I wear my OMP FIA/SFI fire suit on all but the hottest days.

I have a cool suit shirt that does wonders, but when its 110+ its all I can do to be in the car with shorts and the cool shirt on... I am not adapted to wearing a fire suit when its that hot.

 

I'm HPDE-only. Adding the weight (and expense) of a cool suit system so I don't need carpet seems counterproductive. Irregardfull, I believe the right thing to do is make the car compliant so it is accessible to anyone wanting a ride or needing instruction, fire suit-free.

I wore a fire suit all weekend, and the added layers were welcome in the cold.

Does anyone know of a company that makes a multi-layer fire suit with a third, closable pocket? That's my research project for the day. I would like to keep a room key and maybe a few bucks on me, and the leg pockets in the suit I wore were unreliable as far as keeping things secure. I lost one key card.

 

A short follow-up... apparently VIR has come to an agreement with the HPDE crowd and the fire suit is easily waiverable. I wonder how many guys bought a fire suit in mid-Feb, early March, to make sure they didn't lose any track time.

 

The smart ones

 

Just wear the damned safety gear.

 

The purpose of my original post was to inform drivers going to VIR what they might expect, so they had more than a week's notice, like I did. Subsequent posts were to provide accurate updates as to where VIR stood on the issue, and where they might be heading.

As I stated, I believe that as an instructor, I need to be able to take out students (and babes wanting rides) without them needing a fire suit, so I dropped the coin to put carpet back in my car. Since I'm compliant, I now have options if the rule would have remained in affect, but since they don't seem to care (again), it's moot.

I usually wear a nomex flight suit, but the multi-layer suit was too much for my old body. Give the preaching a rest.

 

Get your head out of the sand, wear the right gear, all of it. If that is too hot for you, too expensive, or not sufficiently fashionable, maybe you are playing in the wrong game?.

 

I was going to just write "Blow me", but decided against it.

An Air Force flight suit was good enough for 3400+ flying hours and 17 combat missions. I'm HPDE-only, and very few people wear fire suits, right or wrong. If a fire extinguisher is optional, and sometimes folks can wear short sleeve shirts or short pants, you're barking up the wrong tree.

 

A DIY cool shirt was a lovely addition to my gear for those warm days. The higher quality suits are far cooler and lighter than the less expensive ones. I have several of both types at this point.

I love you, brother, and didn't mean to preach.

 

No worries. Thanks for the consideration. I appreciate it.

I was hopeful the language I chose would convey I'm not pissed off about safety gear, but rather how this whole thing played out. Unfortunately, it appears I was somewhat unsuccessful.

You stated in Post #24 that the "smart ones" were the ones that bought the fire suits. I believe the opposite. They're kicking themselves in the *** for not trying to get some kind of grace period. If I had registered and paid before being told I needed a fire suit, I would have made a big stink about it. Maybe some guys did, but I never heard anyone mention it, and there was lots of discussion in the paddock. And then, literally between 17 Feb and 26 Feb, VIR completely reversed its position. That's what I'm beaked about. I got lucky and although I had purchased a fire suit from a vendor that had one that fit and would be delivered before I needed to leave for the track, I was able to borrow one, too. Returning the one I bought paid for replacement carpet. If I need a fire suit in the future, I would spend more money on something lighter, but it was never a question of money. It just really torques my ballations that some unknown entity had a bunch of dudes scrambling, spending their hard earned dollars, to comply with a rule they decided to waiver. It's just not right.