Fatal Crashes in Land Speed Racing

[outlawbusa]

Now this is an ironic idea:

"There are several ways to reduce corner speed but only one sure-fire method: reduce grip. When I suggested this to Bridgestone they recoiled in horror, as they should. Tyre engineers spend their lives trying to improve grip. Telling them to reduce grip is like asking a bricky to knock down the house he’s just built."

He even talks about it further down the article

 

[TZ750d]

Now this is an ironic idea:

"There are several ways to reduce corner speed but only one sure-fire method: reduce grip. When I suggested this to Bridgestone they recoiled in horror, as they should. Tyre engineers spend their lives trying to improve grip. Telling them to reduce grip is like asking a bricky to knock down the house he’s just built."

He even talks about it further down the article

Quite so.

I suppose we could do it all on the cheap:
just flood existing tracks with water for the whole race.

Everybody mounts "rains," and uses 50% of the power,
and racing gets so very close.

Extra points for full fenders......

Costs nothing, and easily un-done later.

 

[TZ750d]

2014 is over, and the record books have closed.

Many racers achieved excellent speeds,
including our first WOMAN over 260 mph.

One man died, which is most regrettable,
but at least it was "only one," as opposed
to the "several per year" in 2008.

Tony Foster adds his name to those who have raced well,
and lost the fight to stay alive doing so.

Hopefully, we will all be here at this time next year,
celebrating new records, and NO fatalities.

The names of those we have lost, in Alpha order:

Gerald Deneau………..shutdown….ECTA – Wilmington
Tony Foster……………track……….England -2014
Guy Lombardi………….shutdown – ECTA – Maxton 2008
Dave Owen…………….shutdown….ECTA – Maxton 2008
Jerry Wayne Lyons……track……....Beeville - TEXAS
Bill Warner………………track…….. LRA – Loring

 

[fallenarch]

I think they should do some tests to see how fast a bike can go before wind becomes a problem. If they are regularly hitting that mark then they need to require some sort of aeorodynamics to hit or exceed those speeds. Sort of like NASCAR has those automatic air brakes. If we know the bikes have exceeded their maximum safe speeds, then you have to either slow people down or require some equipment that is safe at those speeds. But when you are running 260 mph, even some capable bikes and experienced riders are going to crash and possibly die. I would think the riders are prepared for that. You can't ever make motorsports perfectly safe, if you expect that you need to get an RC car!

 

[Got-Busa?]

I think they should do some tests to see how fast a bike can go before wind becomes a problem. If they are regularly hitting that mark then they need to require some sort of aeorodynamics to hit or exceed those speeds. Sort of like NASCAR has those automatic air brakes. If we know the bikes have exceeded their maximum safe speeds, then you have to either slow people down or require some equipment that is safe at those speeds. But when you are running 260 mph, even some capable bikes and experienced riders are going to crash and possibly die. I would think the riders are prepared for that. You can't ever make motorsports perfectly safe, if you expect that you need to get an RC car!

That wasn't an issue in any of the crashes above. All but I believe two were a result of leaving the race course at high speed. The other two were just unfortunate falls at much lower speeds. LSR tracks don't have the space and runoff like Bonneville has so you are more likely to hit a fixed abject or become air borne as a result.

 

[TZ750d]

That wasn't an issue in any of the crashes above.

All but I believe two were a result of leaving the race course at high speed.
The other two were just unfortunate falls at much lower speeds.
LSR tracks don't have the space and runoff like Bonneville has so
you are more likely to hit a fixed abject or become air borne as a result.

The two 2008 deaths at Maxton were at pretty elevated speeds.

One was a health matter, and the rider went straight into "the woods"
and was killed hitting a 6" diameter tree directly in his path.

This first rider was my new crew chief, and I was devastated.

The second death followed the same path within
about 3 feet, and that rider was also killed "in the woods."

Second rider was quoted in his home-town paper (before the race)
saying something like "To go 200 MPH on a bike,
you don't need brains, just balls."

The second rider tried to go 200 MPH on his FIRST PASS,
(After being ordered repeatedly to make the first pass at 125 mph)
and I am disappointed, but have little sympathy

I guess he was lacking something,
since the bike was without fault before the crash.

 

[fallenarch]

Funny, it's probably statistically far more dangerous to ride your bike to work than run an LSR and people want to gut the sport.

 

[TZ750d]

Funny, it's probably statistically far more dangerous
to ride your bike to work than run an LSR
and people want to gut the sport.

