This happened at NJMP Thunderbolt yesterday--it was one of the "Advanced" Driver Club Open Track events, which I attended before. Need some tips and opinions on how and if this is anything I can do differently in the future to avoid or at least minimize the encountering the same thing again. Video should explain the whole thing, I hope at least.

 

Man, that sucks! And it really sucks the people who ran the event let the guy keep running, without any sign of remorse or apology or offer to help you pay for it. I guess we are surrounded by horrible people.

 

We always stress at the driver meeting that it is a point by for EACH CAR and not a general point by for every car to the rear of the driver giving the point by. Each car has to be pointed by.

The guy was in the wrong, plus who thinks they should take a point by right at the point where you are going to be turning into an apex?

That's not just a mistake on his part - that's poor track judgment and awareness.

 

That guy was in the wrong and he should have admited it but its a track incedent. Sucks but we r all responsible for our own cars even if its not our fault.

I give passes all the time through that apex but with no point he should not have assumed u were gonna leave room. Im guessing he thought he was a race car driver?

Just 1 more reason for me not to join the drivers club at njmp.

 

Ahhh, the US fascination with point by's. Never had them in Australia, wasn't ever an issue. To me they cause more issues than they solve.

 

you can't fix stupid

 

No point bys and driving upside down? DE in Australia sounds wild!

 

 

That was unfortunate for you and stupid of the driver that hit you. Otherwise, I kept saying to myself what I tell my students when behind a slower car “stay with them!”. I think you were being way too considerate of the BMW ahead of you. If you “stay with them!” hopefully the slower car will see they are NOT pulling away from you at any straight or corner on the track and finally point you by. Now if it was a Cup car coming up behind me then I’d let them by to go harass the slower car ahead.

 

FIFY

 

That dude thought he was Senna going for a gap. As others have said, unfortunately sometimes you just get screwed by someone being stupid/impatient. Sorry.

For the future I would make sure you pass the head of the train before letting others try and force a slow car to give point by.

 

Point by or not its passers responsibility to execute a safe pass.

Where your car was it likely should have been obvious to someone experienced that there was not room to make a safe pass there as you needed racing room to make the corner. If you were to not apex that corner at that speed you would have gone off track.

IMO it takes 2 cars to have an incident and there is always something you could have done better to prevent it is my personal creed for incident avoidance. You're 0% to blame for this but if you want to nitpick what you could have done in this case is point by earlier on the straight or even started pointing by in the corner (I do actually do that becuase it takes people time to prepare to pass and I ideally do want them passing me well before the end of the straight. Especially if we're doing exactly what you're doing and let another guy apply pressure and see if the a-hole in front lets him by). I refuse to say you should have gone in the pits and come back out, because what should have happened is the a-hole in front should have let cars pass.

I think you could also be firm with the organizers that this guy hit you, and his story was BS. If you let that guy do whatever he wants he'll learn nothing and do it again. The guy is driving a car that should be able to pass anyone anywhere in that session so wtf is he doing being that aggressive and dive bombing in a fast sweeper.

 

Of course, flat earth and all that. There’s always one….

 

This.

 

Thanks all, my takeaways from this are:

- If I want a point-by, don't be so nice and get comfortable with riding on the slow car's bumper.
- If I don't want a point-by and are okay with waiting for the next pit opportunity, then let the other cars behind pass sooner.
- Let the other cars pass sooner, ideally mid corner if it is safe, or the corner exit. Passing going into a corner is often higher risk due to higher delta V.
- If you take your car to the track, **** happens even if it is no fault of your own. It is what it is, just like street driving and life in general.

I also posted the same video on another place that has much broader track going audience (Reddit), the comments are mostly helpful and concur with what has been written here. But of course, lol, there are some wild opinions as well from a more diverse audience:
"
- I am way too slow of a driver and I should go f'off and play with the other noobs in lower groups. This was coming from a local NJ guy who that drives a ND1, Rush, and Elise and claims I should be doing mid 1:20s consistently with my car on street tires. I am still new to the area so I can't put a face on this guy, but maybe some of you know who that is for your own sake. And frankly I don't think doing consistent 1:32ish on this car at NJMP is horrible... and at no point I tried to be unpredictable and unaware of other faster cars, which is the most important part of being in a more advance group.
- The tone of my video seems condescending and make me seem like an *******. Very fair point, I heard this from my wife before too lol. But to truth is I am still quite salty when I posted the video after the BS I get from the other driver and his son, who was driving with him and arguing together with his father.