Ringmeet 2019 - Taking in US refugees!

This year, I was again able to meet friends I don’t see that often, and have a great time with them while talking about cars and drinking beer.

That was the Ukraine-Romania roadtrip. For me, this year’s Ringmeet instead came with a weird, unprecedented feel of ”What the hell am I doing here?”

It all came down to very poor judgement on display, fueled with a weird, supercharged ”fuck you” energy that usually gets you kicked out of campsites. On Friday evening people got so turbo fucking drunk it made quiz hosting a complete 90+db pain, and the following revving engines and asshole behaviour made me head to the hotel soon. In the morning, checking Ringmeet telegram messages I saw this had been a good idea for anyone valuing sleep.

In short:

No respect for the other campsite people, no respect for Ringmeet arrangers who will take the heat if things go wrong, no respect for people who had brought kids along or people who had travelled from afar, no respect for Ringmeet itself. Stretch all available goodwill far enough and I could see VS giving FinalGear the cold shoulder. Had I brought new-to-Ringmeet people along, I would have been fucklng appalled.

After a day at the track and the Saturday evening dinner me and Lauri headed to Weihs to finalize the quiz award ceremony with Mikko joining us later for the TG part he masterminded. During that time, the awards had randomly started with no communication on the Ringmeet channel about the start time; we had expected an on-the-hour opening as earlier. As a result, Mikko wasn’t even present at the tent to receive his award. It felt weirdy outsider-like to stand in the open awning, looking at the rushed ceremony inside.

I’m not sour about the quiz going to shit from beginning to end results, as I care just as little about it now as everyone else. The problem is easily avoidable bullshit decisions that can be fixed by not being fucking stupid.

By Sunday, when the drunkenness had evolved to a hangover, the mood felt like old time Ringmeet with genuine camaraderie back on track, like it has been for a decade. But this year made me think the meet is autopiloting itself into a barrier with everyone drunk on the back seat, too busy patting each other on the back. Because all it takes for a meet to go well is that there’s plenty of alcohol and exhaust noise, right?

If I want that, I can just go to a BMW tuner fest in Finland. It’s cheaper.
 
While you shared your thoughts and complaints about this year's Ringmeet in the car on the way to the airport, I think you are overreacting a bit in your post. I can understand your frustration from the PubQuiz as your effort seems to be unappreciated, that the awards started kinda unexpectedly (I missed the first half, but that's because I had to put Gabi to sleep - my problem of course) and there was no "official" announcement of the quiz results. We could have a fixed schedule for these things and maybe get a loudspeaker and a microphone for the next year so you (or nanyone else hosting the PubQuiz) don't have to shout over 40 people already excitedly discussing answers to previous questions, some of which they actually barely understood.

The engine revving thing at night was dumb and unneccessary and the culprits probably feel guilty already, we could hang friendly reminders around tents for thext year. Excessive noise after 22:00 will be rewarded by a kick in the nuts! or simple REVVEN VERBOTEN, 500 EURO BUSSGELD might do.

Other than that, this year's Ringmeet was quite alright, very similar to the previous ones. Alcohol was consumed, friendly discussions in and around the partytents were had and cars were driven. I was having a good time.
 
I’m with public on this one. If the main focus is to get so drunk you lose respect for what’s around you, I don’t need to be here. I can book a more convenient time in June or July, stay at a hotel that is easily booked online with points. I don’t do this because it’s easy, I do it because I like hanging out with good people.

It’s why I wasn’t around for most of Saturday night. If it was going to be another immature I-Just-Got-Car-and-I’m-16-years-old rev fest, fuck showing up again. I wasn’t interested in getting told off again by both galantti and Icebone stating that we’re 20 minutes before quiet hours. Doesn’t matter, don’t be an asshole.

Thomas has a system going and we should not try and ruin it.
 
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stating that we’re 20 minutes before quiet hours.

Bad thing with that was, we were already gone quite a bit into the quiet hours before the first engine started ...
 
I agree with public completely.

The Italy Roadtrip was amazing, everyone got along fine and we had a ton of fun together (some smaller incidents happened, and I admit I also got annoyed at times by the communication/group dynamic caused by too many people on the trip to manage). But that is to be expected and I am fine with it. We had 10 days of friends having fun and seeing/driving amazing roads.

