This. A thousand times this. Great post.

 

^^Wisdom^^

 

+1

"Control of myself" is an essential attribute. You need to know when to say when.

 

But your signature says,

"If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough" - Mario Andretti

 

I generally agree with the comments about control, but offer these thoughts:

- We can never have complete control. Some things are beyond our control, so the risk can never be zero. And while we want to manage the risk to an acceptable level, some degree of risk is probably part of the appeal of this sport for many of us.

- To some extent, part of the fun (and certainly part of the challenge) is to flirt with the limits of control, which adds to the risk.

IMO, part of the goal should be increasing understanding of the risks and how they vary as a function of various factors, so we can reach for the limits of ourselves and our equipment while managing risk well - in other words, better control.

 

You are out of control.

 

I said "You have to know when to say when."

I wasn't talking about myself because I don't know when to say when.

 

Friggin lawyers.

 

My student at VIR this past weekend was a 16 yr old AND had some left - right confusion.

Needless to say, this made point bys very interesting.
I did have an "Oh ****!" moment when I said "point by to the right" and saw that arm go out straight to the left. Otherwise though was a good learner and we made it through fine.

Bottom line: Each time any one of us gets in the right seat, we take a risk. The question is *how big a risk are you willing to take?*
Isn't the risk part of the adventure of instructing?
It's not like our hobby is needlepoint or anything.

As an aside: One critical difference Is that in DEs, instructing is for the love of the sport and to give back. But these type of SUPERcar experiences, instructors are paid money (but not much). I guess that could change one's motivation under some circumstances.

I once had a pro Indy car racer give me one session of in car coaching for $75.
So there's that...

 

Your avatar is PERFECT!

I would think VIR is a handful for any newbie- let alone someone with only 6 months driving experience!

Congrats!

 

Just read thru most of the posts on this thread. This is perhaps the most insightful, thought provoking thread I've read on any forum. Thank you all for sharing your wisdom. It is a truly tragic incident.

With only 4 years experience, I am a relative newbie at the track. I got my start from participating in an exotic car experience. I think that exotic car experiences are definitely a part of the sports rapidly growing popularity.

There are things I don't understand about track safety that perhaps someone here can help illuminate.

1. Do concrete barriers and tire walls actually make a track safer?

To me, a sandpit would best slow a car without causing as much injury to the car or occupants.

2. Why do volunteer instructors instruct?

To me, it is so inherently dangerous, I always feel my instructors are both extremely generous and bit crazy for doing what they do.

3. And, finally, with today's street cars being faster than the worlds fastest race cars of just 20 years ago, in your opinion is it really safe to run around a track at near the limit with only a helmet and a seat belt?

 

Take this for what it (worthless) is but here is something I've noticed.

This year I started running car trackdays for the first time after having tracked / raced motorcycles heavily for about ten years. I sat in on a novice class that was meant to illustrate safety, but what it came off as, to me, was something that was being done because people were forced to do it.

Safety seemed like a wink, wink, nod, nod or joke kind of thing throughout the entire class and there was very little in terms of safely entering and exiting the track (major, major thing to hammer home, in my opinion). It was pointed out that the difference between the fast street car group and the race car group was just in the safety gear required as it is a pain to track prep a car properly. The drivers meetings were not mandatory for all drivers and the safety rules were not hammered home each and every time.

The organizations did not tech and it was clear that some vehicles had fluid leaks.

Students in high power vehicles were stuffing other drivers coming off the main straight because it was the only area to pass in the early groups... yet there were instructors encouraging this overly aggressive passing.

Maybe I'm getting old, maybe I've hit the ground at track speed a few times too many, or maybe I just had a few bad experiences with organizations but I really, really do not get the carefree attitude surrounding vehicle prep and overall safety when tracking cars. I don't even want to get into the acceptance of no runoff.

 

With a first post like that you need to tell what organization, what track, etc.

 

+1

Bad apples need to be identified and removed.

 

The best runoff will be flat, infinitely wide, and not enough friction to potentially roll a car. With nothing to hit, you just go off the track and eventually stop with no harm done. To the extent we can't achieve that ideal, we have risk.

If there's something to hit, you preferably want to keep it away from the track (ie, sufficient runoff) and slow the vehicle before the impact. For the impact itself, you preferably want to smoothly and gradually redirect the path of the vehicle, and next best is to absorb the energy of impact gradually enough to increase the duration of impact and thereby reduce deceleration.

Bare concrete barriers absorb very little energy, so they should only be used where the angle of impact is always shallow, resulting in redirecting the vehicle without much deceleration. Think head-on impact with concrete barrier = bad.

Tire walls are a cost-effective way to absorb energy for impacts which aren't shallow (closer to perpendicular), but they need to be properly configured, designed, and detailed, and ideally crash-tested as well to get empirical confirmation of their performance. Unfortunately, I've seen that many tire walls at tracks are clearly inadequate, and were installed without any meaningful understanding of how to do it properly.

The SAFER barrier used at NASCAR tracks is designed to both smoothly redirect vehicles and absorb impact energy, and does a fairly good job (it was properly engineered), but it's expensive.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SAFER_barrier

There are also other barriers to absorb impact energy, such as the TECPRO barriers used at F1 tracks (eg, COTA), but they're very expensive.
https://www.tecprobarriers.com/#/autoproduct

Also, direct impact with an object such as the end of a concrete barrier, utility pole, or tree is particularly hazardous because such objects can spear through a car, so those types of hazards need to be eliminated or properly shielded.