I'd have to think about that.

Most fatal highway statistics are on the
basis of 1,000,000 miles driven per death.

For bikes, it is for sure more than cars.

HOWEVER, at the moment, I am of the opinion
that on the deaths/mile driven motorcycle
LSR is MUCH more dangerous.

We are averaging maybe 1 death per year.

Of the pavement associations that welcome bikes
(The biggest doesn't allow bikes AT ALL ! ),
there might be 4 orgs x 3 meets x 500 bike runs / meet
@ about 1 mile (Loring is more, some are 1/2 mile)

That about equals 6,000 bike miles raced
on paved LSR tracks per year - and one death / 6000 miles.

If you "commuted " 50 miles to work every day,
that's 100 miles, 5 days per week about = 500 miles / week.

6,000 miles / 500 miles = 12 weeks.

so one (1) death every 6000 miles.

Maybe motorcycle LSR is NOT so safe......

 

[fallenarch]

It usually supports your point better when you shoot from the hip!

 

[TZ750d]

It usually supports your point better when you shoot from the hip!

You inspired me to do at least a minimum of research.......

According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)

http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/810990.pdf

The expectable traffic fatality RATE for motorcycle riders
is less than 1 per million miles traveled. (See Table 1),
more like 0.4 per million miles.

In pavement LSR, it is about 167 per million miles.

When you do the fractions, LSR is about
440 times more likely to be fatal than riding on the street.....

Are those good odds ?

 

[mjl3truck]

No the odds suck when you look at LSR racing that way but what are your odds of dying when you are trying to go 175 mph on a "deserted" public highway? Or trying to set the fastest lap time on Yarnell Hill Saturday morning. Been there, done that, and the fact that God looks out for little kids and idiots, lived through it. Won't go back there.

I don't delusion myself or anybody else by saying mile racing, road racing or drag racing is safe but compared to taking it to the streets, I'll take my chances on the track any day.

 

[TZ750d]

I don't delusion myself or anybody else by saying mile racing,
road racing or drag racing is safe but compared to taking it to the streets,

I'll take my chances on the track any day.

This is probably a very smart attitude.

Racing in the mile; you have people watching you,
with radios, and an ambulance standing by.

On a deserted public road, you have nothing.

On the other hand, in mile racing, there can also be
problems that do not appear until a "certain speed."

IF that happens, often without warning,
than you have to deal with a potentially fatal situation
with only the skill and knowledge you started the run with.

190 mph is a bad time to discover that
your bike wobbles over 180 mph,
and you forgot to set the steer damper....

 

[Dark3]

This is actually an improvement in comparison to what I do now. We are hitting very close to 200mph on the street and getting faster. I know its a big risk. Why people like myself with a cherished family decide to take risks like this Im not sure. Im also a combat vet and still active duty in a combat MOS (13B) Its in our nature for some of us to want to go fast and blow poop up. However, the ones that should survive are the ones who are not ignorent to the risk and mitigate a portion of it through proper understanding of the machine, maintanance, proper gear, and when we are beginning to exeed our skill level.

 

[TZ750d]

We have all noticed that when we go on track
(and sometimes on the street) to do battle,
we wear the best of equipment:
Helmet, gloves, leathers and boots, etc.

Usually, we do NOT wear NECK protection......

Some of us recall the unfortunate racing death
of Marco Simoncelli in MotoGP. Marco fell on
the track, was impacted by his own bike,
and then struck in the head / neck region
by another rider.

The helmet came off in the crash.

The cause of death was never announced,
but it would be easy to believe
(I have seen several video's from
different view points) that the front
wheel of the other bike struck Marco
in the neck region, and forced the helmet off.

Such an impact could have predictable results:
1) If the impact was to the front of the neck,
than the larynx would be crushed.
The result would be death by suffocation
since the airway would be blocked.
2) Impact to the rear of the neck could either
crush the vertebra, or cause a transection
of the spinal cord.

Both outcomes would probably be fatal.

And yet, when we see on-board shots
of the MotoGP riders, the ONLY part of
the body seen to be "bare skin" is the neck.......

Without seeing pictures or video of Guy's crash,
we cannot know if the motorcycle "jumped
up and down" on Guy's neck.

In any case, whatever the eventual outcome, we do
know that Guy Caputo is alive and improving.

Pretty lucky !

