Motorcycle Race Accident ................dramatic video footage

I found this clip with a very unfortunate Motorcycle Race Accident
involving 2 drivers and 2 Track assistants. Does someone here has or
know about this crash, where when ect. ?
regrads, F. Nufer
http://www.jumpingpixels.com/motorcyclecrash.html

 

That is sickening sh*t dammit.

That is exactly what happens when unprofessional, amateurish crews control a
race. A bike was in the middle of the mother%$#@! racetrack for a straight
minute, and obviously no mother&^%^%$#! flags warned anyone, there is no way
on earth anyone would have come in so hot if they'd yellow- or justifiably
red-flagged the race.

I *HATE* to see crap like this, with an immense passion. Sickens me.

....pablo

 

pablo, I think you might wanna check your judgemental attitude a
little. I don't know how much experience you have, but I've
cornerworked (CCS, AMA, and FIM) including Loudon and have raced there
myself. What I can tell you is that not getting the right flags up
happens much too often. As a cornerworker, your order of priorities
are as follows:

1. yourself
2. your fellow cornerworkers
3. injured rider(s)
4. other riders on the track

Red flagging a race is a bit of an artform in that the decision has to
come from the control station and the red flags must go up everywhere
simultaneously. The way red flags happen is when the workers at the
incident believe the situation warrants it, fly waving yellows and
possibly debris flags and at the same time radio to the control
requesting a red flag. Then it's up to the control to decide what to
do. As you probably know, incidents like this can unravel very quickly
and sometimes, as a cornerworker, you just have to do the best under
the circumstances.

A few years ago, I cornerworked for an AMA/FIM superbike weekend at
Laguna Seca. I was in turn 10 and we got most of the crashes of the
Saturday. There was one incident I remember vividly, where 2 riders
(Hayden and Mladin I think) came together and Mladin's bike was totally
destroyed, parts were everywhere, including right on the racing line.
Turn 10 at Laguna is a pretty fast corner (which one isn't when those
guys are on track?) and we knew bikes would be coming around fully
committed in no time. We relied on the flagman to fly waving yellows
and others to do the "line change" signals to the riders. For whatever
reason it didn't happen right away. After I got Mladin's bike off the
track, I noticed his fuel injection unit was still on the racing line
and no one was close by. So I went for it. When I picked it up and
looked up, I saw Eric Bostrom's 32 headed right at me. If it wasn't
for his quick reaction, I wouldn't be here writing about it. Would it
have been the flagman's fault? -- maybe, honestly I didn't see what was
happening there and I can't jump to conclusions. I do know that at
that moment, my teammates were giving him the "line change" motion,
though it wasn't enough of a warning at that spot -- but that was all
that they could do at the time in that moment. But I do know this: a
waving yellow by itself does not mean "slow down". It just means
there's an incident coming up and you can't pass. Even in club races,
you don't back off for yellows unless it's accompanied by a debris or
ambulance flag, or a "line change" sign.

In that particular video, a red flag should have come out sooner, I'm
sure. But it's hard to know what really transpired there. But my
point is that as a cornerworker, you rely on your teammates to watch
your back in situations like that, both literally and in the form of
flag people and the control doing their job. But no matter what, it's
always dangerous and it's a labor of love. Those guys at club races
are there all day through the rain and the sun and the most they get is
a T-shirt and lunch. You have to love it to do it. And my hat's off
to them. I always try to wave at each cornerworker station on the
cool-down lap.

Agreed. It was nasty.

 

Come on. There was no excuse for guys to be on the track while it was
obvious no one had *yellow* flagged things, guys were still coming in full
tilt, and predictably as soon as a larger formation came in the riders in
the middle of the pack raced into that mess.

Yeah, and the best protection is to yellow-flag as soon as someone is in the
iddle of a racetrack. You're supposed to yellow-flag immediately.

That was not the best cornerworkers can do, and you know it. There was
plenty of time, and riders where coming in hot all the time.

