Sun Ra

mr serota,

methinks thou doth protest too much.

in this thread, on a different subject, i was told to go to your event as safer, to which i responded. i have an opinion, formed from data from people i trust, that private track days or empty roads are probabilistically safer for me than your events. that is my opinion. i stated it on this forum for opinions.

your words here speak eloquently about you. they are not worthy of response. Good luck to you

Todd Serota [TracQuest]

You can backpedal all you want, Watt, but your post clearly implied that TracQuest events are generally unsafe because guys are getting run off of the track and there are lots of scary unskilled strangers. That's trade disparagement, plain and simple, and if your defense in a court of law was what you put in your post - that your statement was based solely on "data from people [you] trust," and that you had never even been to a TracQuest event - you'd lose on summary judgment.

If you want to make a total idiot of yourself by posting that doing 120 mph on a public canyon road followed by immediate hard downhill braking into a hairpin is safer than driving at a DE event on a race track, feel free. Just leave me and my events - about which you know absolutely nothing - out of it.

DJ

I'll wade in here too in support of TracQuest. You will be hard pressed to find any organization with better run, safer events, with an instructor ratio of 1:1. Tons of track time (more than most people will take advantage of), great people, friendly relaxed atmosphere, and great food. This is not at all a "Wild West" type deal. Everyone behaves.

Hamann7

Wow Todd, so now you bring your great legal skills to the mix. We are all so duly impressed. It would be rather humorous to see you try to take legal action against Watt. He has enough resources to crush people like you into the ground.

You want to talk credibility? Let's talk credibility.

I know Watt as a person of integrity and even though we may have differing views on occassion, he has never screwed me over or misled me. He has better things to do than spread rumors, everything he expresses is something that was actually told to him by another person. He is simply repeating what he was told, by that person's direct experience.

You have a reputation around town with service providers as being painfully difficult to deal with, to put it in the most polite manner possible, so don't try to act so innocent. We see right through you.

Hmmm... so who would I believe? An Ivy Leaguer and Harvard MBA who manages a huge amount of capital or a lawyer moonlighting as an online wine merchant and the next Skip Barber? That's a real tough one.

Todd, you and I may not know each other, but I do stick up for my friends. Just like you claim to have loyal customers to TQ, I am a loyal friend to Watt.

1mturo

wow looks like it's Malibu VS Manhattan Bch. I usually enjoy the banter, but when you criticize a persons efforts without first hand knowledge you step over the line. I am amazed that you purchased his car and then he starts circulating hearsay. What’s up with that? Weird

Todd Serota [TracQuest]

Aloha, Michael:

Sad to say, I have absolutely no idea. Even weirder, though, is this Hamann character, with whom I've never had any correspondence, contact or dealings. He's attacking me, including as to subjects that have nothing to do with any of this, in some misguided outburst of being loyal to Watt. I've decided to ignore him. Maybe he'll just go away.

0396

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Hamann7
[B]Todd,

For being quite the entrepreneur advertising 3 businesses, including Tracquest, law firm, and wine, you sure come across as a cheap ***, bitching and moaning about a $50 set of clear sidemarkers.

Hamann7,

It's the 'principle' behind it, also doing 100+ on a public two lane mountain road is dumb.

Just my .02

MJones

If a public road is not closed, how do you know that it is truly empty, and nobody is coming towards you?
How can this road be probabilistically safer than driving on any track?
Guess I'll stay away from Malibu roads, never know who may be encroaching into my lane.

ADOGNY

Todd -

I am about 5 hrs away from Watkins Glen, but I would possibly take a ride. My business, I am a Ticket Broker and I get questioned all the time by people - "Why are the face values of these tickets $50.00 and you are charging $150?? You are ripping me off, etc..". This always comes from people who do not understand that we sell great seats to sold out events - there are no more tickets available for $50.00 and even if there were, they would be sitting in the nose bleeds as opposed to good lower levels or possibly the 1st 10 rows. They come at me with the accusation of "ripping them off", but once I explain to them how the business works, I would say 8 out of 10 usually buy from me. You never know who you are dealing with on the other end, and one instance a gentleman who posed this to me wound up running a large hedge fund and is now a very valuable customer.

