Liability at the track questions

[Kputz]

Horrified for my life. The last one I was at was this summer at a Mustang SV Club, all fast cars, some said they even had raced, me there scrubbing tires. At the "drivers meeting" some wizard arose and asked if there was only passing allowed on the left, and only after a wave like "last time". Everyone agreed. I was dumbfounded. Sure enough, some guy pulls on me on the straight, I run out to the right, he pulls to my rear quarter, and stays there. I went around and exited the track. He comes up to me after the session angry and explains to me I'm supposed to wave. I politely explain to him with much profanity that I'm strapped into my seat and have a window net, and couldn't get my fecking hand out the window if I tried. And besides, most race tracks have 5 times the right turns than left turns, and if you allow passing on the RIGHT the passer can easily see you wave through the rear window AND is naturally set up on the inside for the next turn, most likely a left, and that 90% of the passing done in a race is done on the INSIDE (read left here). It's done that way because its SAFER that way. He looks dumbstruck. I sigh.
In the course of that one afternoon I saw no less than 10 offs, some rather exciting. I got tired of watching puds that have no clue how to run the twisties, but think they're fast because they can go like hell down the straights. I was scrubbing tires on a Miata and there wasn't one guy that I couldn't cover up in the twisties.
Racing is simpler, if only because you can trust the other guy more often than not. You can cover his bumper or his door and you know he isn't going to do something stupid, is going to keep his line, whether there are just two of you going through the corner, or many going, side to side. At open events, I'm willing to wager there aren't 5 guys out of 50 that know anything at all about racing, or going fast for that matter, but nearly every one is driving faster on questionable tires than he has any ability to do.
At the start of a race, whether in the american sedan or the spec miata, you are bumper to bumper and door to door, through at least the first three turns (in the case of the miata through the first entire lap more likely), and rarely does anything happen aside from the occasional rub. At an open event, unless you give the morons a wide berth, you could well be scrapping your ride......or worse. I'd rather have pins stuck in my eyes than attend one.