High speed "emergency" training... how do you do it?
06-08-2005, 11:49 AM
#16
Race Car
car prep
roll cage, fire system, 5 pt harness, helmet, window net, fire suit, shoes, hans, etc...
if you want to be safe-er add these!
I agree with the seat time responses.
Thats where experienced drivers decide to drive off the track, rather than try and save it. and maybe crash out.
Its so hard for less experinced drivers to take that rough ride off track to avoid a potential crash.
theres an old story of a new boat owner that looses power comming into the docks, as the new owner asks WHAT SHOULD I DO... and the answer is AIM for SOMTHING INEXPENSIVE....
likewise, going off track is often much less expensive then trying to save it and failing.
learning which are the low probality moves comes from experience.
if you want to be safe-er add these!
I agree with the seat time responses.
Thats where experienced drivers decide to drive off the track, rather than try and save it. and maybe crash out.
Its so hard for less experinced drivers to take that rough ride off track to avoid a potential crash.
theres an old story of a new boat owner that looses power comming into the docks, as the new owner asks WHAT SHOULD I DO... and the answer is AIM for SOMTHING INEXPENSIVE....
likewise, going off track is often much less expensive then trying to save it and failing.
learning which are the low probality moves comes from experience.
06-08-2005, 12:27 PM
#17
Addict
Rennlist Member
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Totally agree on the seat time statements. The only thing I would add is to always drive below your limit. Leave a little in reserve for when you need it.
Last Friday, as I was tracking out of T6 at LCMT, a deer hoped over the armco onto the track about 50ft in front of me. By not being on the very edge of my limit, I had enough of a reserve to get the car straightened out and slowed down to miss the deer. Also made for a good video
Last Friday, as I was tracking out of T6 at LCMT, a deer hoped over the armco onto the track about 50ft in front of me. By not being on the very edge of my limit, I had enough of a reserve to get the car straightened out and slowed down to miss the deer. Also made for a good video
06-08-2005, 12:31 PM
#18
Race Director
Every situation is different, but there are few things that make it better for you.
1) Vision..
What I mean here is the old looking far ahead adage. I really is true for "emergency" situations at any speed track or public road. The sooner you can identify potential situation the more time and distance you will have to make adjustments. I have been in cases were I see potential situtions so far ahead that I have the luxury of waiting things to settle down before I need to make my adjustment. While that is not always the case looking further down the road or track gives you time to respond.
2) Expectations & predictions.
This goes along with vision and fills in were you can't see. What I mean here is the ability to predict what a car will do especailly if it gets seeming out of control. You want to be able to see that car is losing it and then be able to predict the most likly result so that you can attempt to be somewhere else. 90% of cases I have hard cars spin in front of my I could predict where they were going and this pick place where I figured I would have room. In fact there was an incident at Turn 1 in willow were before the car lost control I could sense it happening and as it did I found myself needing to accelerate to get by the car before momentum caused out paths to cross.
This skill is also important when coming to blind corners were you can't see. In these case knowing that there potential risk area means you will be less surprized of something occurs. Also if you can predict when a car may chop off your line because that probably can't see you will save lots in body work.
3) Maintian calm and control
Vision and predection skills are importat, but once you have these you also need to stay calm and not panic. This is easier said than done, but you will need a clear head to make the right reactions.
4) Comfortable understanding of you car and track surrondings
It is also important to know what you can do in your car at various speeds and places on the track. You will need to decide in many cases to go right, left, slow or accelerate to avoid trouble. There are no set rules and what you choose is depedant on what state the car is in, where you are on the track, and of course what is off track. This takes time to know how much brake force you have left over, how much cornering, etc. Simply put good car control skills come from practice practice practice. It is valuable at any speed as you learn more and more about how the car will respond.
Personally I love autocross from the sand point of learning car control. The risks are very low as arer the speeds and you can use these to really learn what you can do to the car in many odd situations. Ie.. lifting in a corner. Most of the time DE instructors don't want you to do that with good reason. At an autocross it is nice to try it and see what happens. How bad is it? How much lift causes spin vs nice tuck in? Having some confidence to do things like this is imporant.
