38D

Wanted to share some video from a race that I believe can be a good learning opportunity for the community. This was 2 laps into a double yellow. I am the camera car, and I will refer to the other two as car 1 and car 2. Penalties were assessed in this case.

A couple of ground rules:

1. This is not about the individuals involved. I have purposely made it hard to figure out who the cars are in the video (black & white, blurred the car numbers). Please do not post details if you know them. Let's leave the pitchforks and torches at home for once.
2. Editorial comments about who is or isn't an idiot are not constructive. Let's attempt to actual learn from this.
3. If this gets unproductive, I'll just delete this thread.

Lessons learned from my perspective:

1. When catching the pack, be prepared to stop. Look ahead for the flag stations! Especially where there are blind spots. I could see the flagger in my rear view hanging out of the station vigorously waving the flag trying to get car 1 & car 2's attention.
2. If you have to come to a stop in a blind spot, try to do so offline and away from the "escape route" - this is where I should have done better. Had I stopped all the way left, car 1/2 still would have had to go off, but they would have had another 20 feet to react.
3. Catch the pack quickly and safely! One of the mitigating factors was car 1 not catching the pack quickly enough, and car 2 getting frustrated.
4. Don't follow too closely under double yellow, at least not until you can see the pace car.
5. If you are involved in something like this, learn from it. This is one of the closest calls I've ever had in my 18 years of racing.
6. Go talk to people after a close call, and be calm about it. Car 1 and car 2 are both friends before this, and still are.

steved0x

HPDE level comment (I'm not a racer) - why was the car about 15 or so cars up ahead stopped before the turn in to T11? I am unsure of the meaning of double yellow for club racing, Disabled car or incident on track?

I recall a few years ago there was a collision in this spot during the orientation laps at an HPDE - definitely a spot that warrants caution.

roadie13

I had the same question, stopping on the track at HPDE only happens with red flags.

38D

I am not exactly sure, but I suspect it was the accordion effect plus he possibly stalled the car. You can see the pace car bunching up the field, so even if that car had been moving and not left a gap, we still would have been going very slowly.

jscott82

Holy crap!!!!!

Seriously scary.... I get how the "offending" car its a simple mistake, but ho-lee-sheet the consequences could have been devastating/life altering...

168glhs1986

That's why they have run off there. They know what they are doing.....

Jabs1542

Wow, horribly bad place to get packed up. Whenever I slow down a lot (short of stopping) I think of the standard line coming up behind me. Normally the exit of Turn 10 is track right so I would make my way to the left while slowing down. Generally try to stop opposite the side of the line, even if that means it’s a little further from the nearest flag station (you just need to see the flagger, not talk to them).

69911s

I was there, I'm in the video though not one of the two cars in question. The whole thing was not good and unexpected in a very bad spot. If I had yanked my car back to the left after the crest of the hill to get offline I probably would have spun or risked contact with another car. I had just seen the car in front of me lose traction at a surprisingly low speed in an earlier corner trying to make a quick correction. The whole pack had been moving in an accordion of speed/slow pace but something stopped a car up near turn 11 and it looked like he might have stalled and needed to restart. No judgement on him, it happens. If I had it to do again, I probably would have stopped at the top of the hill where oncoming traffic could see stopped cars much farther out but I didn't realize the pack was stopped until I had reached the crest. The two cars coming out of nowhere at that speed was quite shocking but at the speed we had been moving they were probably just trying to catch the pack. Bottom line for me is that you have to be on your toes every second that you are on the track just as much as you are under green going 10/10ths. I can look to see if my video might provide anything of value to the thread if the OP would like. I have watched it several times myself for the purpose of self instruction.

Cory M

Glad you didn't get hit. The number one rule in these situations is always just to be predictable. I don't know why the guy was stopping in the middle of the track, but he created a pretty dangerous situation. I'm sure all the cars behind were trying to figure out what was going on too and just following him, which is to be expected. The cars going off the track were probably going way too fast trying to close the gap under the yellow. I understand the competitive reasons for doing this, but it is taking a lot of unnecessary risk for a club race when there are broken cars and potentially safety vehicles on track.

winders

I was in a SVRA race last year at Laguna Seca where I was in second place trying to chase down a ~850 HP Corvette. As we were coming around to start the 4th or 5th lap, double yellow flags were waving at Start/Finish. The Corvette blew right past them and would have run into the pace car just over the crest of Turn 1 if the pace car had not moved hard to the right off the track.

I've missed single yellow flags before so I am not a saint. But missing waving double yellow flags is a big deal. Especially when blind corners are involved.

Seth Thomas

Great summary and I agree with all your comments 100%.

At the same time the question you guys as racers need to be asking the series involved is why did these cars stop on track to begin with? If the pace car is moving that slow after 2 yellow flag laps then it is an issue caused by the series and they need to figure out a way to help keep an incident with an accordion effect from happening. I have seen several organizations want to say it is up to the racers to be held responsible for the actions on track. To me this is a wrong type of approach. It is that of one where no one wants to listen to the customer base and try to figure out how to make the series/sport better. Remember this is club racing where no one is getting paid. The customer base is only there when it is a safe and fun sport, (small oxymoron there with racing). When crashes total racecars while under full course yellow because the field is going so slow they have to stop on track then the organization involved does not understand what it really takes to run a race.

Jimbo951

I was SEVENTH (and EIGHTH) !!!

93 FireHawk 968

Wow, that could have disastrous. Good learning opportunity for all.

my first 911

To the OP on this thread. I love the way you presented this very informative post. I am in the early stages of solo in the PCA HPDE's and I like to learn.

ProCoach

Double Yellow is for when there is a safety car on track. It means FULL COURSE YELLOW.

Yellow means caution, no passing, be prepared to take evasive action.

Lots to learn here because this should not have happened.