Well as i mentioned i had a blast at NC bike. the only negative i would post and would love feedback on the subject is this..
We all love and enjoy this sport and we all have accepted the possible negative outcome of the sport. now i can completely understand the inspection of the bike and helmet(for the 5 year replacement date) but for my first experience i felt that the entire process of taking every piece of safety gear to the tech inspection was a little excessive. i understand its for our protection but we are all adults here and we have all accepted the responsibility of maintaining our gear or replacing it when needed. can some one chime in and explain it to me is there a liability for the event staff or something too that effect?
It's rather odd to hear that complaint from someone who has just completed their first weekend... LOL
I'll be one of those that will go against the crowd and I can totally relate with you breezie. That's one part about WERA I love - all you need is your helmet for tech. And you tech once for the entire weekend. It's very nice. Granted, the bike tech inspection is much more thorough than at a track day, so regarding the comment about WERA letting the dude wear Mechanix gloves, well, yeah, it's actually rather easy to see that happening when the only gear you need to bring is your helmet.
We (The track day orgs) have to have tech for the same reason your coffee from the drive through has 100 warning labels about it being hot. I'd be willing to bet 95% of the track day riders know what is good gear and what isn't. It's not exactly rocket science. But we got to look out for the other 4%, those that just don't know any better. Maybe it's their first day, and they never had anyone to show 'em the ropes. That's what the tech inspection is for. The other 1% are the ones that know better, and still try to sneak through tech anyways. Those are just people pushing Darwin's theory, because you gotta be totally off your rocker to knowingly go out and ride on sub-par gear.
Ensuring everyone's bike and protective gear are good to go is the best way to minimize the risk of personal injury, and be able to afford the most amount of track time for everyone involved. I don't personally agree with it, but I can't argue that you can completely omit gear inspection. You absolutely must have to. And to be honest, I don't want to lose track time because some guy decided to wear cowboy boots on the track and now the track will go cold for the next two hours as everyone is on a medical hold because the ambulance had to give him a ride to the hospital (And they won't continue on with a track day without an ambulance present). So it's real easy to see that my desire to have the most amount of track time greatly over rides that I'd like to not have to bring my gear to tech. "Necessary evil" is a perfect way to put it.
Now if you're wondering why racing has less stringent inspections of gear, well then I can't give you a real solid answer. I can tell you their requirements are the same, actually its mandatory to have a back protector, but it's not as enforced during tech inspection. With the popularity of track days in the past 10 years, it's extremely rare to see someone go from riding the street to racing. Almost all racers are prior track day junkies, so I would venture to say racers are generally held to a higher standard, and should know what is to be expected regarding gear. Track days focus on good, clean, smooth riding and constant learning, and safety goes hand in hand with that.