The sweepstakes chair Andrew Hundt sent out an announcement about the spring’s first sweepstakes meeting being held tonight, and he included a pretty hefty collection or proposed rule changes that will be discussed.

The 6 most pertinent changes are:

  1. Required mouthguards for drivers.
  2. Required double bales at all times.
  3. Language regarding treatment of the buggy during an accident.
  4. ‘Spin Test’ to evaluate brakes and wheels without moving a buggy.
  5. Follow Car Certification Program, needed for at least one person in any active follow car. (Similar to the required driver meetings)
  6. Edited some rules to be more concise, clearer, accurate, and shorter.

It sounds in general like sweepstakes is really putting some thought into how best to prevent and respond to the accidents that are serious enough to injure the driver. Can’t argue with that in general.

Having double bales for every day of rolls sounds like a lot of extra work. How about double bales in the high risk areas and fewer bales in those places where nobody every crashes (i.e. 100 yards past the apex on the outside of the turn)?

Check out the thread I started in the forum here if you have any opinions about the proposed rules you’d like to share.

A full change-by-change document is available here.