These may not transfer well:

all can be found by searching YouTube
for Marco Simonchelli crash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6x7Vf2LSE0
Better:

 

[TZ750d]

Guy Caputo's crash, and Shane Stubb's "moment"
last weekend at the Wilmington Mile brings us
back to the vagaries of "the wind.".......

Some motorcycles look very good in the wind tunnel:

Stable, smooth and efficient.
Most are less so.

Quartering winds are a problem.

Bikes can (as we all know) be
"blown off course" by a strong side wind.

A wind tunnel that can pivot the bike on the
vertical axis will allow assessment of
the bikes susceptibility to "yaw."

As part of motorcycle dynamics, "yaw" is usually
accompanied by "roll" - the bike also leans to one side.

The Caputo bike and the Hass bike both have (had)
extensive "flat bottoms." These go right from the
front to the back, and are pretty wide.

In cars, this flat bottom can be used for significant "grounds effects,"
which allow high down-force, and "keep the car on the ground."
Some race cars have more "down force" than the weight of the car.
That means that they could literally drive upside down !

How does that work out with bikes ?

The Caputo and Hass bikes are also pretty tall, and both have
(had) a lot of "vertical side area" that is part of the "flat bottom" design.

The "vertical side area" makes the bike much more susceptible
to side winds - and that results in more yaw and roll.

When the bike rolls (leans), the flat bottom is higher on one side than the other.

That happens with race cars too, but there is a significant difference:
The car might be 5 feet wide, and might tilt one inch, a 1- 60 ratio.

The bike, on the other hand, might be
20 inches wide and "tilt" two inches, or a 1-10 ratio

Cars are very careful about how they allow air to "spill out"
from underneath, since they do not not want more down force
on one side than the other, and thus upset the suspension.

"Skirts" and tunnels are used to assist control of the air.

The bikes we are talking about here have no skirts or tunnels,
and so very little control of "spillage."

If these (potentially 300 mph) bikes are generating significant downforce,
and that is lost - suddenly - in a gust of side wind, what happens to
the downforce and the bike stability ?

Does the sudden loss of downforce also
suddenly "lift" the bike off it's tires ?

Does (because of the roll) the bike get "thrown sideways ?

EVERY very-fast sit-on LSR bike (with a fairing)
so far has had a round bottom.

Is there a reason for that ?

 

[TZ750d]

On Friday, Luis Salom died in Spain in a Moto2 Grand Prix race.

Yes, this is an LSR thread, but the Salom tragedy speaks to us, too.......

This is NOT a particularly good video, but at present, it is all we have.

Leading up to the high-speed crash, there was no reported contact
with other riders, unusual situations that we know of yet, and the
crash happened on a straight portion of the track.

There is speculation that Salom - a highly experienced rider at the world
level in roadracing, just "got a little too much front brake," and the front
end "washed out from under him."

The video shows the bike sliding, mostly on it's side,
in a straight line down the straightaway and into the "AIR-FENCE"

The Bike hits (and deflates) the air fence,
and rebounds back toward Salom.

Salom then slides straight ahead (maybe head first)
into the bike and then the air fence, now deflated.

Shown is the bike rising into the air pushed by the force of Salom's impact.

The cause of death was Salom's impact(s).

The cause of the crash has as yet not been determined.

So, what is the connection to LSR ?

Well, most LSR is trying to attain high speeds on straightaway tracks,
and then safely slowing to suitable reduced speeds.

So, what's hard about that ?

Well, it was a contributing factor to the two deaths at Maxton,
at least one death at Wilmington, and two almost-fatal crashes at Beeville.

That is a big deal !

Imagine that for some reason a rider, at a not-unusual speed of 230 MPH
"misses" the finish line at Wilmington, and hits the brakes too late. The rider
in a little bit of a panic, gets a little too much front brake,
and puts the bike - and himself - down.

The rider now has NO control over EITHER his speed or his direction.

Suppose that there are some BIG pieces airfield equipment in the
run off area at Wilmington, and the rider - like Salom - rams head first
into those posts.

(Use Google Earth , look for Wilmington OH Airpark, and inspect the shut-down area....)

Even at very slow speeds, the momentum of the body
"pushes" the head harder into the impact.

Is death does not come instantly,
it is easy to imagine a broken spinal nerve
in the cervical (neck) area; thus leading
to partial or total paralysis.

So yes, Salom speaks to us, too !

