[Rab0099]

There have been multiple devastating wrecks at Watkins Glen over the years, one causing fatal injuries to driver J.D. McDuffie. The recent wrecks bring us to the debate of safety for the drivers. There is an informative article including all of this at HardcoreRaceFans.com on the front page, it also includes a nice picture of J.D. McDuffie in 1980.


Hope You Enjoy.

[gordon_fan_4_life]

Nothing needs to be done! You are gonna see wrecks like this every where! Though they would do something about the tires around the track! Those are the only things make the wrecks more devastating!

[Lefturn]

Originally Posted by gordon_fan_4_life

Nothing needs to be done! You are gonna see wrecks like this every where! Though they would do something about the tires around the track! Those are the only things make the wrecks more devastating!

I disagree. I am not familiar with the track, but it looks as if they could remove the trees in behind that wall and put in a big gravel trap run off area there. I think they should look at that. The tires do their job lessening the initial impact, unfortunately the angle of the wall throws the car back accross the track which caused two pretty significant wrecks this week.

You will always have wrecks, part of racing, but I'd rather a car plow through the gravel than rebound into the race track.

[MikeRaceDayTek]

Originally Posted by Rab0099

There have been multiple devastating wrecks at Watkins Glen over the years, one causing fatal injuries to driver J.D. McDuffie. The recent wrecks bring us to the debate of safety for the drivers. There is an informative article including all of this at HardcoreRaceFans.com on the front page, it also includes a nice picture of J.D. McDuffie in 1980.


Hope You Enjoy.

Ok, lets kill the motor here a sec. J.D. died in a crash in turn 5, the next seasons race there NASCAR had implemented the bus-stop. That reduced the speeds entering that turn. So let us keep things in perspective here. Both "wrecks", as you called them, this weekend were in Turn 9, which is the fastest turn on the track. There are currently only 2 choices for NA__AR at that point in the track. #1. Maintain the wall as it is with better energy absorbing walls or #2. Turn the angle of the wall so it will not bounce the cars back out into traffic.

Choice 1 is the better option. Adding just a gravel pit is ridiculous. Ask Jr if the gravel pit made his head on into the wall any less of an impact. Also, Gravel pits work great for areas where the car is already slowing down, like the entrance to turns, but on exit? Not so much. Let's use the Hornish wreck as an example. Kahne got loose after the apex of the corner, as both drivers were accelerating. That leans the car nose high, meaning the gravel pit will not catch the nose of the car to slow it down the way they are designed to do.

[Motorsports One]

Originally Posted by MikeRaceDayTek

J.D. died in a crash in turn 5, the next seasons race there NASCAR had implemented the bus-stop. That reduced the speeds entering that turn. So let us keep things in perspective here. Both "wrecks", as you called them, this weekend were in Turn 9, which is the fastest turn on the track.

Turn 5 in 1991 is now Turn 9 in 2009, one and the same turn. McDuffie crashed going in a straight line from the entry point to the turn. Leffler and Hornish crashed at the exit to the turn.

There is somewhat of a run-off area all around that turn (without a gravel trap) and cars wouldn't bounce back onto the track through most of that turn. But where Leffler and Hornish crashed is where the retaining wall is angled to get closer to the track at the exit of the turn.

They could push the wall back some to avoid that angle that threw the cars back onto the track, but they would be limited to the distance from there to where the boot section of the track rejoins the short course.

[Bob Tanner]

Originally Posted by Motorsports One

Turn 5 in 1991 is now Turn 9 in 2009, one and the same turn. McDuffie crashed going in a straight line from the entry point to the turn. Leffler and Hornish crashed at the exit to the turn.

There is somewhat of a run-off area all around that turn (without a gravel trap) and cars wouldn't bounce back onto the track through most of that turn. But where Leffler and Hornish crashed is where the retaining wall is angled to get closer to the track at the exit of the turn.

They could push the wall back some to avoid that angle that threw the cars back onto the track, but they would be limited to the distance from there to where the boot section of the track rejoins the short course.

Correct me if I'm wrong, Martin but it seems that i remember it had rained for a couple days prior to race day in 1991 and the grass was still wet when J.D. had his wreck. As you say, it was a straight, head-on wreck and even though there was a considerable distance between the track and the site of the wreck, he was going almost full tilt when he hit the barrier.

I believe the following year Harry Gant had a similar wreck at a different point, also with wet grass and he said it felt as though the car almost speeded up when it was sliding through the grass.

[MikeRaceDayTek]

Originally Posted by Motorsports One

Turn 5 in 1991 is now Turn 9 in 2009, one and the same turn. McDuffie crashed going in a straight line from the entry point to the turn. Leffler and Hornish crashed at the exit to the turn.

There is somewhat of a run-off area all around that turn (without a gravel trap) and cars wouldn't bounce back onto the track through most of that turn. But where Leffler and Hornish crashed is where the retaining wall is angled to get closer to the track at the exit of the turn.

They could push the wall back some to avoid that angle that threw the cars back onto the track, but they would be limited to the distance from there to where the boot section of the track rejoins the short course.

