They do trackdays at Fontana, Pocono and Louden for example, right? Is the trackday orgs responsibility to keep you from bouncing yourself off the wall on the high bank. or do you have to exhibit some level of self-policing?
Sean, as seen in the video, do you think the sandbags, the placement of which were for drainage and not safety, increases the risk (above that which would be "normal" if not there) of a crash and injury during an off track excursion in that area? If SCRAMP told you tough titties, the sand bags stay and we'll still charge you the track fee if you don't run ... would you run a trackday or a WERA event given the conditions that were present when the gentleman in the video ran off track and was ejected when he hit the sandbags? Personally, I'm with G97 on this one. The best way to avoid any potential issue is to not create, or acquiesce to, an environment that, given your level of experience and knowledge (Mongo, SCRAMP, Keigwins), exponentially increases the risk of an otherwise dangerous venture. As a business person, knowing you have new or newer riders who don’t have your same level experience and knowledge, you cannot expect them to fully see, understand and appreciate every facet of the environment and make a decision on their own. Again, I am pro-waiver ... but only up to the point of grossly negligent, reckless or intentional conduct ... after that, its game on. Allowing, or acquiescing to, sandbags, the placement of which were for drainage and not safety, to be located just off track, in an area where it is reasonably foreseeable that a participant might have an excursion at speed, I think approaches the grossly negligent bar. Racing Loudon and Pocono, I guess I sound a little hypocritical. Yeah, there are walls, but generally they are running parallel to the lane of travel. Secondly, what is the purpose of the walls? So you don't hit something else head on, right? So the walls are safety based, the lesser of two evils if you will. And at least at Loudon, Eric Wood has seen to it that we have a HUGE amount of air fence covering most if not all the walls in critical areas, thus making the walls more safe. Now, what is the purpose of the sandbags being there while the trackday sessions were running? I didn't see any rain in the video, so I'll guess maybe their presence was because it was too much of a bother (or expense) for either SCRAMP or Keigwins to pick them up before the event and redeploy them after the event. So it was a monetary or time based reason, not a safety reason. Saving yourself a few bucks at the expense of your customers' safety is never an adequate justification to avoid liability ... in fact, juries love to hear stuff like that because it makes their job so much easier. .
Im not the fastest by any means around Laguna... but what the heck was he doing out by the sound booth?
To stop cars. And usually you hit it head on even when it is parallel with track. I have 1st hand experience with that For safety I take open runoff vs wall any time.
Haven't seen the video and not going to make that kind of judgment call from a video. I need to see it in person or a lot of videos and pictures to be able to really tell. On the "would you run" end of things, we've walked from events in the past and had to pay rental or partial rental.
Right Now if you watch that video again, the area where that first sandbag is located is basically what most would consider to be the start of the parallel section of track between turns 5 and 6. The area where most people would lose it/slide and crash off track is ahead of it and fairly unobstructed. The rider more or less stood the bike up and drove the bike off in what looks to be the "parallel" section of track. Similar to I guess if you were coming onto the high bank, panic'd and stood the bike up and drove it straight into the wall. I'm not saying it was "wise" to have sandbags placed there, but at the same time the rider has to take some responsibility for target fixating and driving straight into them. There's a good several feet to the left of them he could have stayed on (both dirt and curbing) and not hit them at all. Sandy like the beach.
The onus is certainly on the rider to decide if its worth it, but damn, that's some rough ass run off. I would expect it to be at the very least smoothed out, regardless of material.
I respect that. I also realize my question(s) was/are a little unfair, given your position. Lets just say it was rhetorical, meant to provoke thought on the subject. I'm glad to hear you've walked away. .
Evelyne would shut WERA down and walk away rather than hurt a rider. Y'all aren't just customers to us.
Destroying American motorcycle racing one racer at a time No. They are responsible for placing objects in the run off areas and along the side of the track that are then removed for other organizations. What hi bank walls do Fontana, Pocono and Louden ( you left out Daytona, Gateway, Iowa Speedway and Pikes Peak) remove for one organization but employ for others?
Bad analogy. Walls don't move. We all know and expect that. Run off is not meant to have wash gulches in it. We all know and expect that too. Or maybe I was just spoiled at WERA events where shit was right.
We've run at places with ditches in the runoff or rocks (we do try to move them) or even just really bumpy ground - especially if they last mowed when the ground is soft. If those issues are in an area where you'd have to make a turn off a straight to get to them I wouldn't consider them a major safety issue at all.