Had one of these people not accepted my explanation and kept up with me, I would have just deleted their emails and stopped responding. My time is better spent on my good customers and personal interests, rather than arguing with idiots. I think it was COLM who said "Never argue with idiots - first they bring you down to their level, then beat you with experience.." or something to that effect. That is a great quote and it makes perfect sense.

Now of course I am not calling Watt an idiot, but I do see your point on the side markers, just not sure if it was necessary to bring that into the equation here when trying to defend your business and livelihood. Take the advice from the very intelligent 20 year old young man - Keep doing what you do best, defend yourself as you need but do it professionally, and let your hard work speak for itself. Watt doesn't like your events - so what? Everyone else here seems to and you can see that while Watt may be smarter than I (Harvard MBA), his opinion is his own and I can think for myself.

You have made your point, others have come to your side stating only positives about TQ - leave it alone. Honestly, do you really care if Watt likes you or not? I think the answer is most likely NO so why would you want to waste anymore time with this? I know I would have quit a long time ago..

rockitman

I have yet to track my car and I want to sometime next year. As far as the side-mark issue...I agree, if they were presented with the car at time of sale and upon delivery, they were not there, that is not right and I agree on the principle issue. I also agree that public highways are not the place to test ultimate performance of these cars. While you can control yourself...the uncontrolled variables of other driver's showing up at the wrong time is not worth the risk...at least for me and out of my concern for innocent third parties.
As far as open track events, keeping in mind I have yet to attend one, this is my main concern..."Male human nature and collison". If most events have at least 90 cars...I would be interested in knowing how many are out on the track at once. Here's my concern. You have a guy out in his 100k porsche and you have many other's out in a 50k vette's, 25k mustangs and 30K supped up ricer's. Human nature would tell you that those in the cheap cars for lack of a better expression would like nothing better than having the ability to brag to their friends that they just beat up on a 100K porsche. This tells me that they would be driving more aggressively and taking more risks, whether you factor in driver skill in or not. I don't relish the thought of damaging my car...It would hurt me alot. If I was driving a ricer, my attitude about that would be much different. While it would be advantageous to ones driving skills to have experienced instructors to hone your skills at an open DE... my concerns that I have outlined above make me weary about attending an event with so many cars with unknown experienced levels, hence I agree with watt's probablities that private track days are safer. As far as legal liability regarding watt's quote unquote disparaging remarks, while I can understand why you would not be happy with them, this is an open forum and everyone is free to post opinions and comments how they see fit. It is not the same as publicly advertising opinions in the open marketplace, therefore there is no legal basis for court action.
Todd, please feel free to chime in on my concerns regarding DE's and the uncontrolled issue of testosterone boosted ricer driver's. I am sure that their attitude regarding risk and damage to their vehicle is much different than those attitudes of Porsche drivers. Just my thoughts.

Todd Serota [TracQuest]

Hi ADOGNY:

Thanks for your post. I agree with you 100%. Believe me, I have no desire to waste my time dealing with people like Watt and Hamann, and I agree with you that my point has been made and I can move on. That's why I ignored Hamann's last spew. However, I do note that what happened is very different than what you described happens often in your business, which is actually one of the few that may be disliked as much as being a lawyer! If someone emails me directly with a problem, I handle it just like you do. But when someone posts on a very public forum that my events are unsafe, I need to address it directly, quickly and hard. Saying that a group's track events are unsafe is the single most damaging thing that can be said. The analogy in your profession would be if someone posted in a very public forum that your business is fraudulent because you sell counterfeit tickets that aren't accepted when customers get to the venues, or perhaps that you tell people they're getting 5th row seats that turn out to be in the nose bleed section.

As for Watt being smarter than you, I guess we're all in the same boat now that Hamann has let the cat out of the bag, although I will confess that when I was in college, we used to call Watt's alma mater "the junior college down the river."

In any event, it's very nice to "meet" you, such as it is on the Internet. You're definitely close enough to come up to the Glen and say hello, or even participate, if you can get free. The first Glen event is on Monday-Tuesday, May 17-18. I hope you can make it.