Fundamentally running at 160 vs 45 is not that different. Physics are still physics. Barring any major aero influences the car will respond the same way. What one must remember however is that at 160 mph the distance the car travels is much greater. The inputs themseles must be buttery smooth and result from an error can be much greater, but same basic dynamics apply. If you swerve at 45 mph the car will do the same thing at 160. The critical thing to remember is that you must be much more gentle at 160 as at 45 you can move the car 6 feet side ways in 30 feet, but at 160 that 6 foot sideways shift will take 500 feet to happen. Try to do ti 30 feet and bad things will happen.
Note if you ski the feeling is just the same. When going slow you can make tight turns the faster you go you can still make turns, but it takes much greater distance to complete them safely. The baisc inputs are the same.
1) Vision..
What I mean here is the old looking far ahead adage. I really is true for "emergency" situations at any speed track or public road. The sooner you can identify potential situation the more time and distance you will have to make adjustments. I have been in cases were I see potential situtions so far ahead that I have the luxury of waiting things to settle down before I need to make my adjustment. While that is not always the case looking further down the road or track gives you time to respond.
2) Expectations & predictions.
This goes along with vision and fills in were you can't see. What I mean here is the ability to predict what a car will do especailly if it gets seeming out of control. You want to be able to see that car is losing it and then be able to predict the most likly result so that you can attempt to be somewhere else. 90% of cases I have hard cars spin in front of my I could predict where they were going and this pick place where I figured I would have room. In fact there was an incident at Turn 1 in willow were before the car lost control I could sense it happening and as it did I found myself needing to accelerate to get by the car before momentum caused out paths to cross.
This skill is also important when coming to blind corners were you can't see. In these case knowing that there potential risk area means you will be less surprized of something occurs. Also if you can predict when a car may chop off your line because that probably can't see you will save lots in body work.
3) Maintian calm and control
Vision and predection skills are importat, but once you have these you also need to stay calm and not panic. This is easier said than done, but you will need a clear head to make the right reactions.
4) Comfortable understanding of you car and track surrondings
It is also important to know what you can do in your car at various speeds and places on the track. You will need to decide in many cases to go right, left, slow or accelerate to avoid trouble. There are no set rules and what you choose is depedant on what state the car is in, where you are on the track, and of course what is off track. This takes time to know how much brake force you have left over, how much cornering, etc. Simply put good car control skills come from practice practice practice. It is valuable at any speed as you learn more and more about how the car will respond.
Personally I love autocross from the sand point of learning car control. The risks are very low as arer the speeds and you can use these to really learn what you can do to the car in many odd situations. Ie.. lifting in a corner. Most of the time DE instructors don't want you to do that with good reason. At an autocross it is nice to try it and see what happens. How bad is it? How much lift causes spin vs nice tuck in? Having some confidence to do things like this is imporant.
Fundamentally running at 160 vs 45 is not that different. Physics are still physics. Barring any major aero influences the car will respond the same way. What one must remember however is that at 160 mph the distance the car travels is much greater. The inputs themseles must be buttery smooth and result from an error can be much greater, but same basic dynamics apply. If you swerve at 45 mph the car will do the same thing at 160. The critical thing to remember is that you must be much more gentle at 160 as at 45 you can move the car 6 feet side ways in 30 feet, but at 160 that 6 foot sideways shift will take 500 feet to happen. Try to do ti 30 feet and bad things will happen.
Note if you ski the feeling is just the same. When going slow you can make tight turns the faster you go you can still make turns, but it takes much greater distance to complete them safely. The baisc inputs are the same.
06-08-2005, 02:36 PM
#19
King of Cool
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Originally Posted by pole position
Senna was not killed by mechanical failure , it was driver error.
His steering column (or something else in steering) broke and that's why he went off.
You can clearly see from in car camera video that while he was steering to the left, car went right.
Besides, there really is no possibility for driver's error where Senna got killed, Tamburello is fast but it's not fast enough for those cars losing grip.
06-08-2005, 02:45 PM
#20
King of Cool
Rennlist Member
Rennlist Member
Regarding how to prepare for emergency situations:
Good way to practice is when it's slippery and you have open area where to "screw up" on purpose. It's different when the grip level or speed is not as high as it is on high speed and on asphalt but your brain will have experienxe what to do. Like learning to play guitar, you'll practice something hard for 1000 times slow and then you can do it faultlessly fast.
I've driven on frozen lakes or ocean during winters in Finland (yes, you need a cold climate for that) and when you have wide open ice you can get to very high speed and then do possible scenarios. try to keep control, lose it and then gain it back etc. Also doing controlled 360's, 180's slodes etc.
