Do safety cars make races boring or more exciting? Dilemma for US series as it considers cutting back cautions

When it comes to sports car racing, it’s not just the American tracks that are markedly different from most of their international counterparts. The overall philosophy used by the FIA for the World Endurance Championship and IMSA for its SportsCar Championship about how to run and officiate races is significantly different as well.

While recently attending the Lone Star Le Mans at Circuit of the Americas, I had the extraordinary opportunity to sit down together with the race directors from both series – Eduardo Freitas of the FIA and IMSA’s Beaux Barfield. The relevance of the conversation was thrown into light a couple weeks later at the SportsCar Championship’s season-ending Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta, where no fewer than 16 full course cautions (one which led into a 26-minute red flag for lightning and rain) resulted in nearly 40% of the 10-hour race being run behind a safety car.

Putting aside the issue of driving standards or ethics and their contribution to the frequency of cautions, the length of interruptions during IMSA races has also become a front-burner issue. Unlike the FIA, IMSA does not utilise slow zones or a virtual safety car (VSC), and while Barfield has the option of calling a ’short yellow’ that closes the pits, the majority of caution periods are drawn out by the practice of resetting the field in running order through the four classes. The process can take up to 20 minutes.

It feels interminable, and it’s all too easy for fans at the track or watching on television to lose their focus on the race. And when those interruptions come one after the other as they have with increasing frequency over the last couple of years, there’s the prospect of them losing interest altogether.

IMSA has conducted private tests with teams to evaluate a VSC system like the one used by the FIA to neutralise WEC and Formula 1 races. But it’s a double-edged sword for the sanctioning body. While many fans and competitors clamour for fewer and shorter race interruptions, others appreciate the additional strategy possibilities and closer finishes that are often a product of packing up behind a safety car for pitstops and resetting the field. That’s the accepted norm in stock car racing, and let’s not forget, IMSA is owned by NASCAR.

“That’s what we’re here for, to win these races, everybody going all-out”

Barfield is a former open-wheel racer who served as the chief race officer for Formula Atlantic in 2006 and ’07 before stepping into the same role for the American Le Mans Series from 2008-11. After three seasons as IndyCar’s president of competition, Barfield returned to sports cars as IMSA’s race director in 2015.

“I grew up in the 1970s watching Le Mans and WEC puts something on the table that I completely embrace, understand and appreciate because it was absolutely in my DNA and upbringing,” Barfield said. “Now I do this thing that’s different, that has the US culture of racing with full course yellows and restarts and bumping and banging and all these things.

“Is there a benefit to that?” he pondered. “Different types of fans on a broad base can look at two race series that race identical equipment – often the same drivers and teams – yet see a very different product. I think absolutely, there’s clearly space for people to consume different products and maybe even a need for it.”

After working as the Estoril track secretary in his home country of Portugal, Freitas took over administration of the FIA GT and European Touring Car Championships. He has served as race director for WEC since 2012.

“We may both like very good red wines, but from different producers; we can’t say that one is best than the other. They’re different,” Freitas remarked. “The product is high quality on both sides, which is a fact. But the way of managing it operationally during the races is different. It’s adapted to the clients on either side. Taking it to an extreme, for BMW to sell cars in England, they need to put the steering wheel on the right-hand side of the car. IMSA opts for a different way of strategy. But their effort is enjoyed the same way, as long as it’s safe. At the end of the day, both work.”