Dbltime

Thought you might enjoy a short in car video from last weekends races. After this film the car re-fired and went back racing. Study the film and tell me what the driver (me) should have done differently to likely avoid the incident. This is a test.


Sebring Bannana Peels

LastGT3

clean the track.
dont follow the line of the guy ahead of puffing smoke like he is spitting something.
I give up

Dbltime

Bingo. I thought the car smoking locked his brakes. If I had considered blown motor and moved left off line and out of the oil I could have easily slowed to a slow but uneventful turn in.

GT3 Chuck

I thought you did great to supress the obligatory "son of a b...h!" when you bounced off the tires....glad you weren't hurt and the car still wanted to race...

LastGT3

Tough to think about the other guys engine internals with 240 kph on the speedo!

Dbltime

Next time... when I see smoke I move off line. Period. I never considered my car could be OK to continue racing. I am accustomed to amateur/club racing where the rules require you to quit. The tow truck guy was surprised I did not attempt a re fire. At his suggestion I pulled away from the wall and he said "hell dude that will buff out". All I could see from the drivers seat is my left headlight lens flapping in the breeze and getting dark fast. Another racing lesson...

Larry Herman

Bill, Bill, Bill. Man, you've got to keep that thing in one piece. If it weren't for bad luck, you'd have no luck at all (or did I say that last time ) I think that Rick DeMan should buy you a nice Christmas present to make you feel better.

Dbltime

Larry, As you know this incident was a small inconvienece in comparison to some of my race events. I should buy Rick and his boys a nice Christmas present . We still had 5 hours of great racing until the motor let go. Dropped a valve we suspect. Next time...

NJ-GT

If the smoke was from braking, that meant 4 wheels lock to generate such cloud, and that car would have gone off track or off-line. If the car stayed on the racing line (as it did), with all that smoke, forget smoke from brakes and think engine/transmission oil, get out of the lapping line.

If that happened to me, I would be at the same tire wall you hit.

Nice Car

viperbob

Darn Bill, I missed you again at Sebring... Well one of these days..

Dbltime

Bob,
Mark your calender March 1,2,3 Sebring Race
Is Rt 60 your best option from the Tampa Airport?

por29

Hi Bill,

I love your video selection.. What car were you driving in the 2005 Glen race. I'm sure you'll be at the Sebring club race.

Bill Rudtner
www.rudtnersracing.com

viperbob

I'll mark it on my calendar Bill. Actually from the airport (which I have to drive past as I am 38 miles straight north of there) I take 275 south to 75 south then in about 4 miles you hit 64. Take this east about 45 miles to 66 then another 30 miles and you are literally at the track. Very low traveled route with almost no stops.

38D

To answer your "what could you have done", the only thing is recognized it sooner and slowed down. You can actually see the smoke screen just before you go to shift, while at the same time it looks like you are going thru some smokey remanants. You probably still would have gone off, but might have avoided contact. Hard to say if you realistically had enough time to do so. And it is obviously easy to second guess after the fact.

I learned the slow-way-down-when-you-see-smoke lesson at WG in '05 after watching Brett Overacker crash hard when the 968 in front of him threw a rod thru the bottom of the case. If I hadn't been 75 yards back, I would have eaten armco for sure.

Dbltime

Bill, I was driving my 993 converted street car in 2005 WG 2R or S. I am not racing PCA Sebring as the HSR event is March 1st. Once you have raced a HSR event PCA becomes a fill-in (for me anyway)

VB, Thanks for the travel tip. Mapquest sent me through Tampa on 60 and it was a slow go forever.

Colin, The spin was bad but laying against the tires and having the next two cars spinning in your direction was more of a threat. I was lucky and able to keep on racing with minor body damage.
Oil in the braking zone is bad news.