93Polo

Abruptly effectively taking control of the car in a moment which is what was implied is very different than what you are explaining.

Newton06

Thanks for the update. As tragic as this event was, it could have been worse.

apex26

Rearranging liability responsibilities after the fact is not an effective answer. The tragedy still happens, and anyone expecting consistent justice from the courts is not familiar enough with the system. There should never be a tree or berm in a runoff area. Frankly, that just shows contempt for participant safety. Too bad the Society of Automotive Engineers can't develop ASE standards. Even absent that, a hay bale is only $3. Progressively positioning hay bales and/or a catch fence and the instructor could have walked away. Hopefully these shattered lives count for something in this arena.

jlutherva

My sympathy to the family of the driver.

Glad to hear that the instructor is out of the hospital. I wonder how his medical bill are being handled......

Jim

C2Racer

Very very sad. Unfortunately we lost 2 racers in one weekend a few years ago at Hallett. One on track with a heart attack/then crash and another in the paddock. The track incident was a very close friend and I'm still not completely over it...never will be.

My condolences to the family and best wishes to the brave instructor who it sounds like may have saved the lives of others.

Steve

TopSpeedNeed

The DE was a Saturday/Sunday event. After the incident, Sunday was cancelled for obvious reasons. We got an email a couple days later offering a 147 dollar refund for the cancelled day, or send it to a gofundme account for the instructor. I believe everybody is sending the money to the instructor and family.

BladeZ06

Horrible to hear. Always a risk but never fun when things like this happen.

Found an article about the crash.

http://www.thedrive.com/accelerator/...rack-day-crash

RIP and hope the instructor pulls through.

maj75

Wondering if in addition to the tech sheets we need for our cars, we need tech sheets for our health. I’ve seen some pretty old guys with some outrageously fast cars. Even a minor health issue could be very dangerous. I’m 60 and I can foresee the day when my eyes and reactions will get to the point I shouldn’t be on track. You need a medical certificate to fly a plane. If medical issues are really causing fatal accidents, maybe it’s worth considering.

apex26

Be careful what you wish for. The theory may be fine, but strangers behind a desk making random decisions is scary. My observation is that guys who look in terrible shape, and you just know they are on multiple meds, are not wearing the medical wristband that NASA requires they wear. Age really isn't on point. Carroll Shelby was swallowing heart pills in the cockpit as a young man and Paul Newman was winning fiercely competitive races at about age 80. I'm 65, but my MD says my reflexes are still "hyper" fast, and I routinely run 10 miles or more. Groups can tighten up some slack and mitigate these risks without forcing physical exams, etc.

spearfish25

As a physician, i have to say the idea of medical clearance for track events is a bit ridiculous. Good luck telling someone that they can't participate because they had an MI a few years ago and haven't seen their cardiologist lately. An HPDE can induce some physical exertion but i doubt a heart rate goes above 105-110bpm on track for any of the drivers. I know mine doesn't based on Apple Watch health data. We don't get clearances for people to run a 5k, swim in a community pool, or get a membership to LA Fitness. All of those can be more strenuous. The instructor was unfortunately in the wrong place at the wrong time. I'd venture to guess inexperienced and over zealous students have killed more bystanders at track events than medical conditions.

badhabit_wb

Even with planes you can get a basic med cert if you have a drivers license and you can get your doctor to sign off. This is kind of like flying in that you have to decide if you're healthy enough to fly before each flight.
It's going to be tough with something like this because you could be fine on Friday and have a mi on Saturday.
I had a girlfriend years ago that lost her dad during a stress test. The doc's thought he was fine and they were giving him a physical.
Stuff happens...

Olden Slowe

WTH kind of race track has a berm in a run-off area?? Let alone one substantial enough to launch a vehicle. Unbelievable

apex26

BINGO! Senna would be alive today if tracks listened to safety concerns. And, the good MD hits the nail on the head--your chances of getting hurt from a medical event are dwarfed by other risks, for instance the kid driving a crap box boosted to the moon (always with stock brakes), and desperate to create a youtube passing any corvette.

maj75

I haven’t run into any Carrol Shelby or Paul Newmans at the HPDEs I attend. Pointing out the exceptions is no reason to reject the idea. Great, YOU go to your doctor and YOU know you have hyper fast reflexes. Awesome! But I’m willing to bet there are plenty of guys who haven’t been to an eye doctor or regular doctor for years. Given the lethal speeds of the cars that show up in the green group, I wouldn’t be an instructor. Not for a lifetime of free track days. I really see a huge change in the last five years in the types of cars that beginners are showing up at the track with. Just seems a little funny that more attention is payed to the condition of the car than the condition of the “nut” behind the wheel.

Bill Dearborn

A couple of comments about things mentioned in this thread. First, instructor taking the wheel. When I took my instructor training back in 2007 this was on the almost Verbotten List. The reason, you could have two people fighting for control of the wheel and neither having any control. It wasn't ruled out in all conditions but communication has to be clear between both parties with the instructor saying what they are going to do and the student agreeing they can do it. Even then it was suggested to do so with some trepidation. In the 11 years since I took instructor training I have only taken the wheel twice to do as Poor Sha indicated teach somebody the line and that was at a much slower pace than running at .7. Other than that I have talked to students about the line and then taken them for a ride in my car at a slower pace to talk to them while showing them the line and telling them why I am doing something. This always seems to work better with women than men.

