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Nobody’s really going to mention the flagger that couldn’t take a second to lift the scolding exhaust pipe from Hymas’ neck? Half-ass one arm lift while doing a half-ass flagging attempt. C’mon dude.
Lift the damn bike off the seemingly unconscious kids face and get to flagging.
Are the flaggers allowed to do that though, aren’t only ama people allowed to do that? I maybe totally wrong.
There’s a rule against “outside interference”, however, to my knowledge there’s an exception when the rider is helpless and can’t move.
Yeah, there has to be(i almost made a totally stupid and dumb comment back to what you said but i didn’t read all of what you said initially 😂😂).
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He appeared to drag the foot peg uncaring across the riders body.
I thought that the flagger did ok. He was panicking but managed to take the weight of the bike off of Chance while still trying to caution the other riders.
I give that flagger props for trying to help. His job isn't to help riders back up, it's to prevent other riders from hitting the downed rider. I can appreciate the humanity in trying to help the downed rider in danger, while also trying to alert the approaching riders.
If you want to be upset at a flagger, look at the Cooper Webb crash.
Or the Casey Cochran crash. Casey got off the track on his own quickly, left his bike lying on the backside of a blind jump. Yellow flagger left his post and went to sit with Cochran.
+1 for C. Webb crash.....leaving the bike in a blind spot for upcoming riders with no Flags being waved.
When Webb crashed looked like the flagger may have not been paying attention due to being involved in a conversation with individuals at his flagging spot. That shouldn't happen and most def at a Pro national!
I also agree that the flaggers in those situations did the best they could do, yeah people wanted more from them but that’s not their duty, their duty is to flag.
Chance and his bike were both off the track or right on the edge. I would have quickly flipped the bike off of him to keep the exhaust from burning him (which it looked like it was), then flagged immediately after. I would have handled it differently if the bike and Chance were still on the track though.
The flagger for the Web crash was an idiot. Looked like he was BS'ing with people next to him on the side of the track.
Thank you.
Easy to tell who's flagged a national in here. Just for conversations sake, let's say the flaggers first move was to yank the bike off of Chance and then they both got ran into, holy shit you guys would ream him a new one for not flagging and protecting the downed rider (and himself) plus now you'd have a 3rd piece of shrapnel in the mix. "Technically" he shouldn't have helped lift the bike at all and put 100% of his concentration into making sure he didn't get run into by another rider, and start yelling for someone to come help Chance, that's what we we're taught. He's not an emt he's a flagger. Maybe if he was all alone in last go help him but there were 39 more guys coming in full race mode. The guy got thrown a scary as shit situation where the rider's exhaust header was on his head, he made a split second decision and did the best he could. That could have gone worse in a lot of ways. Just my opinion but that flagger deserves a beer, A for effort in a fucked up situation. no one's perfect but at least he was present and paying attention, which is more than you can say about some of the other flaggers...
I went back and looked at the video. Hymas and his bike were both 100% completely off the track. Any MXer worth their salt as a man doing the flagging in that situation would have lifted the bike off of him first seeing that the exhaust was on his head and it was smoking (clearly burning something) then do the job flagging. Takes ~5 seconds to get the bike thrown off him then go back to flagging. You make light of it, but the bike being on top of him could have been way worse than it ended up being thankfully. It wasn't in a blind section of the track, so that played a factor.
I was wondering when someone would post about this. These flaggers amaze me week after week how incompetent they seem to be. Have they raced before or just total random people they hire off the street.
Wasn't trying to "make light" of the situation. My point was a flaggers job 1 is to flag. When I flagged the GH national and usgp there we were flat out told our job is to make sure the other riders know to be aware there's a rider down, is that cold hearted when a guys laying there under his bike ? Probably.
Edit : I wish the flagger that left his post to help the guy who crashed in front of me would've done his job instead of going to help the downed rider while I launched into his downed bike...
Pit Row
In my opinion the problem here is that flaggers are supposed to be "experienced" in fast paced racing... and 95% of us would have flipped that bike off him in 2 seconds and then started flagging the scene. We all know as racers that a hot bike will mess you up when its on you. That would be #1 to me. I would have flipped that scooter right into traffic... Maybe thats why I am not a flagger though.... so yeah.
But long story short... I think we can do better. Most def at this level.
It's a totally different situation if the bike and rider are still on the track, especially on the downside of a blind jump take off. One has to think this through situationally. And as for race directors telling your job is only to flag, if they told you to put a bucket of piss on your head in case there's a fire, would you do that too? Know the situation, be prepared, and do the job - which often requires critical thinking. I already noted in another post in this thread earlier that had the downed rider still been on the track - especially on the downside of a blind take off, I would have responded differently. but Chance was completely off the track with the bike laying on him burning him.
Hey you know what guy not once in this thread have I been disrespectful to you or the situation, I said I thought the guy deserved a beer because he was right on it and tried to do both jobs at once. Then you're are all he sucks he blows fuck that guy I'd of done this blah blah. You're criticizing him on a split second decision he made after watching it forwards backwards and sideways and analyzing it on pause for how long ? Hindsights 20/20 give the dude a break. And like it or not, right or wrong, when they're showing and coaching you what they want you to do as a flagger first and foremost is make sure you're safe, sorry but that's what they tell you, then make sure the other racers know what's up. They tell you to not to go on the track and help (yes I know "He was on the side of the track") Anyway in that situation I probably would have lifted the bike of off of him too, just out of pure instinct, but "Technically" that's not what the flagger is there for. That's all I'm saying.
I see by your picture you're invested in this topic more than the average guy, sorry to see that hope he heals up well. I'm somewhat critical after being on the "flagger didn't let me know" side of the equation so were both emotionally invested. No big deal I get it.
As far your would you pour piss on your head comment ? ...yeah if you wanna go there let me know. Otherwise how about we be 2 dirt bikers looking at something from different angles. Or we can turn it into a fuck you fest, whatever you want to do lol.
I would have flung that bIke off Chase like RC tossing that bIke off Stew. And if i got in trouble and was told my flagging sservices were no llonger nneeded, I'm fine wwith that
Wasn’t exactly a “split second decision”. The flagger had enough time to smell the flesh of Chance’s arm burning below him. Plenty of time to realize what was going on.
I can’t believe some of you guys are defending him.
How do you know what he had enough time to do? Whole lot of clairvoyants and Captain Hindsights posting in this thread.
Sure, maybe all that time he had just wasn’t enough for him to comprehend what was going on. Yeah right.. They probably pick up these flaggers off the side of the freeway so who knows what state of mind they’re in. Wouldn't be surprised. Dude could have been drunk or high and you guys would still be defending him.
I'm not defending anyone, I'm just saying that the people saying "he should have done X," or "he had enough time to Y" aren't looking at the fact they're seeing the situation from the comfort of their couch with the luxury of replays and plenty of time to formulate a plan for what the guy should have/could have done. Hell, Le Big* was right there, too and no one is saying "why didn't he..." about him.
*This isn't a hit on Le Big at all.
Lebig did help the bike away from Chance, then backed out, probably to avoid being involved in an outside assistance situation. The duo of flagger / Lebig did as good as was humanly possible and I bet Chance thanked them for that !
Just bringing back this thread to mention that Keefer backed me up on this topic in the recent Pulp show.
Flagger still had a responsibility to watch downstream and flag for subsequent wrecks. Dropping his flag and helping the downed rider is exactly what you are trained not to do. Flagger attempted a compromise. As someone who has a significant amount of experience flagging, I do not fault him for what he did.
Flaggers like you are the problem
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