Captain Slow

Not sure why the gov is being brought into the discussion. A bit of knee jerking here?

By signing up to run with an organzation either in DE or racing, you are agreeing to abide by their rules - that is a contract - not a "nanny state control" issue

One interesting point RB makes - if there are more incidents - the insurers of track events may make the ultimate decision for us.

Matt Romanowski

I'm surprised to read so many people against slowing things down. Every time their is group of instructors together, they talk about how fast the new cars are and how much easier it was to instruct in an older car. Everyone talks about how people in GT3s crash more than other Porsches and how those people should start out in a 944na. Now when someone suggest actually doing something, everyone is in arms?

Not that I necessarily agree with all of Ross' points, I think it's a good starting point for a discussion. How many people have to crash, get hurt, or worse before we, as participants and organizers, start to do something?

JustinL

This is a really interesting analogy. It's actually 10.99 for the NHRA rules, which is really fast. 10 years ago you needed a pretty well prepped, powerful car to run sub 11s. Today you can walk into a dealership and buy a street car that can do that all day long. For convertibles it's 11.49, so it's conceivable that a stock C7 is fast enough that it would need a roll bar after the first pass.

We're hitting a point where off the shelf street cars are genuinely faster than race cars. The Maclaren mp4-12c is faster than the GT3 variant which they have to slow down for the rules. I don't have a solution, but it is quite a conundrum.

Gary R.

I'm with you Matt. I had a Green (1st day ever) student this weekend at Palmer in a new C4S. He did extremely well and I let him increase speed accordingly. By Day 2 he was coming up on slower (beginners all) cars with a 30-50 MPH closing rate on the straight. I would of much preferred a cone chicane mid-straight for that run group... You can set a speed limit also but to me the more corners to learn proper braking, rotation, balance, and smooth acceleration the better..

GMP911

Thanks for the correction - it has been too many years since my drag racing days. - But you see my point - Yes a C7 is a great example

jscott82

I agree with Ross 100%.

I think it would work well... For the entry level driver, no safety equipment is needed, but speeds are limited to 100-120mph (for a lot of tracks, for most cars, this is a non-issue). For the guy with a little more time under his belt, someone that is committed to the sport, they still have the option to go "flat out".

I see so many people spend tons of money on performance modifications, yet spend nothing on safety. A simple rule like this would get people to start thinking about safety on par with performance.

winders

Matt,

Stop being so melodramatic. Not everyone is up in arms. Nor have I seen comments necessarily against slowing things down.

To be effective, you would need to slow down faster cars, like the GT3 or McLaren, everywhere...not just on the straights. Because I can almost guarantee that most incidents happen in the corners. How do you do that AND keep the owners of the cars engaged and not feeling like they are being treated like children?

When an instructor is in the car, it is the instructors job to keep the driver under control. If the instructor is unable to do so, he should get the driver off the track for a discussion. If that doesn't help, the driver should be removed from the event.

Once the driver advances to the point of driving by himself, you are right back the potential of the car versus the standard street safety equipment problem.

So, maybe a partial solution is to have speed limits on the straights for drivers in the lower groups. I don't see how you could have speed limits in the advanced groups and keep those drivers happy. Of course, many drivers will want to be put in these advanced groups to avoid the speed limit even though they are not qualified. I don't see temporary chicanes as practical. They are too easy to displace.

Ultimately, you can't require roll cages, 6 point belts, and head and neck devices for these faster cars. For some, they drive the car to the track and the mods would make driving the car on the street impracticable and possibly unsafe. For others, they do not want to modify the car from stock.

Matt Romanowski

These are certainly some good solutions here. Using a "safety breakout" time in drag racing has worked for them pretty well. Maybe we have a similar straightaway speed limits. And it doesn't have to be just the main straight, maybe it's parts of the track that are deemed to have the most incidents? That could include some corner entries or exits too. There are a lot of smart folks drivings cars, I'm sure we can come up with something to make it safer.

