RA Results and Videos thread

#41

Saturdays video : https://vimeo.com/m/98237016
Qual 7 Finish 8

Sundays video : https://vimeo.com/m/98375985
Qual 6 Finish 6

#42

Video from trailing car of the T5 qual accident.

Man did Aaron get some air!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ALqpwR6ugsM

#43

I put together a video from this incident that has 4 different vantage points. I’ve not published yet because I want to get some comments on it first. Chuck, I’ll send you the link.

I’ve watched Greg’s video now a dozen times. There’s no quick movement of his hands that would have caused clear steering input to the left. That indicates to me that the e36 did not startle Greg such that Greg moved left. No clear movement left of Greg’s wheel, yet his car does seem to move left into Aaron. Maybe Greg drifted left a smigeon, then his car got sucked left, I dunno. I’m thinking the lesson here for us is that one must be wary of cars getting sucked into each other when side-by-side at high speed. It’s not enough to simply drive straight, one has to deliberately ensure that gap is maintained.

I had prob 18" of room on my left that I could have used to move over and give Aaron more room. But I thought I had about 2’ of space between us and so no reason to get, what I perceived to be, perilously close to 2 wheels off, just to give Aaron more than the 2’ of space he already had. At the time of the incident, I frankly had just shifted my attention away from Aaron so he was outta sight and outta mind. I was moving past at a high enough rate that our overlap was about 1sec from being over so I shifted my focus to entry to 6. I thought that as long as I drive straight, there is no risk here. I imagine everyone was thinking that same thing.

#44

Racing (qualy) incident.

Anyways - I cannot believe how close Scott came to hitting the wall and didn’t even touched it! coool! :slight_smile:

#45

[quote=“ctbimmer” post=77460]Video from trailing car of the T5 qual accident.

Man did Aaron get some air!

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ALqpwR6ugsM[/quote]

[attachment=2048]image.jpg[/attachment]

There’s an idea of how high I was! ???

#46

From the closest trailing car video, it appears that 6 and 15 were maintaining and 118 came left, but not necessarily by driver input. Could have been some kind of air dynamics that sucked him in, but if he came left w/o steering input then the takeaway is to actively make sure to stay from being sucked in. Hard to say.

#47

Here’s the 4 video study. https://vimeo.com/99336464

#48

I would have to agree that the 118 is solely responsible for the incident. I did not see him check his mirrors prior to moving left so I dismiss the moving over for faster traffic theory. I do think, that he made a minor course correction toward T6 but did not have enough room, causing the incident.

#49

Paez video shows it best. In my opinion Greg started moving over ever so slightly to give the other faster car room and squeezed Aaron. Three wide doesn’t take much movement make contact and it looked like aerodynamic played no part in it. At 100mph slight movements in the wheel have much larger affects. 4 wide ain’t gon work at all! Should have made the faster car wait his turn.

#50

This isn’t directed at any person in particular.

Pls take care that this doesn’t become a beat-down thread. My intent was to create an educational video and stick it in the Lessons Learned section. If the video becomes a magnet for criticism, I’ll pull it.

I know it’s tempting as hell to weigh in with comments, but if you’re going to say something critical, I’m asking you to keep it to yourself.

#51

Scott, that was posted to provide a learning experience and for comment. Each driver must have situational awareness at all times in a race car. Even though it was a chain reaction accident, each driver could have prevented the incident.

#52

[quote=“Ranger” post=77469]
I know it’s tempting as hell to weigh in with comments, but if you’re going to say something critical, I’m asking you to keep it to yourself.[/quote]

If this is too critical, delete it.

This accident started in Turn 4, not Turn 5

In qualifying, there is no good reason and every bad reason to spook the car ahead when entering the esses. As seen here, Greg ran a little wide through 4. By not tucking hard back in line, the lead car of the pack thought Greg was attempting a pass and gave room.

Going 2 wide in the esses was the next wrong move. That will slow both cars every time. That’s why Ranger was alongside after 5.

There was a small move of the wheel to the left. Just enough to erase a 2’ gap at 100 mph.

Once you’ve gone through the esses two wide or behind guys doing that, your lap is hosed. There is no good reason to put yourself in a 3 wide position.

Plenty of culpability to go around. I’m glad the outcome wasn’t worse.

#53

Sorry, but all three have culpability. The discussion of who turned into who is irrelevant. This would have been poor decision making in a race, let alone qualifying. Falls under the category of “just because you can, doesn’t mean you should”.

