That's their reasoning. They also get real pissy about the right lane car exiting the track to the left before the left hand car. One of those'll get you grounded for the night. From your video it appears that your track is a little more lenient on that policy too - or is the camera perspective misleading?
This was my first time at that particular track. They did seem rather lenient in a lot of respects. But, everybody was very safe about turning off for the return road. The camera angle doesn't really show enough to see what's going on to the side or rear. They actually have 3 turnouts to get onto the return road (to the left), but the shut down area is very short! No top fuel dragsters will ever be racing there! I was barely slowing down in time for the 3rd turnout, whereas many of my opponents were in much slower cars that turned out on the 1st or 2nd turnouts before I was slowed down enough. When it was closer racing, I yielded to the car closer to the turnout. When I was in the left lane, my opponents yielded to me. I read the track rules before going to this track since it was my first time and I found no mention of a rule, just a 10 mph speed limit for the return road.
My home track is very different (Pacific Raceway, aka Seattle Int'l Raceway). Been racing there for 26 years. They host big events: jet cars, top fuel, funny car, etc. They are very strict and people get ejected every time I go (I've never been ejected as I follow the rules, but I've received warnings for little things). They have a super long shut down area so there's plenty of room to sort out who's turning onto the return road first. It's an unwritten rule and common sense to let the nearest lane to the return road turn off first, but with so much shut down area, we're going so slow when we turn off that there's no safety issues.
All in all, most of the rules serve a purpose. Most are safety related, while others are designed to keep the racing action flowing without interuptions & delays.
You mentioned that your track won't let you have the radar detector in while you race. I just remembered a time long ago when I had a car that launched so hard that the radar detector would fly off the window suction cup, bounce off the steering wheel and land in the back seat. That was a 68 Pontiac GTO with a big block putting out 550 lb ft of torque and cutting 1.60 sixty foot times, so anything loose in that car was a problem. So I guess it makes sense not to have extra stuff in the car, but I've never been told I couldn't.
great video as well
