Capt. Carrera

I never drive any student's car. What if some a$$ hat hits me while I'm driving their car?

Likewise, there are three things I don't lend out. My car, my wife, and my underwear. Go get your own.

SundayDriver

From what I know, not even close. Todd had an incident and not only took care of the damages (insurance covered part) but took care of the other party in regards to increased premiums for some time. **** happens on tracks and no one is likely to feel like they got a good deal in an incident, but the person who is the subject of this thread appears to have run from any personal responsibility while Todd stood up and took responsibility.

Z-man

I am sorry, but if:
1. Your hobby is driving a car on the racetrack
and
2. Your car happens to be a Noble,

Then your "inability to pay for damages you caused to a car" is just a flat out lie. If you can't pay for something you damaged, you sell your car, and/or stop going to track days until you do the needful and pay for the damages, especially if you first stated that you would pay for it.

If anything, the notion that Paul Wilson is still driving his Noble on racetracks, YET claims to be unable to pay for the damages he casued would certainly cast a lot of doubt on his case if this goes to court...

As for driving a student's car - my thought on that is simple: respect other people's property. For me, that means driving it at a level even below the student's pace. You don't need to be driving at 10/10ths to show a newbie driver the line.

-Z-man.

roberga

We have in the past given the novice drivers a few laps as an orientation and demonstrate the line. I always use me car even going freeway speeds. Anything can happen even mechanical.

multi21

Sorry to hear about the accident and the disagreement about who is to pay for the damage, but this is neither the time or place to discuss this. It appears this is a personal matter and other than outing this so called instructor, what are we on this board to do? IMHO, it is pointless.

Tim

[hijack]

Just a quick note. At a DE last year, We instructors were required by the organizer to drive a green (novice) students car for a whole session.

FYI

[/hijack]

A.Wayne

Because all are 25 yrs old


This has been my disposition for years , as a matter of fact i force my instructors to drive my turbo beastie.....

1AS

Well, I'm not a lawyer either, but have been involved in litigation, including a suit for defamation (and loss of consortium). Those who posted, "anyone can sue for anything" are correct, and that includes Mindy. Unfortunately, sometimes you need to pay for the lawsuit to force the situation to come to the negotiation table. In my case, it mean need to counter sue.
Looking at it from Mindy;s side, she paid for "instruction", not some guy sawing away at her steering wheel to hear the tires howl. She didn't pay for a mechanical evaluation of her car, an assesment of its raceworthiness, or anything other than instruction.
Further, she asserts that she was informed that the process would involve laps with the instructor driving the instructor's car. The instructor, who can be seen as an agent of the party that sold the instruction, told Miy, "Let"s take your car". We aren't told that he asked permission, or a consent was signed for this purpose.
Mindy can tell us (or the court) if she felt the organizers required these "instructor drives" laps, so she had little option but to assent or walk away from her fees and time commitment.
I think Mindy can make a reasonable assertion that she assumed the instructor would have the same responsibilities in her car that he did in his own- namely pay for any damages he incurred. Others may disagree, but that would be for a judge to decide. She can assert that her signed release applied to her driving, and that of others driving their own cars, but not an instructor negligently crashing hers. In an extreme, woud she be seen as "more right" if the instructor had intentionally pinned the throttle and driven straight into a wall with the purpose of testing her seat belts? I think that woud be seen as something besides instruction.
In any case, in multiple circumstances where I feel I (or the organization I represent) had been wronged, I have filed suit. That is done with the belief that there is a valid arguement (again open to discusion), hoping for resolution.
Once you do that, at some point the other party says, "Isn't there some way we can settle this?" The reason that occurs is that in our country, everybody has to pay their own legal fees. In most cases, that means somebody has to calculate the cost of litigation vs. the cost of settlement.
Mindy now has costs, and will incur additional legal fees. Right now, the other dude has no costs, so until he has some risk, Mindy probably won't hear any offers from him.
It may be that she will spend more than $1 for each $1 she wins, but there isn't any way to predict that now. The difference can be seen as the value of not getting abused by an ill-doer.
I see little liklihood that Mindy can be counter-sued. That means no lawyer will take ths case on contingency for the instructor. Mindy may have to pay somebody to start the process, as the liklihood of prevailing may not be enough to get a lawyer to take it on contingency, but she can always decide when to pull the plug.
Unfortunately, whe somebody decides to step away from doing the "right thing", few choices remain.
When I did this on a race engine that self-destructed (due to a faulty crank being used in assembly), it cost me $900 to file the case, and got me $6,000 one year later. That was less than my cost, but a better outcome than whining.
The process works better if Mindy can sue in a state other than where the instructor lives, and other than where the sponsoring group is based, and particularly well if Mindy lives in the stae in which she sues.
The reason for that is her lawyer is a local guy, and the other dude not only needs his lawyer, but local counsel as well. AS