What I am totally not fine with is what happened at night on the campsite, especially the engine revving and honking at night. I spoke up about it, the same way Chris did, and then people started ridiculing the people who complained "Oh I better shut up before World Police Chris complains" - What the fuck people.

I think part of that crazy escalation has been caused by hard drinking before dinner (in my case, I was very tipsy due to beers, Rakija and Klopfer).


Regarding the pub quiz: it was - sorry - also a bit shitty, since

a) we were way too many people to handle it
b) the whole process with google forms was taking too much time and some people just googled every answer (at least my team (the winning team) did, why after asking a couple of times not to do it and being ignored I just lost all interest in the quiz.

I noped out as well and was at the hotel around midnight, didn't want to be associated with the shit that went down.

Then on Saturday Chris from the campsite tells us that there were noise complaints and that people asked if they should expect the same again this night, Thomas and me say no we will talk to the people and prevent them from doing it again. One hour later, we take off the mufflers from a car and rev the V8 in the campsite, what the hell people.

Also, I have serious worries that this FinalGear Test track behaviour will get us into deep shit soon. First of all, we had a couple of almost accidents between FinalGear cars in the twisties, as well as the guy who lives in the house next to the bumpy road giving me the finger when we drove past for the fifth time in one hour. If someone starts a noise complaint or even uses the word "racing", shit will happen, German cops are currently EXTREMELY sensitive when it comes to illegal street racing or what they call "car posing", driving around in modified extra loud cars.


My suggestions:

a) Stop bringing hard liquor. Seriously, shit goes bad. Beer is still ok.
b) Better communication & schedule announced ahead and stick to it.
c) Kick people out who act like dicks. Rev your rental AMG in the middle of the night? Car banned from campsite, end of story.
d) Limit the amounts of test drives we do, make sure only one FG car out & especially DO NOT GO FAST before you hit the twisties.
e) act like adults, not raging drunk 19 year old tuners


Again, thank you Thomas & orga team for making it happen, once again. Everything you did as preparation was great, but the people managed to seriously fuck up this year.

Also, on this note, special thanks to Mikko for organizing an amazing roadtrip & Ales for being an amazing "background supporter" who keeps shit going :)
 
OK, let me take the middle ground here.

Firstly, I was a bit irritated by the speed of drinking before dinner on Friday, especially the Klopfer escalation was not needed. I believe that most people were still well-behaved, eventhough a bit obnoxious, with a few very loud exceptions who know who they are.

Regarding engine reving - totally stupid, childish behaviour. The "muffler delete" thing was early enough in the evening and very much in the spirit of "very good bad idea" Ringmeet vibes that I think on it's own it would not have been a problem.

Thirdly, pub quiz. It went down like it did due to a mixture of tooling, drunkenness and lack of incentives, and I feel really sorry for the guys who put so much time into it.

Fourthly, test track - it's a function of number of cars until shit happens. So let's really keep tabs on who is doing what in which car. Especially with super-wide cars like Lucille or the Model 3 the test track needs a lot of focus.

Nevertheless, I found the weekend very enjoyable and do not regret coming. It was not the best Ringmeet ever, but it was not a disaster either.

This is also where I have to thank @thomas and @loose_unit for orga and storage of shit.

Not great, not terrible.

So, what to do:
a) Please don't abandon Ringmeet next year, especially @public , @DaBoom and @Lastsoul .
b) The last years, hard alcohol was limited to sampling of specialties like Single Malts, Malört or Cappucino Vodka. Most everyone still got shitfaced, but only in the wee hours, as it is supposed to be. Maybe let's all try to drink like a grown-up next year and not drink shots for the sake of getting shitfaced, we are no fifteen year olds any more. This also means that everyone will still be able to enjoy Saturday instead of spending them in a hung over haze.
c) @_Jules_ , @leviathan and I volunteer to contribute to/take over the pub quiz. This would include:
  • Bringing cardboard boxes for mandatory smartphone storage during the quiz. No exceptions.
  • Bringing some kind of portable projector to put the questions on a wall
  • Bringing pen&paper
  • Expanding format/categories
  • Making sure we have a strong believe that each question's answer has a realistic chance to be known by at least two members of the group
  • Making sure that only those who want to take part (no rain of course would have helped a lot here)
  • Bring prices (a box of cool crap!)
d) Coordinate the test track drives.
e) Generally, look out for each other and your surroundings and not act like a complete dick.

