe. In the USA everyone tends to keep the same numbers year after year, whereas in Europe numbers are changed each year due to championship positions the previous year. In Australia over the past decades has always seemed to be whoever wins the series gets number 1 the next year (Europe style), but everyone tends to keep the same number (US style).

[Jack racer]

Allot of driver's stick with there karting numbers or the number they had the most success with.

[Crash Test]

Also there are family ties and things, you see this a lot at a club level.

[RaceTime]

It is also surprising that CAMS in their infinite stupidity (lets start calling a spade a bloody shovel for a change) allow both Procar and AVESCO to allow vehicles under their control carry number that are not permitted in any other category (by both FIA regs and the CAMS NCR's).

However I undertsnad that to do so you have to PAY CAMS a fee for this privilidge - so does this mean that CAMS put money before everything else or someone in CAMS is on the take????

[coln72]

I think Larry chose 11 because
a)he only needed to carry one number around
b)11 takes up less space, therefore more room for sponsorship.
I think I read this somewhere, it may or may not be true.

[RaceTime]

Personally, the sooner they allocate numbers based on the previous years championship and stop this 'But this is my lucky number' BS the quicker people will start to believe it is being run as a professional series.

But whilst we have bull**** numbers such as 00, 021 (and links to advertisers is also banned under the NCR's...), 888, 427 etc the better off the category will be.

[V8moz]

00 is OK for me. But I think three-letter-numbers are stupid. They remind me of Stockcar racing on your local dirt track ("oh just look athe #m00h car!"). Didn't Bowe start this whole "mess" with the 600 back in 1999?
Another thing I don't get is why people are allowed to change their number in the middle of the season for just one or two races (e.g. GT 34 to 427 or in 2000 Rodney Forbes 13 to 28). That's confusing.
But this "lucky number" thing also exists in Europe, say Germany: In the DTM Christian Abt always uses the 10, Manuel Reuter the 7 (the number he won LeMans with) and so on.
But I'm on Race Time's side: The big numbers give an unprofessional view.

[RaceTime]

What you have to remember is that they are numbers - not letters, numbers

And no matter what language you speak there is no such number as 00 - it is double zero.

The other part of this is that the timing system used, if you have to revert back to the manufacturers software (which would be needed in an emergency) CANNOT handle 00 (it is, after simply zero) or ANY number greater than 254 - you cannot enter 888, 600, 427 into the Dorian Systems backup timing buttons!!!! mind you they have been told but can't/won't do anything about it...

[DAVID PATERSON]

RT, as you would be aware, in addition to the problems you have desvcribed, at tracks like Bathurst and QR, where they have alarge scoreboard for fansas to follow the race/session positions, the boards simply cannot schow a three digit number.

I also believe that having 2 and 02 in the same race is just plain silly, 021 and 21 like wise. 00 was made famous by Dick Dastardly in the "Wacky Races", come on Craig, find a better role model.

Bowe carried 550 on the Cat Falcon when he first joined the team to promote Caterpillar's new 550hp truck engine, when they released a 600hp enbgine, he changed his number to promote that.

Racer69, it actually states in the CAMS manual, that number 1 is exclusively reserved for the current champion to use at their discretion.

In an interview Larry said he likes number 11 because, it is easy to make/cut out, it takes up less space, leaving more room for sponsor logoes and when he wins the Championship, he only needs to remove a 1.

Dick has had number 17 since the '60s.

Skaife seems to like having 2, when he can't get 1.

[RaceTime]

David,

Correct - I hadn't touched on that aspect as it is so ridiculous. When Brock ran 05, NO other car ran 5 so there was never a problem.

And scoreboards - yes that ahs always been a problem - as is the problem of indicating a three digit car number on penalty boards!

What I haven't mentioned is the problem any 3 digit number causes in racing - when you are trying to 'spot' or write down car numbers as they pass you, a 3 digit number will ALWAYS may you look twice and break your concentration - believe me - this is 30 years of timekeeping saying that! So what happens is you subconsciously start to track the 3 digit number trying to confirm what you have just seen - and in the process you miss other cars around you.

