BobbyC

The whole darn driving culture in the US sucks!!!

Bad drivers, bad attitudes, bad roads and a law enforcement ethic that borders on highway robbery. Our finest will tag you for not having a front licence plate, yet these same enforcement corps will allow tractor trailers terrorizing (often two wide) at 25 above the posted speed limit, ignore or condone moms doing 85 mph in their supersized Escalades while yakking on their cell phones and/or sipping lattes at the same time, encourage slow moving traffic to sit in the passing lane, and otherwise promote a culture of initmidation and intolerance.

Anyone here surprised there aren't more fatalities on the roads where weaving in an out of lanes is as American as apple pie? If this doesn't suck, what does?

Z-man

Hey, I'm one of those "instructors" that never raced. Do you consider me to be one of those "Steve McQueen" types (per Todd's translation)?

Just because I'm not a club racer doesn't mean that I don't understand what happens at high rates of speed - on the street or on the track.

And it doesn't take a whole lot of experience or intelligence to see that this tragedy didn't have to happen if the driver had enough self control and common sense to know you can't be driving that fast on that road at that time.

Unfortunately, when someone buys are car, there is no 'self control' or 'common sense' test. Seems the Lotus driver would have failed those two tests miserably...

-Z-man.

Doug H

Again, please do not speculate if you don't know what happened. Witnesses confirmed that the car came around a corner and a deer was in the road. Excessive speed was not an issue nor was driver control. The car hit huge jagged rocks sticking out causing the poor guy's wife to strike her head on the rocks sticking out.

carreracup21

I will say that just because some broken speedo says 112, it is far from scientific evidence that he has going 112. In fact, I doubt it is evidence of anything at all except a terrible fatal crash. Better not rush to judgment on these issues when all the facts are not in. That light little lotus doesn't appear particularly crash worthy. RIP and blessings to the family.

F350Lawman

Speculation. The Elise is very hard to get above 120. Maybe going downhill on a very long straight. The speedo also has about a 4 to 8 percent error rate and is very slow to react to quick braking at high speeds. The indicated speed usually does not correct until after a threshold brake and the car settles. No need for speculation to try to make things look worse than they are. An enthusiast died. Sad day. Learn from the experience and pray for the family.

Perhaps I should have worded my response differently. Obviously you are a familiar with the Elise, so I'll take your word for it that an unmodded Elise won't do much more than 120mph. Oh and I'll even stop speculating if you stop making assumptions about why I wrote what I wrote.

I wasn't "trying to make it look worse". That would be near impossible.... after all death was the result of this incident.

His speed, if it was 60, 90, 112, or 120+ mph is really just conversation. We all do it, you see a T-bone accident at an intersection and the reaction is often along the lines of "gee it sure looks like the red car ran the light" or "hey, look at those tire marks, the blue car was speeding". Scientific...no, just a guess based on the minimal information we have at the time. No harm done, this is just a forum. It is unlikely we'll be called as expert witnesses or that our comments will taint the jury pool.

Charley B

I guess jumping to conclusions based on a speedometer reading after it has been violently ripped from a car in a fatal accident makes about as much sense as it would for me to assume someone was an ******* for calling a fellow auto enthusiast names for finding himself dead beside the highway from an auto accident. At this point we have no idea what happened or how fast the driver was going. None whatsoever. He could have been doing 112, he could have been doing 55. We DON'T know. We also don't know how fast the opposing traffic was going, 55? 112? We DON'T know.
We have absolutely no idea what happened or who was at fault. If you want to feel some real disgust, assume for a moment that this guy was driving safely and one of the other vehicles was at fault. Now go back and read some of these posts.
Where the hell do you get off crucifying some poor bastard without having a shred of evidence that he has done anything wrong? That speedometer is probably pointing the direction of the point of last sudden deceleration.
If it turns out this guy was speeding, drunk and totally at fault, it still doesn't excuse convicting him before there is any kind of evidence regarding the cause of the accident or the speed of the vehicles involved.

mamoroso

+1

It always shocks me how easy it is for some people to point the finger and judge others even without knowing anything about the circumstances.

