How NOT to take turn 1 at Eastern Creek

Guran · Postby **Guran** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 11:46 am

The "fun" starts at around 6:30 ...

This was at the BMW Supersprint on 18th Sep 2011. A few old friends were competing on the day. The car was #21 and was a modified road registered BMW 325i with stock seatbelts! He did 1:57.356 and 1:57.459 on the first two laps. After losing it on turn 1 and hitting the inside wall, the car rolled at least a few times before ending on it's roof. The driver walked away with a punctured lung and bruising. Lucky boy! :shock:

Dweezle · Postby **Dweezle** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 11:52 am

OMG!!! CRAP!!! sh*t!!! FU*K!!
insert more expletives here!!

Glad he is ok. That was crazy violent!!

PaulF · Postby **PaulF** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 1:03 pm

As soon as you said "turn 1 at Eastern Creek" I knew it wasn't going to be pretty, but as Dweezle said it looked very violent.

zossy1 · Postby **zossy1** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 1:16 pm

Wow - what caused it? The subtitles suggested that he might have had some kind of mechanical failure...?

Guran · Postby **Guran** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 1:53 pm

Only if you call excessive entry speed and understeer a "mechanical failure."

deviant · Postby **deviant** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 2:35 pm

The dangers of a stock seat and seatbelt on circuit. Head unsupported with the weight of a helmet on it and it appears as though his body is across the seat and not upright in it. He is a very very lucky boy.

Why doesnt that wall have tyres on it? Is it not usual to go in there?

It is bloody scary sometimes seeing how quick some road cars are on track. It's just the risk you take though, you might crash or you might blow your engine. Thats motorsport.

Dweezle · Postby **Dweezle** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 2:36 pm

Out of interest, would a better thing to have done be to allow the car to understeer off the right side of the track across the grass??

Natural instinct though would be to counter and try to correct it.....

Any pics of the aftermath?

deviant · Postby **deviant** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 2:41 pm

Natural instinct would keep you turning left but about where he says "somethings not right" would have been a good time to straighten the wheel, get on the brakes and run off the track in a straight line.

I dont have sound on my work machine...does he lift off or brake at any point?

manga_blue · Postby **manga_blue** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 3:34 pm

deviant wrote:Why doesnt that wall have tyres on it? Is it not usual to go in there?

The biggest hits often occur on an inside wall well after a very fast corner, and usually involving a higher powered car. Conclusion of the big tank slapper, if you like. The pit wall at the start of the main straight at Phillip Island takes a similar punishing.

I think you're right, Deviant. You need to go for the brakes early when you lose it on a fast one, so that you keep on sliding out to the outfield. Outfields are usually set up more safely than infields.

Guran · Postby **Guran** » Fri Nov 11, 2011 3:59 pm

deviant wrote:The dangers of a stock seat and seatbelt on circuit. Head unsupported with the weight of a helmet on it and it appears as though his body is across the seat and not upright in it. He is a very very lucky boy.

Yes I agree. However, even in a race seat with a 6-point harness, his head would have been flying around too. Only a HANS device would help with that and VERY few people use them at club level motorsport.

Why doesnt that wall have tyres on it? Is it not usual to go in there?

That's a good question. I don't know the official answer but I'm guessing that it might be because the most common way drivers hit the wall is at speed and at a grazing angle. A tyre wall might encourage a car to roll (not that it needed much help in this rare case). Or a tyre wall might encourage a car to bounce back onto the track into the path of VERY fast oncoming cars.

Without a doubt, if you ever find yourself running off the outside of turn 1, you should NOT try to bring it back. Just get on the brakes and let it run into the kitty litter, preferably in a straight line. It is designed to slow you down and there's plenty of it out to the right. On the inside of the track there's nothing but pain.

BTW, I'm still looking forward to the next two days of supersprinting at Eastern Creek! :mrgreen:

With a little more trepidation than usual.

greenMachine · Postby **greenMachine** » Sat Nov 12, 2011 3:22 pm

manga_blue wrote:... The pit wall at the start of the main straight at Phillip Island takes a similar punishing...

That brings back memories of a big tankslapper there after putting two wheels in the dirt on exit, fortunately without hitting anything.

It was a useful lesson, applied later at EC T1 when (after an off-line entry) the GM steered off braking as hard as possible and getting back on the circuit with a surprisingly small amount of lost time - even though the off track ride seemed to last forever - I think I came back on around the 100 braking marker for T2!!

Am I seeing that his problem started with an early apex?

:mrgreen:

Postby **Okibi** » Sun Nov 13, 2011 12:35 am

Yowch, glad he's ok! :shock:

wilch · Postby **wilch** » Thu Nov 17, 2011 8:30 pm

Guran wrote:Without a doubt, if you ever find yourself running off the outside of turn 1, you should NOT try to bring it back. Just get on the brakes and let it run into the kitty litter, preferably in a straight line. It is designed to slow you down and there's plenty of it out to the right. On the inside of the track there's nothing but pain.

Funny you say that. I remember the instructors drilling that into us during a drivers meeting at a Skylines Australia day at EC. Was mentioned more than once.

Guran · Postby **Guran** » Fri Nov 18, 2011 6:38 am

Sure enough, one guy went off at turn 1 on Sunday at the Supersprint Nationals. He did the right thing though and ended up deep in the kitty litter. The turn was yellow flagged for the rest of the run, but the car was back again in the next run.

Luke · Postby **Luke** » Wed Dec 07, 2011 10:59 pm

Ouch, glad I went into the kitty litter when I went off there on a drying track.

I lost it differently though. I did it on the old surface when it was still bumpy on the inside, plus being half wet. Found out the hard way not to hug the inside line in the wet. I actually did hit the brakes immediately but it was still heading for the inside.
I was lucky the car had already rotated enough for me to flick it back the other way whilst going backwards into the kitty litter on the outside. I was only about 3m into the kitty litter and wasn't dug in, but still couldn't get out

. Had to be towed out by a Falcon ute.

I came out with just 2 scratched up rims and an underbody full of pebbles. Oh and slightly flat spotted Achilles which was probably the root cause in the first place. Didn't stop me driving on them though.