That is why, when I time, I yell, scream and jump and ban any 3 digit numbers - the guys that try to run them just do NOT realise the problems they are causing others (but of course, to them there is no problem and they look good).

[racer69]

I don't really agree with allowing stuff like 02 and 2, or 021 and 21, they should only allow one of them.

I don't have a problem with 3 digit numbers, though i do understand the problems with timing and scoring.

[Hog]

IMO it doesn't really bloody matter what numbers are used. From grass roots to top level, people associate a driver with a race number. What really matters is that the cars look good, the fans identify with them, and they are out there racing for our pleasure.

[RaceTime]

Hog,

I suggest then, at some time, you volunteer as an official and start trying to identify vehicles with ridiculous numbers, fancy font styles that simply cannot be read at racing speeds.

Because these are the problems that happen - I know the timing side because I earn my living from doing this and have been a timekeeper since 1972.

[Hog]

Fine Racetime. Perhaps you would care to join me when I next marshal banger racing. Fancy fonts, strange numbers, roof fins, and mud to boot. And just in case you don't class banger racing as real motor sport, I'm also a regular marshal at Lydden. Strange how the fancy font styles used in NASCAR seem to have been excluded from this article.

[RaceTime]

OK seeing as you brought it up - I have no problem at all with NASCAR fonts - we ran them at the Thunderdome and they had one big advantage - they were BIG and stood out. So that's why I haven't brought them up because if they EVER caused a problem, they were changed - no questions asked. I should also mention that there was one category about 10 years ago (Commodores???) that ran large NASCAR style numbers - and we NEVER had a problem with them either)

I also made no comment about other forms of motor sport, and have no intention of ridiculing them for any reason.

What I will say though is that vehicles need to be identified and identified easily. How many other forms of motor sport have multiple car teams where the cars, apart from their numbers, appear - to all intents and purposes - identical? This is part of the problem - the inability to accurately identify vehicles on the track by marshals. If you ever get a chance have a look at HRT's numbers 2-3 years ago when they ran a white number on a black background - looked good stationary but virtually no one was able to read it at race speed - thus the rule now that numbers are to be black on white.

Go back - what was it? 2 seasons ago at Queensland Raceway - where John Bowe was to be black flagged - he eventually had the charge of ignoring the black flag kicked out. Why? Because they hung the black flag out and simply pointed at his car. And the reason they did that? Because they didn;y, reportedly, have two zeroes to display on the board (600).

Regardless of wether numbers are good, bad or indifferent the only argument that should hold water is this - there is absolutely NO NEED, no matter how you look at it, for ANY race car in Australia to have anything other than a single or two digit number - simply because there is NO CAMS SANCTIONED EVENT in this country that runs over 100 vehicles (I willexclude rallies here but even rallies, these days, struggle to reach 75-80 cars).....numbers are there to identify vehicles - for no other reason - legally (FIA and NCR's) it is the responsinility of the promoter to allocate numbers NOT the drivers.

[FatBoy]

This year was my first in IPRA. I was given # 78. I requested 8 (day & month i was born) or 70 (year of birth). Dumb i know, but the best i could come up with... lol

I was given # 78... maybe a combination of both. Having run with it this year, i'd like to keep it for the rest of my racing career...

Just my opinion... and btw, the triple numbers suck IMHO...

Paul...

[RaceTime]

I understand why some people want to retain numbers - but then you get into the ridiculous situations where the HQ Association in NSW *sell* numbers between 2 and, I think, 30 (not 100% sure of the upper range).

Formula Ford allocate 3-20 based on previous years championship - keeping in mind that 1st and 2nd aren't allowed to run again.

But what do you do if you move to, say, Victoria, or drive in the nationals where there is already an allocated 78?

[William Dale Jr]

Originally posted by RaceTime
But what do you do if you move to, say, Victoria, or drive in the nationals where there is already an allocated 78?

Ask for 87

Formula Ford allocate 3-20 based on previous years championship - keeping in mind that 1st and 2nd aren't allowed to run again.