As if these people had never ever exceded the speed limit ("If I did do 112 it was on a deserted highway bla bla bla").

The guy killed himself. I feel sorry for him. I feel really sorry for the others involved. But were they going at the speed limit? Were they somewhat resposible? Who knows.

What happened is just tragic. It is a reminder that accidents happen and have dire consequences.

Kiko

+1

But Veloce Raptor was only one of the many who seem to feel confortable calling names someone they don't know for doing something they didn't witness. None of this would be important if that person wasn't killed which was the case.

Veloce Raptor, nothing was lost in translation, you and some of the people who supported your "name calling" are ******** to say the least.

BTW, I bet my English is a lot better than you Portuguese...

LVDell

It always amazes me the ***** some guys grow when hiding behind a computer (like yourself) and then feel comfortable calling somebody and *******. What a hipocrite you are and have done it now TWICE in this thread. Had you the stones to dissent as the devil's advocate in this thread you would have been the FIRST one to post about how "wrong" everybody was for jumping to conclusions without name calling. Cowardly if you ask me.

I've noticed in several threads you (and your type) seem to do this. Typically follower of mob mentality whereas one person dissents, then gets some support and a head of steam and then you jump on board with the "yeah, me too" holier than thou attitude.

Sure, it's not right to come to conclusions without all the facts. But the fact is the article was claiming "high rate of speed" and thus we extrapolated the conclusion. It's human nature. especailly on a board where it is SEVERELY frowned upon to haul *** on public streets. Save it for the track.



Off my soapbox now. Flame away. My skin is thicker than you can imagine.

ps. why can't you practice what you preach (err, I mean PREACHED )

Kiko

Did you feel you comtemplated in my post? I sure hope so...

Btw, you're wrong I don't go with the flow I was the first to criticize V. Raptor's post and yours. I didn't reply before because I don't have the time to make 10,000+ posts on a forum like you.

I don't hide behind a computer, you can get me anytime you want unlike the poor chap who died and even after that was called this and that...

TheOtherEric

+1. The posts in this thread, jumping to conclusions and crucifying this dead fellow without ANY evidence really makes me ashamed of Rennlist. The speedo reading means nothing. The quote about him driving at "high speed" means only that he was on a highway.

His younger sister is having the ECU sent back to Lotus so they can figure out the details of the accident. Until then, people should STFU with their criticisms.

jimculp

The Elise isn't "hard to get over 120"- It may be hard to get over 140. It's also not slow to react to braking at high speeds.

I agree about the speedo error. Mine is generally off 7 mph.

Doug H

Driving on the track it is. I was at a track with a 3/4 mile straight this past weekend and my car runs into a brick wall at 120 about 1/2 way through and my car is under 1,900 pounds. It will get to an indicated 120 quickly, but after that, hardly any accelleration whatsoever.

My speedo is very twitchy and slow to react to threshold brake at high speeds on the track. My brakes are a little better than stock and I have R6s. I would say my speedo is about a second behind the tach during a threshold brake from 120 or so to 85 mph.

LVDell

Quite the winner you are. So simple to attack somebody for posting a point of view based upon the information presented. If he was driving as people suggested then yes I stand by my statement (as I'm sure others will). However, if this was a simple case of him following the speed limit and somebody ran him off the road, etc., then he doesn't deserve this criticism. For that you are correct. What people are chapped about is reading stories about this and "speed on public roads" attached to it. It is senseless and stupid. That gets people pissed b/c we shouldn't lose anybody that way when we know it's not something that should not be practiced on the public roads.

As for jumping me b/c of my # of posts. Why don't you go read through them and undersstand that a great majority of them are to HELP OTHERS OUT but then again that doesn't mean anything to you b/c you are doing exactly what you were critical of others....jumping to conclusions. Once again, a hypocrite.

And enough with the false macho bravado your try to use to ease your insecurities. Nobody said they wanted to kick your tail in face-to-face tough guy, all that was said is that you seem to like to hide behind the keyboard and lob grenades in. Apparently you didn't follow what you preach in the thread where you got on people for not being nice. Go read it again.

Consider this the last you hear back form me. I don't have time to waste on trivial people like yourself.

Doug H

To funny.