MetalSolid

The one quote in this whole tread that concerns me the most is this:

Wreck Me Otter

rockitman (and MetalSolid) – I can understand your concern about your car as when I started DE’s 2 years ago I had similar concerns. What I had discovered though was that it wasn’t danger from other drivers that became my main concern, it was just the potential danger from driving at high speeds in general and putting a pristine street car into the a wall due to my own driving mistakes. In addition, you will take some hits to the paint from flying debris on the track…but I’ve found that I take more damage from the debris on the street than on the track.

I’d also say that you can’t attribute a poor driving attitude based on how much their car cost. In addition, the typical ‘ricer’ you see on the street wouldn’t be caught dead on the track. Remember, those cars are meant to sound or look fast, they’d be shown up at the track. For the most part, modified cars you see at the track are for performance and safety and are real. Although, I’ll cop to putting on mufflers to make my car sound better rather than perform better even for a track car…but I’m past that now….LOL….

The one time I’ve seen a Mercialago on the track, the driver was unskilled (well, maybe unskilled isn’t quite fair, but he should not have been driving that car on the track at the speed that he was trying to do…) and came very close to putting his car into a wall. It’s the attitude of the driver not the price of their car that causes a problem. I’d be more worried about someone who thinks that fast street driving is safer than being on the track. In addition, as for a private track day, if the drivers haven’t had instruction, I’d be even more worried. You are right that the testosterone can get in the way of safe driving on the track, that is why it is imperative to get good instruction from the start. A good instructor will see the ‘red mist’ set in quickly and will help you recognize it so that you avoid it as much as possible. That is something that is difficult to recognize as a novice driver. This is also why structured run groups are usually much safer.

I also run with a private track group in addition to TracQuest and other more controlled track day clubs and it can be safe, but again, it’s with a bunch of experienced drivers who have gone through a lot of instruction in the past. “Wild West” driving isn’t tolerated.

There are usually 20-30 cars on the track at a time and over a 2.5-3.0 mile track there is usually plenty of room. Some tracks like Laguna Seca have an explicit limit on the number of cars (LS is 25) in a given session. That may seem like a lot of cars, but it really isn’t. Cars can bunch up when there is a wide discrepancy in the relative speeds of the cars and the rules for passing of that group. If a car is blocking traffic and the flaggers are doing their job, the offending car is brought into the pits for a “discussion” and the other cars are set free.

Spins happen to pretty much everyone. It can be from driving beyond your limits, pushing the limits of the car going too far, mechanical failure, changing track or tire conditions, or avoiding far worse things (like hitting a wall). All of these things can be addressed in a structured DE environment. You have to learn to recognize these situations and it helps to have someone that is much more experienced that yourself to teach you these things.

I’d strongly advise you to go to a DE event with a safe club, such as TracQuest, or if you local PCA has a good reputation and go for a ride and see what it is all about. It may not be as unsafe as you’re thinking. However, I do understand your concern about the safety of your car, but you will soon find that it is as much your driving that you’ll be worried about as anyone else. And please, make sure you get good instruction from the start.

The trick is to identify a good group and stick with them. I’ve spent a year weeding out the local groups that I felt were unsafe. I will be running with 4 groups this year as opposed to 12 last year as I have seen first hand how they’re run and don’t have to rely on second hand info.

Have fun…oh and your car was MEANT to be on the track…LOL…

Feel free to e-mail me if you have more concerns about DE's that I can help with...this goes for others as well. I've only been doing DE's for 2 years now but I have over 40 days of track time as well as having done all 5 of the Skip Barber schools during those 2 years. Yeah...I'm a track junkie and I know it...LOL....

rockitman

Let's see Metal...hmmm that's a statement demonstrating your level of maturity...
For your information, I got my car at the begining of October. In case you don't understand weather changes...and probably don't since your from Socal. Snow comes in up at my parts in late Oct. I believe that the last DE, a tracquest event, I think was at Watkins Glen later that month. My car was far from broken in at that point and as of today, I have 1300 miles on it. So yes, it has not been tracked yet...So here's back at you dude!!!

PS: You took next year out of context. It is 2004, so I should have said this year. Maybe that would have cleared up your confusion...As I am sure you are the best driver on the planet...

rockitman

Thanks for the info Kim...If I have any questions, when it gets near track weather up here, I will be sure to email you. Take care...