Brian P

Frank, you are definitely entitled to your own opinion, but I suspect that there are many people who would prefer to at least be asked for permission to have their wrecks posted on the internet. I get that you have already stated permission for all of your misfortunes to be posted on the internet, but I doubt others would grant the same latitude.

Brian P

I'd suggest that anybody who is concerned about their coverage actually take a look at their policies and don't use the "internet" to figure out if they are covered or not. Policies differ widely across companies and differ widely in the same company if people are in different states (or countries). Even if your contract has the same language as somebody else's contract, two companies may differ widely in their willingness to try to not cover the incident.

For example, when my wife got into an accident in DE, we called up the insurance company and they had a few questions...
1) Were we on a racetrack? (Yes, we were)
2) Who else was in the car? (The instructor)
3) Was it a timed event? (No, it was not)
4) Was anybody else hurt? (No)

From the questioning that they had, it was clear to me that the big question was #4 (NOT #3). When you stop and think about it, it actually makes a ton of sense. The amount of money it takes to fix up a car pales in comparison to what it takes to fix up a person.

For that reason, I think it makes a LOT of sense for insurance companies to basically ignore DE's since the average DE person ends up being a lot safer on public roads than non-DE people (no stats to back that up though) and when a DE person gets into an incident, it is almost always a single-car incident (and when it isn't, the two cars are almost always going in the same direction), so the overall damage is generally a LOT cheaper than incidents on public streets.

sbelles

Don't need to, I was right behind you and it was only through sheer luck that I didn't join you. Glad to see the car nice and shiny again! For the first time ever, I did take a photo (with my phone), of a car that went off last weekend but only because of the unusual place it ended up and I certainly won't be sharing it on a public forum.

Ron Cohn

If you are running DE's, you should consider coverage with Ontrackinsurance.com. I heard of a guy through a friend that bought a policy on his 996. Unfortunately, he had an accident and had to make a claim. His car is fixed and he is running again.

The company knows the high-performace insurance business and the owner is a PCA and NASA racer.

Veloce Raptor

How on earth could they possibly police this? Especially with self contained systems like TraqMate and small HD video cameras?

Streak

I did not get the email but I suspect the PCA brass has this scenario in mind:

"Hello Mr. Insurance Guy. We need to buy a general liability policy for our Driver's Education events."

"Sure thing. I can help you with that. Give me a few minutes, " says insurance guy.

Insurance guy pulls out his keyboard and googles "PCA DE CRASH" . . . .

http://www.google.com/search?client=...UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

This is the problem. Help PCA help us keep our track events a reality.

spare tire

I run video sometimes and I like to time my laps. How does me timing myself cause a problem? The event is not timed.

Bob Rouleau

In my region we make a distinction between video and real time displays. The latter are not allowed. Traqmate is fine as long as there is no display inside the car.

Driver8

That is not the scenario at all. I was the the Zone 1 Presidents meeting this past Saturday and this topic was discussed by Pete. There is not a law suit that is driving this and the insurance costs to regions for DE's have not gone up in the past few years. It is simply to respect the privacy of other club members and not to make the decision, of whether or not to to post photos/videos of their misfortunes, for them.

Streak

Well then, seems like something that PCA shouldn't be getting involved with unless it directly effects the club and it's ability to put on the events. Don't need PCA acting like a mother hen.

ProCoach

Bob, it's important to realize that "timed events" are verboten because they establish an organized, competitive event, far and away from the DE format that the insurance companies agree to underwrite.

Speaking to K&K, Naughton and a number of other insurance companies as an event organizer over the last twenty years, their definition of a "timed event" is one where there is a publicly available, organizer supplied comparison of performance between participants, i.e. time sheets and posted times. An Autocross is a timed event, because all who run are graded, based on times recorded for each run.

No DE qualifies as a "timed event," period.

If there is a Time Trial element or Club Race element in addition to the DE event, ONLY that portion of the event is considered a "timed event."

The ban against in-car data and display (what do you do about cars with the Sports Chrono in the dash?) is ill-informed and incorrect.

Individual timing (through data displays or timers in the car) has NO competitive element, is not publicly available, nor is there any place at DE's where comparative times are posted.

It's time this fallacy was exposed and the fear of it dispelled.

There is NO timed event without a public, structured and organizer supplied comparison of participant performance.

Driver8

It can directly effect it members. PCA understands that they cannot stop people from taking photographs and video of incidents, and that is not the intent of the email. What they are asking for is people to use good judgment before they decide to make those videos or photos of another members misfortunes public without that members consent.

jcb-memphis

I am all for privacy protection in this age of instant youtube via iphone.

Pete's request "shouldn't" be necessary in an ideal world, but it is. For those with manners, it will seem silly....but for those without manners, it could allow them to be excluded from future DE's and thus protect the vast majority of us from that stuff.....so I am for it. And I support a ban from future DE's if done, frankly.

And I think it is sad to need to be stated at all... I fully support Pete on this one.


Jeff

sbelles

+1

Coochas

Well said. This summarizes exactly how I view these issues. I do not know however if PCA and other venues see it this way.

I agree. The gentlemanly or well-mannered thing to do is not to post up pics and vids of someone else's misfortune unless they told you it's OK to do so.

If someone had posted video of my wife's crash at Calabogie last year I would have been more than upset.