Bloomquist & a few other drivers suing BIG E for off scales. Link to article.

If the dept of ag showed that those scales were faulty, it will be extremely difficult to defend in court. That is regardless of how others scaled.
 
I see this settling out of court with WRG restoring prize money, refunding fines, and admitting that there were irregularities in sample collection and testing procedures.
 
Why aren't they suing the scales manufacturer and the company that did the tire testing?

The backlash on the drivers could be something that happens that they aren't expecting from other series, tracks, fans, etc...
 
jmcgrew47 said:
I see this settling out of court with WRG restoring prize money, refunding fines, and admitting that there were irregularities in sample collection and testing procedures.
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If you settle out of court, you set the precedence of just letting a driver that is found illegal to sue and not get punished for being illegal.
 
This will not be good for the sport. This could drag out for a long time and could they not ban the 5 from competing at the track.
 
I think Eldora should stop all late model Races until this is settled.

Depending on how it goes. All sanctioning bodies should ban all of the drivers involved

This is ridiculous
 
jdearing said:
Why aren't they suing the scales manufacturer and the company that did the tire testing?

The backlash on the drivers could be something that happens that they aren't expecting from other series, tracks, fans, etc...
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The scale manufacturer isn't responsible for maintenance and calibration of the scale.

As for the testing, if I would challenge anything, it would be proving that the samples weren't tampered with after they were taken.
 
It would be up to Tony Stewart/Eldora/WRG to sue the lab that did the testing for not being consistent or competent to back up their results in court, should a court find in favor of the drivers suing. On the scale side, that's down to whomever is responsible for calibrating it.

As far as everyone else was legal on the weight, that doesn't say much. I would take the word of most of those guys that they scaled their cars on properly calibrated scales to know exactly what that car weighed with an empty fuel cell and them sitting in it before going to the track. And if the track scale showed something else, I would be very skeptical of the track weight too. Cars don't just lose 30 pounds of dry weight when nothing fell off.

Hurting the sport? On the contrary, if these guys feel this strongly that they have been unfairly accused, and they feel strongly the sanction doesn't have the indisputable proof that can withstand a courtroom, then they are actually doing the sport more good than harm by holding the sanction accountable.

If the drivers win, it will show the sanctions are not doing a good enough job of policing the sport.

If they lose, it will show the sanctions are doing a good job policing the sport and I can see the sanctions increasing their fines and suspension periods knowing they have the courts and the law on their side to deter any future competitors from trying anything.

Either way, it will be an improvement in the future and at least it will let everyone know what the state of things are on the sanctioning side and how solid they are in their processes for enforcing and policing their rules.

The worst possible outcome is an out of court settlement. For this to really be beneficial to the sport it needs to go to court and a decision come from there as to who is in the right.
 
Either side you take, regarding the tires at least, it seems to me what they did at the north/south 100 makes more and more sense.
( providing a new rr tire and locking it down until feature time)

I see the drivers side of this if the evidence shows in their favor, but 16 million seems rather excessive to me.
 
The scales issue will be extremely difficult for Eldora to prevail on. Given the findings by a government agency that the scales were out of tolerance, it will be an easy legal argument to call all measurements performed on those scales null and void.

The tire issue is the interesting one. The plaintiffs feel that there were serious questions about the sample collection process and the results themselves.

One thing is certain. If you are going to disqualify, fine and suspend people, you'd damn well better be absolutely 100% sure that you got it right. The burden of proof will be on them and based on the information available, that's going to be a tough sell in court.

Scott Bloomquist wouldn't bring this lawsuit if he didn't think he'd win. This is not a hail Mary pass. This is why I think WRG and Eldora will attempt to settle.
 
On the doping tires issue I think it should be 4 strikes your out 1st time suspension for 3 months 2nd time for 6 months 3rd time 1 year 4th time banned for life from that series it wouldn't take very long and it would stop some would disagree but to each his own in racing two things you shouldn't mess with fuel and tires
 
ricky brown said:
On the doping tires issue I think it should be 4 strikes your out 1st time suspension for 3 months 2nd time for 6 months 3rd time 1 year 4th time banned for life from that series it wouldn't take very long and it would stop some would disagree but to each his own in racing two things you shouldn't mess with fuel and tires
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The issue at hand is is the testing method sound? You should have a chain of custody from collection all the way to the testing facility. If you cannot prove that samples were not tampered with at any time, then you will have issues.
 
I'm really kind of surprised that there isn't some sort of "release" form that the racers essentially sign when they register for the race that states that they accept the limits of the technical inspection whatever that may be as a condition of entering the race. In other words if they are going to weigh the cars using a balance scale made from telephone poles with 2300lbs of rocks on the other end that's the standard. Could he not have run his car across the scales to see how their results compare to his own when he got to the track?
 
I was doing a lot of driving today and this topic came to mind and it occurred to me that WRG/Eldora et al could very well have some kind of clause buried in their agreements with drivers (assuming that drivers have to sign up, sign in, etc to run these big events or even race with the sanction) that says "drivers release the sanction from any and all liability and the decision of the sanction is final" or something like it.

The easy answer to the scale question is since you already agreed the only recourse you will have is the approved appeal system of the sanction and the decision of the sanctioning body is final and you will abide by it, why didn't you scale your car at the track prior to competition? That scale is there the whole time and you could have checked your calculated weight against the track scales any time before finishing the feature by simply driving across it and asking for a weight. Just to be on the safe side and know your car will be legal should you get weighed later. I don't know if they weigh everyone after each race or not, but why risk it? Just drive over there and weigh, it's free.

Same with tire samples. When you race with the sanction, you agree to abide by their decisions whether you like it or not.

These guys may very well be wrongly accused, but if you sign up in advance to live with whatever decisions the sanction makes, it won't really matter. And it wouldn't surprise me at all to see this tossed on that technicality. These sanctions, from Nascar to USAC to UMP, are pretty good at making sure drivers have little to no power to disagree with anything they say. That deck has been stacked in their favor forever.
 
I couldn't find a current one. But here is the 2014 DIRTcar Membership application which all drivers competing at the Dream & World must have a license.

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