There was a death this year at Snetterton where someone hit a front brake lever, flipped over forward and broke his neck.
that was someone I know sadly. to be perfectly honest, a brake guard wouldn’t have changed the outcome in his situation. The closing impact was horrible. it is a good move though. But I will say they’re not going to do much with a reasonable enough impact. And the cheaper ones are so flimsy they just buckle anyway.
Sorry for the loss. It's very sad when someone passes you know. I guess if it saves 1 life, it's worth it. And the guy that sells all the bits on TDs will make a nice coin too.
If honest buddy I’ve become somewhat numb after the last year or so. It’s seemed somewhat endless. Really very sad. It should never be ‘normalised’
What do you think is causing the clear increase in crashes or red flags? 200+ hp bikes in unskilled hands? The Covid lockdown? (I mean lack to track time and then everyone wants to improve) I am only asking because compared to 2008-2012 when I was doing 15-20 days /year...there was a clear increase in red flags in the last 2-3 years. (bear in mind I have done an average of 3 days/year in the last couple of years and none this year) Nowadays, I prefer enduro practice days (just turn up pay the £40-60 and ride as much as I like, no more noise testing, briefings, tyre warmers and especially red flags). Racing enduro is also much cheaper...
Hey there, It's a question that has been raised a lot of times online. Here's my take on it; Track days are oversubbed. They're extremely busy these days meaning that people book in to whatever they can (wrong groups). I've seen it with my own eyes numerous times however the worst was on a day last year, there was national riders running around in novice and inters at Oulton for Christ sake ! And I got wiped out by a guy at Druids on a v4 wobbling around on the racing line in fast. Wrong groups in general is an issue. It's hard to police but I DO believe that the TD organisers need to do more about it personally. There's one or two TD organisers who really don't seem to give much of a shit about it and keep putting the responsibility at the feet of the attendees... This year specifically has lead to the lack of testing time for racers meaning more racers than usual on trackdays which compresses the above issue even more as the closing speeds between even a quick ish club racer and a fast track day rider can be astonishing let alone bsb guys. Social media has attracted and bred a crap calibre of new punter. People think it's funny to be wreckless. There's also an abundance of newer people to trackdays who I call the ex cafe lot. The ones who love skids and wheelies who can't be seen in novice but also can't ride for shit. There's a lot of poorly maintained sheds running around and also a culture of people who won't ride anything bar a 200bhp 1000.. I can honestly say I've never seen as many fluids dropped as I have this year. As well as this, even non racers are timing and chasing down times to prove something to someone. But a lot of people just don't have the minerals to do be doing so and are wayyyy too proud to get tuition. It's really a mixture of things for me, but the whole TD industry has grown a lot and unfortunately not really with the right kind of punters (in my opinion).
To add as well, there's a lot of shit advice from clueless social media people online. A girl who I know of and i'll leave nameless crashed a while back and busted herself up. She joked about it despite the fact it clearly shook her up. The whole joke about it thing is an old technique as we know. One often utilised by the Military to normalise and humourise stuff that hurts and can be fairly shocking to joe public from the outside. But this racers mentality of laughing about our near death experiences is basically whether people admit it or not just a coping mechanism. I myself have done it. But it has filtered in to the trackday community sadly and isn't healthy! you can get hurt at this game. Or worse. But I digress, there's so much shit being spouted online by people who really haven't got a clue. But they have a lot of following and people (much like in the media) lap it up. I watched a high side vid recently of someone, and the amount of alarming comments from clueless people was unreal. Some mainly just agreeing with whatever the poster wrote because they wanted a go on her (pretty decent to be fair boobs). Any constructive comments were deleted. It really was pretty black and white what had happened and it was entirely due to bad rider input and technique. But everyones looking to blame something else and then gets all touchy when you state the obvious. Another example is a lad I know of who when I first met him I was in awe of his amazing instagram elbow down and wheelie pics. I watched him at cadwell a while back and he was absolutely shit. Social media isn't real! I was in spain earlier this year and there was a rider on a trumpet who was dropping oil. I went to the owner of a certain TD company and told them. They said they'd deal with it. They didn't. A few sessions later the bike expired and guess who stacked it on the oil....
After reading some of the posts here. It seems to me that relatively new TD riders are embarrassed to use the Novice group to learn in. Much like motorway drivers who have a habit of sitting and hogging the middle lane, because the inside lane is only for trucks or similar but not them doing 60-65mph or frustratingly less. I just wish those who used timings would use them regularly and check them after every session and not at lunchtime or after the day has finished especially if it's on day 2 or 3.
I've heard when they tried to time people and move them at lunch it turned into qualifying in the morning for after lunch.
Track days in the UK this year appear to have been miserable damp meat-grinders, they're supposed to be fun and safe (as can be expected) environments, many riders have given up riding on the roads to attend track days as a safer option. I'm fortunate enough to have been able to choose to do euros only (mostly), however with covid, even these are becoming more and more tricky to attend. Spain now insisting on evidence of a negative covid test pre-entry. This is adding more expense and huge risk of losing the cost of the whole trip if the result should be positive.
That’s always been the worry of turning the morning in to super pole although I’m not aware of many U.K. TDO’s who’ve actually done it. most seem to spout insurance reasons as why they cannot.
