Well.. it turns out I'm not as fast as I thought I was either.
At the last NHRA event, enough people complained and were questioning the track, then it was measured.
As it turned out, the 60' was actually 57.5' ..............which changes the top end results of the track too, which makes your MPH slower.

 

So at Sacramento raceway or all dragstrips?

 

Sac only.

 

Wow that unfortunate. I wonder how long it has been inaccurate. No wonder Sac has always been a "fast track"

 

Is the track still a true 1/4 mile or 1/8 mile? If the 60 foot marker timer is off, it will make the 60's look quicker than actual but wouldnt change the rest of the track if its a true 1/8 or 1/4 length.

 

Whew! Glad I don't think I'm fast.

 

not your time, but your mph..

 

Isn't mph calculated from the beams at the end of the track?

 

Since it went from 58' to 60' its longer, so the distance is longer, therefore taking longer.

Yes still a full 1/4 mile.

 

trap speed is calculated at the end of the track between 2 beams. MPH wouldnt change at all if the 60 foot timer beam wasnt at 60 ft.

There are markers typically at 60 ft, 330 ft, 1/8mile, 1000ft and 1/4 mile at a 1/4 mile track.

If the 60 foot beam was set up at 58ft, it would now be 58ft, 330ft, 1/8 mile, 1000ft, and 1/4 mile. This assumes entire length of the track is a true 1/4 mile. So your "60" ft times would now be only 58' times, but everything else is still the same. Overall ET is from when you break out the stage beam and trip the 1/4 mile beam. The beams inbetween are intervals.

This is same thing as if a car pulls the wheels and trips the 60 ft beam with BACK tires only. Next run he could stay planted down, trip beams with front wheels. 60 foots would be drastically different but ET's would be the same if the car ran the same times. Like a bracket car that runs 10.0's every run.

Longer track your times will look slower and higher mph. Shorter track is opposite.

 

I called my buddy that told me about the story, and he said they measured all the other beams off of the 60'.
I'll try and come up with some more accurate info.

 

Sac has always been fast. They fixed the timing equipment before the last division race about 4 weeks ago. Just about everybody was 3-4 mph faster at sac than at Bako or Infineon. It is true that the beams werent setup quite right, but there was also a problem with the timing equipment. All issues have been resolved now.