OK, I’ll get the apology out of the way right off the bat; Sorry, no “Intro” posting ……. I’m boring and rarely post (but lurk and benefit greatly from the wisdom of others …. Thanks to all for that !) so I did not/don’t expect that you’ll hear from me again.
That said, I feel that it is imperative that the following gets on the board so that others might learn something that could save some skin, if not a life.
Thanks to a great friend I was afforded the opportunity to do Ohio last month (Sept.) on a Busa and big-inch twin. That experience followed a couple of weekends before the demise of Maxton (double handful of 200+ passes) as well as a fairly substantial career road racing (incl. one GP Natl.Championship). so, all in all I have a few growth rings and a good bit of experience going fast at organized events.
Wilmington turned out to be a pretty ugly thrash for us due to tuning issues and we generally spent the entire weekend attempting to get a 230MPH scoot to log a 200.00001 number in order to reach our goal of a record and a hat. The entire effort had boiled down to one last run (3:50 PM or so) for that nominal percentage of 1 MPH needed on Sunday afternoon. The scoot benefited from that cool, damp, post-drizzle atmosphere and motoring past the ½ I was confident that we had done the deal. That was about the time that I detected something on-track that I could only (initially) identify as a Turkey Vulture, just left of track center between the ¾ and the traps. Yeah, we’re goin fast about here and although my world is a bit wonky (what with the speed and ogling through the bubble) I’ve seem them beasties before. I’m out on the two-lanes (at meaningful speed) every Sunday morn and I darn sure know all about those impediments …… spotting them in the immediate vicinity while at speed calls for a roll-off, brake cover and big-time attention to the details! Well, as one might expect things came into more precise focus in a big hurry and my Vulture opponent turned out to be a (black/dark) Busa front fender sitting there proudly, perpendicular to my route. Naturally I tipped the throttle plates back to the full open position and muttered a few choice expletives into my Arai. Having the aforementioned experience at roadrace tracks, after gathering in the scoot I went long and immediately began gesticulating to the course worker at the track end to shut down the track (yeah, in addition multiple throat slash gestures I’ll admit to doing the rider down head tap thing too). Confident that I’d gotten the message across I returned to the staging lanes and trailered the scoot at 4:01 P …….. our weekend was done.
Reading the preceding I find that aside from the bit about muttering into my helmet I don’t sound anywhere as PO’d ……. no, flat out fried ! …… as I actually was at the time. I’m thinking things like “Just how much energy does it take to accelerate a Busa fender from 0 to 200 mph instantaneously and what are the effects of that sort of impact on my ride?” …. too; “There’s a good target for a rookie (or most anyone else) to fixate on!” …. and; “Just how in the Hades can somebody give Al the go to send a bike down course with a big ole black lump like that sitting out there plain as the nose of their face?” ……. AND, “Who shed that thing and did not make sure that the course was shut down immediately? “
Something is seriously wrong with that picture folks! That lump was perfectly located so as to be plainly visible to anyone scanning the course (particularly down on the big end where I presume(d) that “scanning” is accomplished after every pass?). I think that the course scan, right along with competent Tech and comprehensive rider/driver briefings are the imperatives to be met by ECTA at these events. Pretty much everything else is secondary. Sending a rider down course with that sort of crap on the track is flat out inexcusable and it does not take any imagination to understand that it’s asking for yet another short course LSR fatality.
Fast forward a few minutes post-loading and I caught up to Keith Turk at the registration trailer and posed the obvious question(s); Was that in fact a Busa fender? And, “How come I was sent down course with that thing lying out there?”. Sadly, I did not get anything even vaguely resembling what one could/should expect. Most disturbing, from my perspective, was his response to the latter; “We can’t see everything out there!” and this delivered with what I can/will only describe as an indifferent attitude. Pretty much sucks in my estimation. No one is ever going to convince me that that obstacle was not plainly visible to anyone even casually scanning the big end of that course (binoculars anyone?) from what I presume would be the timing trailer ….. period. There’s a deficiency here (perhaps more that one?) that absolutely must be addressed by this organization if riders/drivers are to have any semblance of assurance regarding the safety they expect and deserve.
So, deficiencies identified here’s a couple of suggestions;
Never, never, never send a rider/vehicle down course if it has not been thoroughly scanned (a natural, that) !
Provide clear direction at the rider/driver meetings regarding how to properly react when something is dropped (or thought to have been dropped … or observed) on the course.
Act like rider/driver safety is important! Copping an attitude/getting defensive accomplishes nothing and sends the wrong message.
Oh, yeah ……… we missed our record/hat goal by about 7/10 ths. of a MPH ……. Thanks guys!
BTW; Yeah, I too think the volunteers and Registration ladies at the event did/do an outstanding job!
Just,
Eddish
