That's just hand waving. If she was wearing a 4-point harness in a car with OEM airbags that's a level of added risk that didn't have to be there.

We don't know what happened and what contributed to the death. But people who take risk as binary ("yes risk" or "no risk") instead of weighing the amount of risk miss a key concept.

It's about risk management, not just accepting the presence of risk.

If I drove a RWD, 2-star crash rated car on summer tires in the snow, without a seatbelt, wrecked and got hurt would it be "hey, driving on streets are dangerous and an accident can happen to anyone?"

It's funny because most of the guys in our car club (including us) swear by snow tires in the Winter. It's the casual non-driver-drivers who say, "I don't need them, I have AWD..." an example of people not understanding the risks involved and how to manage them.

I love cars and driving. But for Winter commuting I have a 5-star crash rated AWD vehicle with good stability assist and full snow tires that I sell before they get down to 1/2 tread.

So here, yes, a tragedy. Early reports suggest that there were some things that contributed to an unsafe situation.

 

Here's another point of data... how many people know what crash test data means?

If you're tracking and you wreck in a 2-star rated vehicle, you have a > 4x chance of serious injury compared to a 5-star rated. It's the reason that the only vehicles I'd consider instructing in would be Audi sedans (no joke, going to apply for instructor status with the local chapter). Also a reason why I don't feel comfortable instructing tuner kid 90's Civics with 500 hp and crap tires.

Tracking is dangerous. If I can reduce my risk of injury in a wreck, that's what I want to do. 4-point harness without proper adjustment and in a mushy street car seat can be more dangerous than OEM.

 

Please help out the families through this tragic event. Any donations small or big will be greatly appreciated. Link for Donations

 

The picture really hits it home. Very sad. Some pictures of him and his car on his Facebook.

 

I've climbed into many tuner cars on the instructor line because somebody has to do it or the sport will suffer. You just have to be ready to bring them into the pits and end their day if they don't respond to your instruction.

I do try to reduce the risk of injury by wearing cotton long sleeve shirts, cotton underwear and socks, a decent helmet and a HANS device with a chest strap so I'll get at least some neck protection when riding in a 3-point harness.

Injury during HPDEs and TT are very rare and it's usually not the "tuner guy" or "life crisis Corvette guy" that cause them. The accidents seem to be pretty random. Cale was one of the best driver's I've ever known and yet he paid the ultimate price for our sport. One of the things that makes this sport so enjoyable is the element of risk we take on track. Our sport isn't for everyone but that's definitely one of its attractions.

 

This.

And certainly this.

 

Again, agree with random accidents. But if you assume you're going to be in an accident sometime that may be out of your control (debris, mechanical failure, oil on track), you DO have some control (not total control, but some control) over how hurt you get.

Good helmet, HANS, properly placed and secured 5-6 point harnesses, race seat with lateral head supports ("Halo") and a car with crush / crumple engineering probably reduces the risk of serious injury in case of random accident by over 50% (probably more).

 

I totally agree.

One of my friends rolled his FR-S last weekend at WSIR due to a porsche dropping oil

100% OEM safety systems. He was completely unhurt.

 

You've just eliminated about 98% of student cars with those requirements. Instructing isn't for everybody. I learned that while flight instructing at the Air Force Academy. I had to fly an "elimination" check ride for one of my instructor's students that wasn't progressing. If he failed this ride with me he would not become an Air Force pilot.

We took off and I demonstrated a pattern and touch-and-go for him then let him fly one. On final he was getting a little low so I prompted him by asking him how the "picture" looked and he said he looked low, then added some throttle and climbed up to meet a good glide slope. He made a decent touch-and-go and on climbout I heard him sniffle. I looked over and he had tears in his eyes. I asked if he was ok and he told me that was the first "unassisted" touch-and-go he had ever done. I asked what he meant by "unassisted" and he said his instructor would keep his hands and feet on the controls when he was flying which he isn't supposed to do--only one pilot should be flying. I found out from this instructor's other students that he rode the controls with them too. Turned out this instructor was afraid to let his students fly the way he was supposed to so we did some counseling and kept weak students away from him. Not everyone is cut out for high performance instructing--in the air or on the track.

Oh, and the student passed the check ride, got a new instructor and went on to Air Force pilot training.

 

Man these Porsches. My only incident ever was coolant also spilled from a 911.