I understand that we are still talking about the same turn. There is 4 turns in the bus stop, thus, turn 9. What I am saying is that the sanctioning body had responded to McDuffie's crash with the implementation of the bus stop. This resulted in much slower entry speeds into the corner. My other point still holds true about a gravel pit being nowhere near as effective when the car is under acceleration as opposed to braking.

[Motorsports One]

Originally Posted by Bob Tanner

Correct me if I'm wrong, Martin but it seems that i remember it had rained for a couple days prior to race day in 1991 and the grass was still wet when J.D. had his wreck.

Can't remember what the weather was like, but J.D. had a mechanical breakdown getting into that turn. Wikipedia says he broke a ball joint and a rear wheel broke off the car, but I don't think ball joints are involved in the rear of the car. From what I saw, it was the right front wheel that came off the car, J.D. had no brakes and collected Jimmy Means into the accident.

[Motorsports One]

Originally Posted by MikeRaceDayTek

What I am saying is that the sanctioning body had responded to McDuffie's crash with the implementation of the bus stop. This resulted in much slower entry speeds into the corner. My other point still holds true about a gravel pit being nowhere near as effective when the car is under acceleration as opposed to braking.

Gravel traps help, even if they don't totally stop a car. I'm sure Dale Earnhardt Jr. was glad the gravel trap was there in Turn 10 when he ran out of brakes.

The only different thing I'd do with gravel traps is increasing the height of the ridges the further you get into the gravel trap, almost like what you see in runaway truck ramps on highways. If you're going to go as far as the end of the gravel trap, the higher ridges wouldn't do any more damage to the car than the wall would have and it might just stop the car before it gets to the wall.

[kkfan91]

YouTube - 1991 Budweiser At The Glen - JD McDuffie Fatal Crash

yeah a wheel came off McDuffies car the video even says that corner has been a problem

[MikeRaceDayTek]

Originally Posted by Motorsports One

Gravel traps help, even if they don't totally stop a car. I'm sure Dale Earnhardt Jr. was glad the gravel trap was there in Turn 10 when he ran out of brakes.

The only different thing I'd do with gravel traps is increasing the height of the ridges the further you get into the gravel trap, almost like what you see in runaway truck ramps on highways. If you're going to go as far as the end of the gravel trap, the higher ridges wouldn't do any more damage to the car than the wall would have and it might just stop the car before it gets to the wall.

I get that, at the same time, watch a replay of Jr's wreck, he was nose low and still skipped across the top and hit hard enough to kill the front of his car. Under acceleration they would do even less. The way a gravel trap works is to catch the front of the car making it bog down and bleed off speed. If a car is nose high, like it is under acceleration coming out of the corner, it will just skip across the top of the gravel pit, maybe losing 5 or 10 MPH. Do you really believe that 5 or 10 MPH would have kept Hornish from coming back on the track?

The biggest problem with that tire wall is basic physics, combined with the purpose of rubber. Rubber tires were created so that it could take the impact of bumps in the road and reflect it back to the road, instead of into the passenger compartment. Basically, whichever direction the impact comes from, it is returned to. Now stack these tires into a wall. Whatever direction the car comes into it, it will return at an inverse angle (thus, physics). Meaning unless the angle of the wall is changed (making the impact worse on the driver), or the composition of the wall is changed (my suggestion), cars will continue to bounce back into the track.

Now, I'm not an engineer (yet), but it shouldn't be that hard to make something that will absord the impact, but keep the car at the wall (giant bags of styrofoam peanuts maybe?) instead of getting that insane rebound. I've noticed that most of us race fans are kind of like politicians in that we all want to say the NA__AR is doing it wrong, but can't give feedback on how to make it right. Let's hear some ideas on how to fix it.

[DOF_power]

The Glen is an old multi series track, witch is why it has these problems.

Removing the tire barrier and adding gravel traps are bad as far as safety goes for open wheelers and sport prototype racecars.

[Roadmaster1]

Originally Posted by DOF_power

The Glen is an old multi series track, witch is why it has these problems.

Removing the tire barrier and adding gravel traps are bad as far as safety goes for open wheelers and sport prototype racecars.

ding ding ding, we have a winner! so i guess nascar needs to not go to a sports car track? ugh here we go again... so i guess we just take the cars away and make them run down the track in there underwear like in talledega nites? might be safer...oh wait maybe we should just let them use ps3's and xboxes to sort out the championships and have a bunch of ten year old kids being na$car stars.... the drivers know the risks, the fans know the risks... if drivers wanna be candy ♫♫♫♫♫$$$ they should just race online... seems some writers have nothing better to do than whine like some drivers... and the writers would have to get real jobs instead of sittin on their keysters! hmmm might be a better solution huh?

[DOF_power]

Making the track wider and with more run off space, and a safer barrier for the NASCAR races while removing the tires would be a solution.

The main problem is that old open wheel tracks are an example of how not to design race tracks anymore since safety was not a consideration.
The menthality for such tracks was "if you don't want something bad to happen then don't go of and crash".

[nascaraddict]

Well after the Steve Park / Dale Earnhart Jr. wreck; I think that the improvements that's been made inside and outside the car have made things safer. Other than that, I don't know what you could do. There's already more Saferbarrier at that place than you could shake a stick at.