1st and 2nd aren't allowed back in the nursery once they've graduated? I didn't know that. Goes to show that you learn something new every day.


As for the numbers, I don't like 02 and 2 and other similar cases being allowed in the same. 02 and 2 are the same number. Unless you look at it the way that numbers were applied in NASCAR racing, where '02' would be used in place of '102'.

And three-digit racing numbers just look wierd. The first time I saw one on a race car was on Brooke Tatnell's Toyota MR2 in a production car race at Amaroo in 1989 - I thought they looked wierd then, I still think they look wierd now. As RaceTime said, there is absolutely no need for them in V8 Supercars - or any other class of racing that has less than 100 cars entered to race at a meeting.

As for links to advertisers being banned, how did a then Telecom-Mobilenet-sponsored HRT sneak '015' past CAMS in 1994-95? Did they cite its use on Brad Jones' Sierra in 1989 as a precedent?

[Crash Test]

At least with 78 and other high, unusual numbers, is that there is a fair chance you can keep that number forever more, people lot of people are inclined to go for lower numbers.

If V8 teams use triple digits? Good for them. As far as I'm concerned, most of the cars are very identifiable, and the numbers are reasonably consistent and readable (ok, except for car 1, that's a shocker). I've spent a fair bit of time either in the timing room, or directly above or near the timing room/finish line, and there are 3 classes that I find hard:

1) Regularities: a big field, many cars with numbers made from tape, unknown cars and drivers, and numbers put in hard to see places, facing away from where you are watching.

2) FFord: the numbers are tiny, and in hard to see places, but once you look at them for a while, you generally should be able to pick up who the drivers/cars are.

3) Superkarts: god they are tiny, good luck.

[RaceTime]

Crash,

Congratulations - you have just passed the Queensland Grade 1 Timekeepers test - now don't ever let me hear you complain about numbers again.

[GTRMagic]

Please forgive my ignorance RaceTime but is this not the purpose of the Dorian timing system?

[RaceTime]

Not entirely - you still have to associate a vehicle with a transmitter - we have had at least one outright attempt by a Formula Ford team to cheat (the only way to put it) by changing transmitters to ensure their second driver qualified).

We have had numerous instances of teams putting the wrong transmitter in the wrong car ('by accident'), not putting it in at all or putting it in and then taking it out (Ron Salter in his truck used to do this - put it in for 3 laps so we would see it working, then remove it so no one could see his practice times).

But you have to remember - the timing system only operates on the start/finish line - it doesn't help the flaggie or observer round the back of the track identify a car.

One of the good things to come out in the past 2 or 3 years is numbers on widnscreens - but even here you have the problem, particularly in ProCar, of left and right hand drive cars - so the number isn't consistently placed. Neither is the size or colour.

The Porsche SuperCup in Europe instigated a system which I have been trying to have implemented here - drivers names are now required - in most categories - on the side windows. Porsche SuperCup also required the vehicle number above the name. If this were to be implementd at tracks like Sandown, Oran Park, Wakefield - where door, window and bonnet numbers just cannot be seen because of guardrail, we could at least identify a vehicle to see a) if the transmitter in the car is correct or b) which car does not have a transmitter fitted or working.

We tried for years, before DATA-1 was introduced - to get Formula Fords black flagged for not having legible numbers. Schenken always refused to do it. The meeting DATA-1 was introduced at Winton, Schenken then started black flagging cars because 'he couldn't see their numbers'....this is the sort of attitude we have had to put up with from CAMS officials over the years.

[GTRMagic]

The other alternative I would think could be to follow speedway and offroad racing and put a number 'plate' on the roof... which they do in some classes as the numbers on the doors get covered in mud... ugly though...

Sometimes these graphic designers do get a bit excited regarding the 'beauty' of their numbers and their place in the effect of the vehicle...

Surely the most sensible solution (So CAMS wont have thought of it ) would be to specify the size of the number space, and the font the number has to be printed in, as well as the location(s) of the number on the car??

They do such things in some classes of rallying... and they are allegedly the poor cousin to circuit racing