I agree. nevertheless it is also a huge responsibility, and with
responsibiluty comes accountability. To me it's obvious the cornerworkers
did not work as a team in that incident. I pity the corageous guys that went
out onto the racetrack to check on the riders well-being, and the fact they
were criminally let down by other cornerworkers probably just looking o
insead of running ahead with a yellow flag. There should have been yellow
flags immediately all over the freaking place. The first accident could not
be avoided. The nasty follow-up looked perfectly avoidable - plenty of time,
no yelow flags anywhere, riders coming in at full race speed. A shame. A
damn shame someone has to get hurt.

....pablo

 

or whatever that googlespew hides points to:

OK, I wasn't even going to look at this until ya'll started
dissing the cornerworkers.

The first guys by seem to obviously check up. Did the
flags STOP waving after that? I'm guessing not, but
a bunch of nervous novices (this looks like a club race
at NHIS which I refuse to call Loudon anymore) aren't
paying attention to the flags when they are racing.
The one that hits the corner workers looks up to find
carnage 20 feet in front of him.

It sucks when anybody gets hurt. It sucks a LOT when
a cornerworker gets hurt. But this looks like an accident,
not negligence on the flagger's part. To me.


Go fast. Take chances.
Mike S.

 

The waving yellow was out. It is just outside the field of view of the
camera. A waving yellow does not require a rider to slow down. It
does, however mean there may be something on the racing line, and you
are not allowed to pass until you are past the incident.

Here is a link to a web site that has a lot of info about the guys that
got hit. The accident happen in 2001 and everybody is ok. The two
workers are also racers and they have both raced since then as well.

http://www.broadsquad.org/events/turn2/

Like I said, the waving yellow was out. You have a lot of nerve making
that comment about, "unprofessional, amateurish crews" from viewing one
video. We pride ourselves on being able to keep things going. If we
stopped every time a bike went down we wouldn't get half way through
the days races. And we do not normally get hurt doing it. That is the
only time corner workers have been hit since the present track was
built in 1990. We know what went wrong and have taken actions to be
sure it doesn't happen again.

I am one of the charter members of this group

http://www.usmarshalls.org/

We have been hired by other tracks to show their workers how to do
things. Several of us have worked Daytona, VIR, Mid Ohio, the GP and
many other tracks.

Bruce Richmond

 

As others have pointed out, the yellows and debris flags were out.
That does not guarantee that the riders will enter that particular
section significantly slower than they would under normal conditions.

See above.

Perhaps you can tell me what your suggestion would be.

Plenty of time? Are you seriuos? The only thing I can possibly think
of here is that a red flag could have come out earlier, but I can't
know why it didn't and what the exact sequence of communication was
that took place. But please understand that while track riding and
working is a reasonably safe activity and has gotten much more so in
the last couple of decades, it's not safe in absolute terms. If
someone comes to the track to ride or corerwork under the impression
that it's equally safe as sitting at home watching TV, they should
reassess their logic. Every now and again, we all get lulled into
thinking that this sport is like ping pong, but it is isn't.

I remember very well at a trackday I attended, where the organizer
assigned a meaning to the red flag that was different than traditional
racing red flag meaning. At this trackday, they made it clear that
when they threw out red flags, they wanted everyone to stop on the race
track, not slow down and proceed into the hot pits like you do in a
typical race setup. At one point, they had to use the red flag. It
caught me as I was not far behind another bike. We were not too far
from the pit entrance and the incident did not appear to be anywhere
near us, but we began to slow down nevertheless. We were rolling
through a section that would normally see bikes screaming in 4th or 5th
gear and were probably good 50 mph slower than that pace at that
moment. All of a sudden, we were passed by a bike going full steam, on
the gas, going through the gears, just a few feet away. I believe he
either did not see the red flags or did not properly interpret them.
Either way, it was one of the scariest things I was ever privy to on
the track. Communication and cooperation is key to avoiding things
like that. But at the end of the day, we're all human and we're gonna
continue to make mistakes every now and again. That does not mean you
can't or shouldn't expect and strive for the best in safety. All I'm
saying is you have to be realistic and you certainly shouldn't come
down on people when you don't have a full understanding of the
circumstances.