"All he/she has to do is stick to his/her lines, it is the faster driver's duty to safely and skilfully negotiate the slower driver!"
Dan makes a good point. If the driver ahead is slower than you, but holds a racing line such that you cannot get past without hitting him, then that isn't blocking.
If the driver behind gets impatient or frustrated that he cannot get past a driver who is holding a legitimate racing line and taps the driver ahead, then he is committing an offence.
If the driver behind, as AlanRR suggests, hits the driver ahead into the bushes then it should be a case for the CoC. The problem is getting witnesses.
The rules are balanced.
If, say, the driver ahead drives a line that forces a driver behind over to the inside of the track, then he is going to arrive at a corner with his cornering line impaired. He is almost certainly going to have to go wide and slow in the bend, so the driver behind can switch lines on the straight and go to the outside of the track and cut back in the corner to the inside line, the classic dummy pass.
This is why the rules state that the driver in front cannot change his line suddenly to the outside again, because this is a move designed to hinder the driver behind.
Equally the driver behind cannot surge up the inside so fast that he is going to hit the driver ahead, he has to do it at a speed that allows both karts to go round the corner together, or be clearly ahead when he moves into the racing line in front of the other kart.
The other difficulty is knowing when you are approached by a kart temporarily or constantly faster in order to give him room. Normally that means that the other kart has to have established a viable overlap before you hit the braking area. Realistically that means far enough up alongside for the other driver to know you are there, so nosecone alongside the other driver. Going into a corner, where does your focus switch from broad (aware of the track) to tight (braking point there)? If you wouldn't be aware of a kart next to you at a point on the track because you are focused on the braking point, then don't expect the kart ahead to know that you are making an overlap at that same point.
It happens. I was aware of another kart at the weekend, but he dropped back, I thought, just before my braking point because the inside line braking point is earlier and he wouldn't make the turn. When I started the turn in, he was there but clearly travelling too fast to allow me in the turn as well. If I had maintained my line there would have been a collision, so I avoided him and spun out. It's a fine point and in parc ferme afterwards, he admitted he had got to the 'Oh! shoot!' point too. Both of us had made an error. This time he profited, next time it might be me.
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Blocking rules by 'minimax1' (05 May 2009 @ 18:29)