Tim Webb

How are you going to police speeds? Will you need to radar gun and operator for the event?

jscott82

K-I-S-S

Tell drivers/instructors there is a mandated 120mph speed limit... You don't need to police it to 1mph. If corner workers aren't hearing a lift, and it "looks" like they are going faster you call them in..

mglobe

This.

Every time I go to the track I understand I am taking some risk. Most if not all of us on this forum realize that. Take away the risk entirely and you might as well just go ride a roller coaster instead.

With the faster cars it is incumbent upon instructors and organizers to emphasize safety, educate students on the risks with the appropriate amount of alarm (enough to sober them but not so much as to scare the crap out of them), and police on track behavior.

This does not mean we should stick our heads in the sand. It would be great to have a central clearinghouse for DE incident reports so that the industry could take a studied approach towards improving safety. But we should not be taking radical approaches because of one incident.

I wonder how many fatalities the DE business has per year? Skydiving is 50-70 deaths per year worldwide. I bet DE's are in the single digits.

T&T Racing

I believe Ross is raising an important concern that is going to be exacerbated as more innovation is offered in high performance street cars. To me, his post is a wake up call and a reality check for all who participate or are considering participation in HPDE.

The participant of today has the same DNA as the participant of 20 years ago, but the high performance street and race cars of today have vastly different DNA that has evolved through innovation. If Mark Donahue was alive today and just starting out to become a race driver, what would he do.

Mark would start learning the physics of the race and car control with a low powered car. If it had ABS/TC, he would disable them. He would drive the car with all season radials, not high performance tires.

He would experience feedback as he approaches the cornering limits of the car. He would experience what was needed to correct for mistakes in the line, etc. He would learn how to drive with his subconscious brain not his conscious brain.

Then, when he masters car control, he moves up to higher performance street and race cars.

But, we all want to have bragging rights when we belly up to the bar. We feel more important when we can say how fast we went, not that my goal is to learn car control and be able to drive the lower HP car at its limit without spinning before I advance to a higher performance car.

My suggestion is if people what fast HP cars and bring them to the track for HPDE, then the novices and solo drivers can run if they disable the ABS/TC and run on good all season radials until they can demonstrate excellent car control running at least 9/10 of the limit. Teach the physics of driving a race car and how to learn to drive using your subconscious brain.

As speed increases, things happen quicker and to reduce the risk to you and others, you need to drive with your subconscious mind to correct for driving errors, we drivers are not clairvoyant. You would not ask a child to ride a 2 wheeler without learning to ride the bicycle with training wheels.

Treat yourself to a Boxster before making a leap of faith to a Cayman R or GT-3. You might then experience what makes a REAL HPDE driver and not feel your self esteem was hurt because you did not hold the bragging rights at the bar. You can bring you and your Boxster back home in on piece.

Veloce Raptor

Spot on here.

I suspect the risk of fatality in a DE is lower than literally any other sport. I mean...more people die playing baseball annually than in DE's (which should NEVER be lumped in with racing).

Mark Dreyer

I like your advise. I will admit to some confirmation bias as I own one. I love my Boxster S. Not as fast (in the straights) as the GT3 I owned previously, but wow it is so much fun in the turns, and in braking zones. It is so confidence inspiring. And with the cage, 6 point harness, race seat, Hans, etc, I feel well protected. After each run session I have a perma-grin and that's what is all about in the DE environment IMO.

It is more expensive to track a dedicated race car (tow vehicle, trailer, or as in in my situation, pay a shop for transport and trackside support), but I am willing to do fewer events to offset these higher costs and know that when I do an event I've chosen to approach the hobby with safety as the utmost priority. I have taken personal responsibility for my own safety.

I have instructed for a few years, and feel that it is my responsibility to rein in my student, so not sure that a speed limit is necessary as the instructor should be slowing the driver on an as needed basis. As part of the process of promoting drivers to solo, I think HPDE groups should publicize the potential risks of driving faster in a street car and encourage safety mods. They should talk about the incidents such as this latest tragedy in the context of strongly recommended safety mods. Ultimately however the ball is in the participants' court. I don't feel such mods should be mandated as it is an issue of taking personal responsibility.

Mark Dreyer

Is baseball even a sport? :-)