 

[TZ750d]

We now, on the Monday following the
Spanish MotoGP race, have more useful information.

The race team of Salom was able to recover the data from the crashed bike,
and provide a surprisingly detailed understanding of the circumstances of the crash.

A big part of that understanding was from the "where am I" feature of the data,
that allows the bike to "know" where it is on the track. Much of the same information
would have been available from a bystander taking HD films of the incident,
but is such a film has been made, it has not turned up.


"During the course of the FP2, Luis Salom faced his first laps
and makes his best lap (1’48.608) before making his first pit stop
to change the rear tire of the bike.

After that, Salom comes back on the track and during that same
out of the pits lap he suffers the accident. In that lap, Luis arrived
to the turn 12 braking reference point 6 km/h slower than his fastest lap,
according to the telemetry that was because a
lower acceleration at the exit of turn 11.

Due to that reduced speed, Luis operated the brakes 9 meters
later to maintain a proper corner speed at the turn 12.

At the entry of the corner there is an irregularity
on the asphalt known by all the riders (bump).

The delay of the braking instant made Luis to maintain
the brakes operated running over that asphalt irregularity,
as opposed the previous laps where he already had released
the brakes on that spot.

All of that added to an even speed than his best lap of the FP2
produced a stress on the front tire and a grip lost on
the irregularity of the asphalt.

That grip lost produced the crash
with the tragic outcome that we all know."



The team report is available at:
https://motomatters.com/press_release/2016/06/06/sag_team_press_release_telemetry.html

 

[TZ750d]

For those of us who follow LSR accidents, Salom's crash is remarkably
like the crashes of Karl Gunter and Bill Warner at Beeville TX,
where both men rode superbly, but almost died while crashing under braking.

You will remember that Karl and Bill began their individual crashes
within a few feet of each other, while approaching
the shut-down area from far different speeds.

Same problem.
Same result.


This highlights that, as with most of the fatal accidents in LSR,
the problem is not the going fast,
it is the slowing down that may kill.

 

[TZ750d]

A rider came to me and asked about “stopping” at Wilmington.

Of all the LSR tracks in the USA, Wilmington is perhaps
the most problematic, due is parts to the uneven racing surface,
the lack of shut-down, and the solid objects in the run-off area.

So the question was a good one, and very instructive !

From the Wilmington start line to the end
of the paved runway is about 8600 feet.

Take away 5,280 for the measured mile,
and that leaves 3,320 feet to brake
before leaving the runway.

How about stopping from 275 mph ?

A skilled roadracer, like Shane Stubbs could
probably decelerate at a rate of 1.1g over that distance,
but with no “margin of error.”

A decal of 1.1 from 275 mph is a “brake to stop”
distance of about 2300 feet.

SAFE, by almost 1,000 feet……………

HOWEVER:

Let’s assume that even a skilled rider like Shane
can’t get to that full 1.1g for about 1.5 seconds after
the finish line BECAUSE, he has to “transition”
from hard acceleration to hard deceleration,
AND use his skill (which takes time) to
GRADUALLY come up on “full braking.”

1.5 seconds is about 600 feet at 275 mph.

That 1.5 seconds has reduced that “safe distance”
to only about 400 feet, which goes by mighty fast at 200 mph.

Let’s also assume that maybe Shane has a “moment”
that causes him to have to “release” the brakes for
maybe 1.5 seconds, just as he begins his hard deceleration.

At 275 mph that distance is again about 600 feet.

Let’s also assume that Shane, with at least part of his
mind on his growing family, decided to not use a “full panic”
stopping mode, and decelerated at “only” 1.0g

(Which, incidentally, is far more than most
untrained riders EVER achieve)

Shane’s braking distance is now extended from
about 2,300 feet to more than 2,500 feet.

Suddenly, Shane has run out of room, having “consumed”
1,200 feet with “transitioning,” and 2,500 feet braking.

Needing 3,700 feet to stop, and having only 3,300 to do
it, Shane runs off the end of the track 400 feet short
of a stop at about 110 mph.

It has happened there.

Several people lived,
at least one survived the crash,
and one died hitting
an obstruction in shutdown.

Skill in STOPPING is again the answer......

 

[TZ750d]

More on the SALOM crash:

http://fim.hosting.augure.com/Augur...6-E2CA34A60AF9&filename=Luis-Salom-Report.pdf

https://motomatters.com/analysis/2016/07/22/fim_release_report_analyzing_luis_salom.html