Someone tell me how the shootout works

[DSMgsx]

I was looking at the June 5th results and I don't understand exactly how the qualifing times and eliminations work. Someone explain this to me, please. Thanx in advance.

--Don

[ljasonl]

Well I don't know what shootout you're talking about, but by "qualifying times" I guess it's a quick 8 (or 16 or whatever number) type of thing. All the cars will run though to set their qualifying times, at this point it doesn't matter if you win or lose. They take the 8 quickest times and those are the car that will be in the competition. Then most tracks will use a wheel or something to get a random choice of who races who, and they race until there's only one left. It could be single elimination where you lose once you're out, double where you lose twice you're out, or whatever rules they come up with. It could also be a bracket or heads up race. A heads up race is what most people think of, the green light hits, both people go and the 1st to the finish line wins. In a bracket both cars will have a "dial in" time, and the lights go off staggered to make an even race no matter how much faster one person is than the other. Example: Car "A" has a 12.0 dial in and car "B" has a 14.0 dial in. The green light on B's side will go off and he can start while A is still waiting, his light won't go off till 2 seconds later (cuz his dial in was 2 seconds quicker). Theoretically if they both run their dial in times they should arrive at the finish line at the exact same time, even though B is 2 seconds slower, cuz A started 2 seconds later.