When your spinning totally out of control to a direction and at the same time you try to fiqure out which way you're going and to gain control, it's not easy on first time (just trying to fiqure out which end is forward!) but once you do it many times, you'll learn it.
And after you've learned it on ice, I'm sure you're better prepared on any surface.
Good way to practice is when it's slippery and you have open area where to "screw up" on purpose. It's different when the grip level or speed is not as high as it is on high speed and on asphalt but your brain will have experienxe what to do. Like learning to play guitar, you'll practice something hard for 1000 times slow and then you can do it faultlessly fast.
I've driven on frozen lakes or ocean during winters in Finland (yes, you need a cold climate for that) and when you have wide open ice you can get to very high speed and then do possible scenarios. try to keep control, lose it and then gain it back etc. Also doing controlled 360's, 180's slodes etc.
When your spinning totally out of control to a direction and at the same time you try to fiqure out which way you're going and to gain control, it's not easy on first time (just trying to fiqure out which end is forward!) but once you do it many times, you'll learn it.
And after you've learned it on ice, I'm sure you're better prepared on any surface.
06-08-2005, 02:47 PM
#21
Race Director
Senna crashed due to a combination of unforseen circumstances. Slow laps behing the safety car (which was rarely used) caused the tires to cool, their diameter went down, Ride height lowered just enough to catch in the bumps on the track. Once the car bottomed grip was lost and the car lost all control. Senna crashed and the final unfortunate unforseen event was the suspension part that enter his helmet.
Driver error? Hardly. Some times **** happens.
Driver error? Hardly. Some times **** happens.
06-08-2005, 04:58 PM
#22
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With a limited five years of track experience and after two crashes at Mosport last year, with the second one a write-off, I think the most important thing is to know when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em. I grew up driving a Beetle on ice in the winter in Montreal, and once took a skid school course where Scott Goodyear was my instructor. I took some pride in the fact that he was never able to spin me with the handbrake trick on a wet skidpad. However, in both crashes last year I opted for car control rather than for both feet in. My first time out with my new car, a BMW dropped its coolant in front of me entering Turn 9 at Mosport - with the wall about six feet to my left. When the car started to slide, I put both feet in, slowed, recovered the car, and proceeded. Knowing when to put both feet in is probably the most important factor in these situations, and it's something that gets drilled into us at skid school. I should probably do a refresher on that.
06-08-2005, 05:33 PM
#23
Race Director
Thre are the "official" reasons Senna crashed. Then there are the real reasons Senna crashed.
IMHO we will never know the real reasons. I don't buy driver error for even one second. Not at that corner.
IMHO we will never know the real reasons. I don't buy driver error for even one second. Not at that corner.
06-08-2005, 07:44 PM
#24
Burning Brakes
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Originally Posted by M758
Senna crashed due to a combination of unforseen circumstances. Slow laps behing the safety car (which was rarely used) caused the tires to cool, their diameter went down, Ride height lowered just enough to catch in the bumps on the track. Once the car bottomed grip was lost and the car lost all control. Senna crashed and the final unfortunate unforseen event was the suspension part that enter his helmet.
Driver error? Hardly. Some times **** happens.
Driver error? Hardly. Some times **** happens.
Pure mechanical failure was Jochen Rindt's acciident at Monza in 1970.
06-08-2005, 11:42 PM
#25
There are only two knids of things that you can hit - those that are moving and those that aren't. The normal tarck obstacles like walls, trees, buildings, etc. should be fairly easy to avoid. If you want to probe your limits, pick a place where there is good run off. By far the most hazardous obstacles at the track are the moving variety. Differential speed takes utmost concentration and care. When ever there is an incident or a slow moving car ahead, give yourself enough control margin to avoid if something unexpected happens.
06-09-2005, 01:53 PM
#26
You can't really practice an "emergency" situation... by definition it is an "emergency" becasue you would never voluntarily put yourself into it.... nor can you simulate panic... which is a key element of an "emergency"
Unfortunately, bottom line you learn by f**king up and getting yourself out of it....(or not).
Unfortunately, bottom line you learn by f**king up and getting yourself out of it....(or not).
06-10-2005, 01:21 AM
#30
Burning Brakes
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pole position: You aghast me! The trailer park needs a new TV or adjustments to the vertical or horizontal hold. Please Senna - driver error?