Also, let's keep in mind the positives. Beside from the above, fun was had, there were no fistfights and no blood was shed!

Finally, I'd like to apologize again to the pub quiz team for both the rowdy atmosphere and the stupidity of the awards timing.
 
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I can agree to what others wrote before, the Pub Quiz in its current form is dead IMHO, it needs a serious reboot. I'd also suggest to put it directly after the BBQ when people aren't already mullered. People not taking part in the quiz, should be waiting outside (rain or not, I don't care, get a bloody umbrella).

While the Klopfers alone cannot be made responsible for the drunkenness, I also agree that hard liquor shouldn't be consumed in masses. Maybe some noticed that I skipped the Whisky tasting this year. I haven't forgotten it, I just didn't feel like doing it after Friday, afraid it might attract the wrong kind of people.

I noticed a general mood of some people being rather on edge this year, but that might have had reasons that have nothing to do with Ringmeet or Ringmeet people.

Didn't notice any of the "test track" malarchy, but just one word to remind you: Illegal road racing (which includes going somewhere very fast in order to arrive as quickly as possible, even if you don't "race" anyone), is a felony in Germany. That' s not funny, nor is it a trivial offense, it can have serious consequences, up to a prison sentence. If the Nürburgring isn't enough for you to drive like a maniac, you better stay away from Ringmeet. And I mean that seriously.

The revving at night, well... in all honesty, even in the middle of the night, people are flooring it in the tunnel and that is much louder than a little revving on a lawn... but yeah, it was inconsiderate and it could have been avoided - in contrast to the tunnel noises nobody can influence.

And seriously, when Ringmeeters stay away from the awards ceremony because they have enough of the shouting and the bawling, it should be an alarm signal. Next year, let's try being civilized again.

But all in all it was again a nice meeting of people I like to spend time with, even though my back was giving me hell and I couldn't stand upright for more than a couple of minutes (which is why I didn't go to the Ring this year). Hopefully next year, that will be sorted out again.
 
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I’ll add that I had a good time as always at RingMeet and regret not being able to spend time with more people and saying goodbye to others.

I hope that I can take part in a future Roadtrip and look forward to seeing you all again (in a few years)!
 
Most of what I want to say has been said already, so I'll be brief.

People I like to hang out with, bunch of great cars, general atmosphere most of the time: (y)

Excessive drinking, shouting and revving after dark, almost having a few accidents on the "test track": (n)

Overall a fairly average Ringmeet for me. It felt busier than usual, partly in a good way, partly not. But I still owe a huge thanks to everyone involved for making it what it is, and will happily join again next year.
 
Regarding pubquiz: there are some severe issues that require it to be overhauled.

First of all, we ran it via Google Forms to make point tallying more convenient. But that also meant the surprising impenetrable wall of noise made it harder to actually host with no text based question presentation to help. We also declined a screen to avoid hauling hassle: in hindsight this made things worse. And as we were completely fed up with the shitshow very early on, we decided to push the ordeal through with no breaks.

In the future we’ll probably go back to pen and paper and adjust the difficulty curve more. Earlier years have not been so hard to both host and answer, so clearly we need to do some re-thinking. But I also second the idea of getting it done earlier - this year people’s heads filled with alcohol and urine in the time it took to get everyone in the tent and facing the right direction.

About hard liquor: let’s make it Malört only. It’s so bad it makes it difficult to get shitfaced.
 
I have to apologize to everyone for my behavior on friday evening. Both how I acted when I was drunk, and letting myself get to that level in the first place. What little I remember (which is a bad sign in itself) is enough to know that I was an obnoxious shithead. No excuses.
The only thing I can do is sincerely say sorry for that.

Personally, I will stay far away from any hard liquor during future ringmeets so it doesn't come to this again.
 
I know I'm not exactly whiter than white when it comes to booze related snafus but I have to agree that Friday night went way beyond what could be considered acceptable and far too early into the bargain.

Being asked at one point "who are those two little cunts following you around?" in reference to Sam and Toby is not the kind of behaviour I expect of Final Gear people and if I'd had more than just the one beer at that point there would have been blood on the floor of the kitchen tent for the second year running.

