Kevin Reimer leads Jackson Shapeira and Zak Maytum into a left turn in the final heat of last month’s “Formula 1″ race in Ponce, Puerto Rico. Kevin, an active racer, is on the board of the IDF.
After reading the summary on the IDF site, I coughed up the thirty bucks and took a look at the IDF’s draft rules. They answered a lot of the questions I had and look pretty solid to me. Here’s what you need to know.
GEAR STUFF:
- Helmets: as long as it’s a fullface that’s in good working condition, you’re good to go. Aero helmets and longtails are ok. You don’t need a visor. Added-on breakaway aero fairings are not allowed, nor are helmets with removable chin guards. The start-line guy will check your chin strap every run.
- From Lee Cation: “Long tail and Aero helmets will be allowed in 2013 but a helmet cannot be altered or added to beyond the manufacturers specifications, so sticker it all you want but no helmet tampering or modifications like breakaway aero tails, outer shell must be a complete single piece design as created by the manufacturer. Helmet rules will always be a hot topic and this is something we will continue to look at.”
- You need leathers and either synthetic or leather full-finger gloves. Speed suits are allowed but must be worn over leathers. Two piece leathers have to zip together.
- Boards: four wheels, two trucks only. Sorry Chaput. Your board can be up to 48” long, 12” wide, and 15 pounds. Wheels can be up to 110mm. No dangerously sharp edges allowed.
- You can put ballast on your board to make it heavier; but you can’t attach extra weight to your body. No chain-maille vests. Patrick is bummed.
WORLD RANKINGS AND WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
- There is only one world champion. None of that ambiguous IGSA “World Cup Points Series Champion” and “World Championship Winner” nonsense.
- There are two categories of races: World Cup Series and World Qualifying Series. Apparently the points distribution is still being worked on; but the draft rules say thatWorld Cup Series races award up to 450 points and World Qualifying Series events award up to 228.77 points.
- The world rankings are a combination of your top 5 finishes in the last year, updated monthly.
- Whoever has the most points on December 31st will be that year’s world champion.
- No more than three World Cup Series races per continent, per year. No limit on World Cup Qualifying events.
CLASSES
- Juniors is all one class, 17 and under. If you turn 18 before December 31st of this year, you’re in Open class all year.
- Individual race organizers can run different age classes (Micro Groms, Masters, etc) and the IDF will keep track of the results; but there won’t be a world ranking for young juniors or masters.
- Lee: “It holds no integrity for the IDF to hold a ranking for riders that generally only enter 1 event and where many World Cup venues are unsuitable. We would prefer that juniors are developed by their member countries to better prepare them for the higher level of skill and maturity needed to race and win at the new junior and senior world cup level.” Basically, most of these kids only show up to one race a year and an 11 year old shouldn’t be bombing Kozakov anyway. Let them race in local races until they’re big enough and good enough to hang in the 17 and under class.
RACE PROCEDURES
- Races will have to provide a minimum of two practice runs. If you obviously can’t hang and are a danger to yourself and others, the IDF dudes can kick your kook ass out.
- Minimum one timed qualifying run.
- After the one timed qualifying run, organizers can choose from a variety of formats to seed the bracket: timed qualifying runs, IDF ranking, race-to-qualify or some mixture of all that.
- If for whatever reason they can’t run the race, places will be assigned by qualifying positions.
- Organizers can use push lanes to prevent crashes off the start like we saw at Maryhill last year.
RACING RULES
- Two false starts gets you DQ’d.
- Whoever’s wheels cross the line first, wins.
- No throw-down starts. All four of your wheels need to be on the ground at the start line. Casey Morrow is bummed. Matt K is dissapoint.
- Intentional contact to steal speed is prohibited.
- You’re completely responsible for your own braking. Bump-drafting or pushing another rider into a corner isn’t allowed.
- There are some new blocking rules: “The leading rider will always have the line choice, what he/she cannot do is intentionally shut down a legitimate pass, meaning they cannot deliberately and immediately alter their set line for the purpose of blocking. Any swerving would in that situation would generally be considered deliberate blocking but will be judged on a case by case basis.” – Lee Cation
- Protests have to be made immediately at the finish line and will be ruled on before the next round.
- Protective Position Rule. I’m still unclear on this; but from what I gather it’s something like this: if you’re leading the pack in the final straightaway or into the last turn of a race and someone crashes you out trying to make a sketchy pass, you still get first if you protest and the IDF Steward rules in your favor. If you get crashed out earlier in the course, tough titty.
CONDUCT AT EVENTS
- You’re responsible for staying on top of the schedule and showing up for your qualifiers and race heats. If you miss your heat, too bad.
- You can’t be defacing the event venue with stickers all over the place.
- You can’t be smoking weed or doing other drugs at the race venue.
- You’ve got to listen to the IDF dudes and the event organizer.
- Stay off the track when it’s live.
- Sorry ladies, you can’t race if you’re preggers.
RULE CHANGES
- Any IDF member can propose rule changes. The board will publicize them, solicit input, and vote on the proposed changes.
It’s going to be interesting to see how the passing/blocking protocol and the protective position rule work in practice, especially when they say the IDF steward will not review video footage of racing incidents; but the rest of it looks pretty solid.