Medical conditions do happen on track. I know there was a PCA event about 15 years ago at the Glen where a student had some sort of medical condition going down hill into T6, hit the outside tire wall and rebounded into the inside guardrail. If the driver wasn't dead before impact he would have been killed on impact due to an improperly installed harness system that let the shoulder harnesses come off his body after the first hit. Luckily, he was running solo so nobody else was injured.

Mechanical failures are more likely than medical conditions no matter how well cars may or may not be prepped. Brake lines suddenly pull loose under heavy braking taking you from max braking to none. Gets exciting when the student yells into the microphone "NO BRAKES" at 135 mph 350 ft from a 90 degree turn.

The most likely thing to happen is the student screws up. As instructors we can coach somebody to get up to some pretty fast speeds especially when they realize the car can corner two or three times faster than they thought it could. However, we can't teach them the proper car control for when something happens to change the situation. That takes experience and the only way to get that is through lots of seat time. Sometimes the instructor can prevent this because they see the student setting up a potential failure point. However, students also make sudden decisions in the middle of events when the instructor is thinking "OK, they have this down and are doing fine." That is when the student suddenly takes their foot off the brake when they shouldn't or suddenly turns the steering wheel when they shouldn't or worse suddenly chickens out in the middle of a turn and lifts off throttle when they shouldn't. Those are the fun ones when you take a wild ride through the grass and hopefully don't hit anything. You are always just one brain fart away from disaster.

Bill

ncstingray

Here is some info on Patrick the instructor injured in the accident.

https://www.gofundme.com/patrickwilsonsrecoveryfund

tw78911sc

I would bet less than 1% of any off road incidents at RRR occur in turn 1, the berm is 100 yards off the track, if you go off track there, you gently turn right and do the rodeo thing parallel to turn 2 or past if needed. ABS or not no one is stopping a 150 mph car in GA sand. If the guy was passed out and I was in the instructor seat at 150 mph (which is common there), I too would try to turn the car right. People being instructed are driving, but the instructor is in charge, no time for egos and there is no time for discussions about braking or turn in points. Pull that crap with me and we are going to the pit lane and getting it sorted out, if that doesn't work, I find the chief instructor, tell him/her what I experienced and swap students. I've instructed for 20 years in more clubs I can list, some clubs are real loose and others pretty strict. PCA IMO is more on the strict side and demand in class instruction etc where others just turn people loose and encourage instructors to sign people off as solo ASAP. I've had students that if I never said brake, they wouldn't, I've had others so slow my wife would wax them leaving a Target parking lot. Some students are passive (don't want to be there, spouse girl/boy friend) and others that want to see their fast mph for the weekend. I stopped instructing for a few years after a student I had that had been told to never shift in the middle of turn 9 at RRR, but the last lap of the last day, he decides to shift and before my lips could move, he went from 3rd to 2nd instead of 4th and we wrote off a new boxster on the pit straight. I had a bad concussion and tore some bone off my neck/spine. I feel terrible for everyone involved in this. It impacts your families life/outlook, track workers, event organizers, any one in attendance. When I started HPDE 200HP was a typical starter car, miatas, civic si, now anyone can show up with 800HP and no experience. I will only instruct those that are already solo, proven and are looking to shave time off laps. My wife absolutely hates me instructing, not worth getting a pass on registration and a free lunch/tee shirt. I enjoy doing the classroom training and running an event. HPDE is a terrible gateway drug to racing and that is where it gets crazy. To get a race license you do have to get a DR to sign off on a physical, HPDE nada, Race cars are inspected, maintained between events, HPDE you hope they torqued the wheels.

LG Motorsports

This is very sad and hopefully rare as well. I have seen too many over the years.

you are right there are many ways to control a run away car but one that is full throttle with no attempt to use the brakes is rare.

Having said that, In a Trans Am race at Long Beach St. course on the back straight, I hit the tire wall head on with no brakes at about 125 miles an hour. The tire wall was five rows deep and with that many tires to cushion the the impact - the car ended up with only body damage but no frame damage and I was the driver and walked away.

I have 2 reasons for concern. I am building a new 3.2 mile track on land behind our new LG Motorsports facility just north of Dallas. I have raced long enough to see no less than 4 racers lose their life at races I was at. It is not a good feeling.
We all think we are bullet proof.

I don’t like gravel traps and sand traps because I have seen too many cars flip when they were otherwise just skid into a tire wall.

I plan on thick tire walls where a car could lose its brakes at high speed.

A dirt burm is not good because They are built wider at the bottom and even with tires in front of them A high speed crash can still end up with the car catapulted and act as a launching ramp.

I plan on limiting the top speed of a “supercar” to 150 with run off areas banked up to aid slowing the car in a skid-spin.

We are lucky the instructor will recover in time.

God Speed to the driver

Lou Gigliotti