Tracks with Lap Counters and Start Lines in different places.

Track Building start page   |     More on lap counting    |     More on marking hundredths of a lap

Quite a few tracks have the start line and the lap counters on different parts of the track.  As long as the 1/100 of a lap are marked from the counters NOT the start line it works fine.  

Why do that?
The best place for counters and start lines are not necessarily in the same place - it depends a lot on circuit design.  For example lap counters often work best in the middle of a fairly short straight.  Starts can work best at the start of a long straight.  It works fine as lng as you understand what needs to be done.

What difference does it make to how laps count?
Depending on how the lap counters are set up that can have two outcomes.  I'll use a track where the start line is at 25 parts of a lap (quarter of the way round) as an example to help explain it.
1  The counters are set up to count the first lap.    
               So in the example everybody counts a lap having traveled 75 segments.   So arguably everybody has a 0.25 lap bonus added to their first lap.  As this is the same for everyone, it makes no difference to the racing positions (unless they break down before reaching 0.75 laps, (in which case they'd usually come last anyway)    Also the lap records could be seen as 0.25 lap too high, but it's the same for everybody.
2  The counters are set up not to count the first lap.    
               So in the example everybody has to do 1.75 laps before counting their first lap.   So arguably everybody has  0.75 laps subtracted from their first lap.  As this is the same for everyone, it makes no difference to the racing positions (unless they break down before reaching 1.75 laps, in which case they'd usually come last anyway)    Also the lap records could be seen as 0.75 lap too low, but it's the same for everybody.

How do the race control systems work?
This is how race control systems intended for segmented racing usually deal with this.
They can be set up to count the first lap but ignore its lap time.  What does that mean?
In segmented racing cars can stop anywhere round the lap.  Obviously you want it to count the first lap of the next segment even if the car started from a few feet before the counters.  However, starting a few feet before the counters it would appear to have achieved a ridiculously fast lap time.   In normal running, counters are set to not count laps that are too fast - sometimes called "off set time"  (this prevents double counting laps, link to more about this function), but they can be set to only start calculating the "off set time" from the first time the car goes over the counters.   In normal running, counters calculate each driver's fastest lap, but again  they can be set to only start calculating the fastest lap from the first time the car goes over the counters.

Have a look at the handbook for your chosen system to see exactly how each system it can be set up to do that.

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