Rick

This is much closer to the way it really happened. I'm good friends with the car owner and he's said several times that Todd took full responsibility for the entire situation.

Greg Fishman

Mark and Rick have the story correct. It was a real downer that Todd wrecked my car('98 993 Carrera S) but it was just some body panels and could have been much worse. My insurance covered the damage since it was a DE, total cost was over $16k. Todd paid me my deductible and what we estimated was the increase I would see in my insurance. My insurance carrier ended up dropping me as I had another claim a few months later when my trailer was stolen. Just to be clear Todd did step up to the plate and did take responsibility (financially) for the damage, he was fortunate that insurance covered the damage.
Todd and I are still friends and I understand that stuff happens on the track. Todd is/was a good driver, he was just a bit aggressive and lost it on a track that has little forgiveness in places (Road America).

Bob Rouleau

Many PCA regions including mine require that the instructor drive the student's car for the first two laps of the first green session.This is done at very slow speed. Nominal reaason is toshow the line. More important reason is that it allows to instructor to assess if the car is in reaasonable shape before sitting in the passenger seat at higher speeds. Neverhad an issue since the speeds involved are LESS than those on the street. This is not what happened to Mindy however.
As a rule and except as above, I never drive a student's car.

Best,

porrsha

Interesting thread about a real life financial tragedy. The what if's are mind boggling: What if Mindy were injured, maimed, or killed? Went to Trackmasters web site to find waivers (https://www.trackmasters.com/) . I could not find it posted, only driver applications. I have been signing PCA and SCCA waivers for over 30 years...the last time I read the small print was when I was at the gate working waivers with nothing to do.
I do believe the courts have held that you can not sign away basic rights, I am no lawyer.
Quick aside to John H.....no you will NOT be driving my GT-3 at fhe 48 hours this year!!!

Qwickrick

Our region, CVR, will always have green students first take a classroom lecture, and then have their instructor drive their car for the first two or three laps. This is done at extremely slow speeds, and is used to show the student the line, point out flag stations, and gives the instructor a sense of the car. I've never witnessed nor heard of any incidents with novice student cars on their first track orientation laps. After that, I will never drive their car again, but will definitely take them out in mine in a higher run group, to reinforce everything I've tried to teach them about the line, car control, etc.

We all have to remember how intimidating it was, the first time we went out on the track, and how welcome we found it for our instructor to take us around those for those first few laps.

We can't confuse the above with what happened to Mindy. Her instructor went out of his way to try to impress her by making her "tires sing", and in doing so, should have taken responsibility for what happened. Unfortunately, it's not a perfect world, and she should continue fighting the good fight.

Phokaioglaukos

I don't know this instructor, but I thought Mindy wrote that he did not have a car, that he "crewed" for a Noble owner in exchange for track fees and that that Noble had a techincal issue so that it could not be driven in the session. Also didn't Mindy say that he could not pay?

In any event, getting a judgement against an individual and collecting on it are two different things, and Mindy is far away from getting a judgement, apparently not having a lawyer or having filed suit.

Again, I think her best hope for financial recovery is that the track communiity encourages the instructor to do the right thing. Barring that, at least she can blow off some steam here.

mrbill_fl

There have been times when driving the students car was very helpful and enlightening.

A 930 with a stuck left front caliper comes to mind. Car pulled badly to the right, when brakes were applied. I was able to mash the brakes and free it up. during the 2 laps I drove, so the car then braked in a straight line... (student drove car to Sebring from WPB, and didn't notice it...).

Had I not done the intro drive, (IMHO), there was a high probablity the car would have left the track under braking. So in that case, there was a strong benifit in drving the students car.

Typically the 1st 2 laps are under double yellows...


(of course, thats not what happened here)