At that point on that turn, neither of them was going to get it back. The right side of the track is banked very slightly but the left is slightly negative. So even if you were not completely on the edge of your grip on the line you wanted, once you go left, there is nothing to stop you losing it and as the book says, you get to watch the fence for a long time before you hit it.
As others mentioned, mistakes by both drivers. Obviously what the lead driver did by going off track on the left created the situation, but his tires were rotating when he was going backwards meaning he violated crash rule #1; brakes and clutch in. The following driver was firmly planted and at first sign of the spin should have gone track left, there was lots of room. That's why it's called school I guess.
@racing56789 Very glad to hear! I too wear a HANS and had my first dinger in Lapping at Sebring earlier this year. I will always remember that brief hair bristling HOLY SH#T timeline where you realize that you are no longer in control of what's about to happen.
Holy 5+G from 80 to zero. Glad you're ok! Were you wearing HANS? In the damage waiver scenario, were you considered to be the "crashee" or the "victim"?!?
Speedometer, G-force meter, high definition, multiple views of wreck......What can I say, man? You crash like a pro! Heh, no seriously - that is why I could never bring myself to race. You have seriously big balls to go out racing the very next day, my hat is off to you!
Forgot to mention, he only uses the clutch to get started from a stop, which is a handle on left side of steering wheel. The throttle is a lever type system that links to throttle body. I've only driven this car to pits and around the paddock and it is really difficult to get used to. I've driven the Skip Barber RT car around a number of tracks and I'm far from podium finishing talent. I say this because Michael Johnson can hop in this car and kickass. He is an incredible athlete.
The reason this driver is not using the clutch on down shifts is be cause he's paralyzed from the waste down. He's driving a hand control car. The steering wheel pushes forward which is linked to the master cylinders for brakes. Mind you these cars have no brake booster, takes 250ft lbs of pressure to lock up the tires. His name is Michael Johnson. And he is incredibly talented he is currently racing in the usf2000 series. I know this because I was a mechanic for Skip Barber at the time.
No, you do not. Ask any instructor. The rule is, if you spin, both feet in. The spinning car should have locked the brakes and keep them locked. He's an idiot, locked and then allowed the car to come across the track..
@NIKAS07 What is HANS? and you are one of the luckiest people ever if you got to drive sebring that track is amazing! i wish i could fly over and give it a go!
@myPETsnailFRED HANS device = Head And Neck Support via a patented shoulder device incorporating restraint straps that clip into helmet anchors. Device is supposed to protect the driver from fatal neurological damage in severe impacts. I hope mine is never put to the test. Most track drivers that value their brains are wearing them now. As for Sebring, Google "Skip Barber", they would love to show you around North America's best circuits - highly recommend the experience and the people.
I really think that the reason the car got so much air off that crash was because when the tires touched they gripped onto each other like crazy. Happens all the time in F1 and GP2. Lookup vids and youll see F1 Cars almost doing a complete flip into the air in a straight line
Very Lucky! The driver who spun in front of you let go of his brakes so they came back across the track into you. Major Rookie Mistake for them. You can see the wheels turning on the other car when it is backwards... Scary!
One day of racing school is around $1800. But you have to take intro to racing which is $700. Not bad prices. If you are talking about the wrecked car than I have no clue haha.
Indeed they are learning. However, that spinner needs to pay attention to the road, that is about the stupidest crash I have seen in a while. He needs to learn to drive on the TRACK and not the grass.
for something that doesnt look very safe, race cars like that are USUALLY made safer than your average street car even, especially with fire suits and helmets and all that.. theyre designed to handle crashes at very high speeds just as much as theyre designed to go fast like that
Dang, from the on-board camera you wonder "why is this guy flipping" but from the driver behind you can clearly see why. I'd hope that when something like this happens the guy that wasn't at fault would maybe get a discount at least...??
Definitely the guy in front's fault, twice. The tire off the track was obviously a mistake, which started his spin, but he should've just let the car spin into the grass instead of kind of saving it to roll backwards onto the track. The second car had almost no options. Not enough room to brake, the entire right side of the track was a no-go, the only thing that MIGHT have worked was to just veer to the left and hope that he could bring it to a stop in time in the grass. Even if he ultimately did collide with the wall, I think he would've had less damage and therefore less expense if he just pitched it into the grass to the left. One big advantage to sim racing and even arrive-and-drive karting is that it gives you a chance to get good at predicting the path of spinning cars without the consequences of doing it in a real car with thousands in damage.
How do you upshift and downshift in these cars? Because i know that in a normal car to upshift you do Clutch in, Shift, Clutch out, gas. And to downshift it is Brake, Clutch in, Blip, Shift, Clutch out is it any different in these cars? do they have sequential transmissions?
You can shift up and down in a normal manual transmission car too, it's just a lot harder than these racing boxes as you need to be really careful to match the revs just right.
There was no room left at all. He should of kept on line. And no, in that case you should let off the brake. If he had kept on the back he would of slid and stopped on the track. You should always let your car roll out of the way. If you spin in the racing line, let you car spin out of the way. This guy was just unlucky to panic and try and avoid it rather than let happen in front of him.
You're supposed to go as wide as possible before turning in when you're racing obviously. The problem for this guy is the track falls away at this point and he misjudged it. The car in front of him properly navigated and anticipated the wheels going off in the grass and kept racing. Tough luck here for MJ being the victim.
He did it so that he could get out of the way. If he slams is brakes he likely takes out more drivers. If Micheal stayed his line, nobody crashes except the guy who spun out.
I don't think he would have gotten out of it well either whether he would have brakes or not, if he hadn't he'd have to be going to the the very edge of the track and would have been carrying too much speed to carry that line at that speed and would have went off
The driver made the mistake of slowing down to avoid the spinning car, instead of powering down to avoid him and get around. But that's the difference between racing mentality and street driving mentality, they don't work the same.
You have to have an instinct for crashes. There were two ways to avoid this encounter, stomp the gas and get by him before he backed across the track, or use the brakes and wait till you knew which way he was going to end up. Just coasting along put you right in the way. I've had to back out and wait for a spinner down under me. I wasn't sure were he was going to end up, and it seemed like it took forever. He was staying low, and as I passed him I glimpsed a guy who apparently was blind trying to pass me down low. Sure tore up a couple of cars. Avoiding wrecks can be real thrilling. Dale Sr. was really good at it.