It's the main reason why I stayed off the beers myself and sheltered in the kitchen tent with Texas, and why I was happy to drive Nick and Ethan to Adenau in search of a cigar.

With regards to the comments about the timing of the Awards however, having done them for five previous years people should be familiar enough with the timing not to go AWOL and with 400 votes to count and collate you can't expect D and I to take a roll call before we start. Hell, I even stood outside the tent and shouted for latecomers before we started. I just figured that with the drunken shambles from Friday the quiz and it's results had been abandoned.

I'm very sorry that Mikko missed out on his award, evidently through no fault of his own, and I will do what I can to make reparation.
 
Regarding the awards I can it say that the reason why they were so rushed was because every year there had been an increasing resentment about how long they were running and how much they were eating into the time for other activities. Combined with the stress of this being my first year hosting, it had completely slipped my mind to do a proper announcement and I hadn't considered that people had just left the campsite after dinner as that's when the awards always take place.

I tried sitting down with Mikko and apologizing for that blunder and I hope he believes me it was not intentional.
 
This was my first ring meet ever, so hopefully my perspective is interesting for you.
First of all I wanna say that I had a great time, it was cool finally meeting all of you in person. ?

And yes, Friday night was … interesting … to put it mildly. ?
Pub quiz was unbearable for me, so I left the tent not even halfway through, I couldn’t even tell if the questions were too hard because it was impossible to understand most of them. So I went outside to spend some quiet time with lots of other people who had also fled from the yelling and the constant cowbelling and the rest of it. No matter how hard a quiz is and no matter what’s there to win, that is no way to treat someone who put time into creating something for the group.

As @Dr_Grip already said, we’d like to volunteer to help with next years quiz, or even take over, if the Finns are fed up after this experience. Of course this is not a hostile takeover, just an offer.
I’m an experienced pub quiz veteran (@D-Fence Kommando Mettigel!!) and love the sport, so I’m happy to help.

Also I like the no-hard-liquor idea. In my experience nothing good ever came from a box of Klopfers.
 
This was my first ring meet ever, so hopefully my perspective is interesting for you.
First of all I wanna say that I had a great time, it was cool finally meeting all of you in person. ?
My first Ringmeet had drunk people yelling and throwing punches, me nearly freezing in a tent and people smoking pot. :LOL:
I loved it and have been trying to go again ever since.
 
Smoking pot in Lucille!
 
From my point of view it was a funny year, some good and some bad aspects.

The Friday visit to the Andernach Geyser was great, as was the visit to the bunker last year. Friday seems perfect for these little days out.

I blame the Friday shitfaced-ness on the weather, it started raining and people just hit the bottle before food. The barbecue itself was excellent as always, many thanks to @Eye-Q, @DaBoom and anyone else who assisted with the cooking. Also thanks to Mrs 47 for the superb cakes. Friday night was very noisy, as much as I love the sound of a V8 the whole revving thing was totally unnecessary.

Regarding the quiz, Team Sunroof was based close enough to hear everything and it seemed fairly normal to me. The online answers were a good idea but I know we lost our answers as others did and it did encourage cheating. For the record, Team Sunroof did not cheat. We should definitely persevere with the quiz in some form or other, it wouldn't be right without it.

The awards were short and sweet, our new host needs more experience before he can ramble in the same way as his predecessor.

I'm too tired to think of anything else, overall I had fun and have no reason to put this down as a bad year. It felt like Ringmeet. Now let's hope we can go back and do the same next year.
 
After Ringmeet is before Ringmeet ;)
 
With regards to the comments about the timing of the Awards however, having done them for five previous years people should be familiar enough with the timing not to go AWOL and with 400 votes to count and collate you can't expect D and I to take a roll call before we start. Hell, I even stood outside the tent and shouted for latecomers before we started.

Eh, it's like saying you couldn't find enough matches to start a fire for smoke signals when we have a Telegram channel dedicated to Ringmeet info and a short message like "Awards start 21:39" or the like would have done.

But enough bitching from me. I think we've established how to make 2020's meet a bit better than this year's, and continuous, ambitious and rubbish plans are what keep the meet going. Onwards!
 
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