#54

I certainly believe all three are culpable. But the proximate cause is the 118 moving left. NOW…IF Ranger had realized he was in a bad situation and moved left as far as he could, and IF the center car realized he was the Limburger in the in the sandwich and backed out, there would have been no incident. Only problem is, there are no do overs with an IF:sick:

#55

Okay, no beat down keep it educational.

Can’t resist, beat down on DeVinney.

Steve, you are incorrect. This wasn’t a race lap it was qualifing and the problem started before T4.

This incident started in turn 1 when a leading car realizes that faster cars are soon to be approaching. It is a qualifing lap, the lead car’s best hope is that the faster traffic passes on a straightaway. Regardless his qualifing lap will be junk, lift the throttle for that guy to pass you on the straight .Oops, it is qualifing and you have to lift the throttle, may as well set your sights and look/position your car for a clean lap the next time around.

The 118 didn’t lift the throttle for the faster approaching GTS car, rather he drifted into the 15. He paid the biggest price of the three involved, a totalled-out car. Review the films all you like, no blame to anyone, it was a racing incident (albeit, a poor judgement racing incident, as Kyle noted)… that happened during qualifing. The good news, no one was hurt, however, if you guys continue driving without thinking something is going to happen. I’m hopeful that commentary qualifies as educational, rather that a beat down on DeVinney, or the 118. My apologies to Aaron and Scott for the verbal lashing at Sunday’s meeting.

It isn’t tiddly winks, yet I believe I’d better learn how to play that game. It is a less costly option. Hate to see you all crunch up cars. Perhaps I should have tried with more emphasis when I was a part of the e30 administration. As Ranger noted about two weeks ago, SE30 has a new sheriff or two. Pantas has a scorecard of wrecks, but it means nothing.

Yep, there were avoidable wrecks during my 10 year run as co-director, too, and I should have acted in a more so strict manner. Hindsight has 20/20 vision. Perhaps I will take up tiddly winks, checkers or chess.

RP

.

#56

Couldn’t agree more with Steve and Patton. I do think but pasting this all over the world on FB only makes us look like a bunch of yahoos who can’t complete a qualifying session without incident.

Based on the comments I’ve seen from the shares we might want to take some time debating if there is a truly learning experience or a showcase of something we don’t want to show.

It does suck that we lost a car and could have lost more… in qualifying when laps were hosed.

Greg we have a spare chassis if you need it.

#57

[quote=“epalacio19” post=77480]Couldn’t agree more with Steve and Patton. I do think but pasting this all over the world on FB only makes us look like a bunch of yahoos who can’t complete a qualifying session without incident.

Based on the comments I’ve seen from the shares we might want to take some time debating if there is a truly learning experience or a showcase of something we don’t want to show.
[/quote]

I was thinking along these lines too, especially since it’s my fault. I’ve tightened security settings on the video.

#58

[quote=“Patton” post=77479]Okay, no beat down keep it educational.

Can’t resist, beat down on DeVinney.

Steve, you are incorrect. This wasn’t a race lap it was qualifing and the problem started before T4.
.[/quote]

Patton - Where in my post did I say it was a race lap?

At least we agree that the incident started way before “who did what” coming out of Turn 5.

#59

Well I have kept my mouth shut for to long.

So here’s what happened in my point of view. In turn 3 I noticed they were gaining on me quickly so I went wide through the esses literally giving them the race line expecting them to pass me…but he didn’t, on top of that I took the inside of 5 still expecting him to take the pass but he didn’t. At that point I was going so slow on the straight, If I would have lifted I would have stalled out :stuck_out_tongue:

If you watched the video clearly… You would have noticed #118 turned his wheel slightly, at 100mph a slight turn makes a BIG difference when the other 2 are going straight.

For the people who don’t even race in the SE nor even own a spec E30…why comment? Do you have nothing to do better in your lives than to jump on the forums and act like a teenage girl, giving your useless 2¢ opinions? You know who I’m talking about ::whistle:

Me and Greg are really good buddies and I still would race side by side with him any day!! Accidents happen people…that’s racing. Most people don’t come up and say sorry right after the session especially after totaling there car.

I couldn’t agree more with Eric!!

#60

Eric, I was invited to comment as an unbiased observer. BTW, I have built and raced e30s longer than any of you. I.e., I have more race experience and have seen my share of incidents. Sorry you don’t appreciate my observations.