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RealRideRacing
12-31-2003, 02:02 PM
Wow... what a character building year 2003 has been for me. This has been a year I'd sooner forget.
Starting with the loss of local racer Paul Mumford. Then a week later, the wife of a fellow American Stockcar Challenge (ASC) competitor was killed in an accident while she was driving home from the grocery store. Her Jeep Cherokee rolled and she was killed. Fortunately her infant daughter survived unharmed (she was in a baby seat).
Undoubtedly, my biggest blow came on October 18th during an ASC race at Buttonwillow Raceway when our driver Bill Blauvelt was killed 10 minutes into the race! A simple error (got into the marbles) which led to a slide, then an impact with a common result,a basal skull fracture. Bill was a talented racer, all around great guy and one of my closest friends. Since the accident, his widow and I have become closer than ever and it saddens me to think that his 18 month old son will never get to know his father. Fortunately, Bill did have the foresight to make arrangements for his family in the event of such a tragedy.

Folks,
We all need to worry about safety before performance! I've always been a strong advocate for safety equipment. All our cars are fitted with the latest in racing harnesses, window nets, interior nets, fire systems and rollcages. All our drivers must pass a 10 second exit test, followed by a 30 second blind exit test. Our suits, helmets and gear are replaced every 3 years regardless of wear. Half of our drivers are already equipped with some sort of head and neck restraint protection (HANS and G-Force), while the other half will be placing orders by early 2004. Ironically, Bill was to buy a HANS device at the end of the year in preparation for our GrandAm series entry for 2004. Since the accident, we've removed the seats from every single one of our race cars and have replaced them with RaceTech seats. After intensive research of race seats manufacturers from Recaro, Butler, PPI to Randy LaJoie custom seats, we've decided on the Racetech seats for personal reasons. Most of the other companies offer a seat of equal quality and crash standards. Racetech was commissioned by Daimler Chrysler to develop the seats for the Viper Comp Coupe and provided us with extensive sled crash test data that convinced us that race seat design remains one of the remaining weak links in race car safety. While the information shown to us is confidential, I can only say that I was shocked at the vulnerability of the driver while strapped to 95% of the seats available on the market. The majority of recent race driver fatalities can be attributed to head and neck injuries, and a majority of these injuries are a result of seat design failure.
Whether you road race, rally, circle track or autocross, safety is paramout. We estimate that Bill's impact occured at LESS than 60mph! But our engineer estimated a 26g impact. It's not the speed that kills, it's the sudden deceleration. Under the right circumstances, one could experience a 40g impact at parking lot speeds. Think about this, whether you're competing in an H-Stock Autocross car or a Spec Miata, you need to think about safety.
Our engineer Tim Spencer has posted a brief article outlining his findings at our website (http://www.realride.com "LEARNING FROM TRAGEDY). I encourage everybody to do your own research and make your own evaluations. But please think about your safety!
Instead of buying that new "whiz bang" intake, would the money be better spent on a fire system? How about a well engineered custom rollcage instead of that bolt-in piece?


Regards,
David
REALRIDE.COM RACING
http://www.RealRide.com

RSTPerformance
01-02-2004, 06:43 PM
Agreed, safety is most important... You can always go faster in the next event, lets first make sure we are going to make it to the next event.

My condolences go out to those who have suffered injuries and/or losses this past season (and the ones prior).

Good luck to all on a safe 2004 season!!!

Raymond Blethen

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http://rstperformance.bizland.com/rstsignature.jpg
RST Performance Racing
www.rstperformance.com (http://www.rstperformance.com)
1st and 2nd 2003 ITB NARRC Championship
1st and 6th 2003 ITB NERRC Championship
3rd 2003 ITB ARRC Sprint Race
4th 2003 ITB ARRC Endoro
1st 2003 AS NERRC and NARRC Championships

01-05-2004, 12:26 PM
Wow, that was an eye opener. Thank you David and I offer your whole team my heartfelt condolences, I lost a close friend at Riverside, you dont forget them, you go on and take part of them with you. From the lack of responses from this very opinionated group of racers I deduce you all have been thinking hard about it. I can say I did add 25 extra ft of tubing to my car while building it and got a few grins and chuckles when I brought it out the first couple races, one guy even said "whats a gussett" and "are those legal", the difference was adding 56 pounds of lead instead of 80 (tubing weighs 1.5 per foot, roughly). I hope that my Cobra Imola2 race seat is worthy but up to now I havnt bought a head support, they were $1600 at first, SCCA was going to do a bulk purchase to bring it down but im not sure what happened. I will look into buying one asap but what is really bugging me now is the seat failure and how this leads to injury, I must know.

EDIT
I read realrides article and I have something to add, back in the 70's and early 80's, alum racing seats had a side support that was below the shoulder, that is what kiiled my friend. if any of you have one of these seats, destroy it and make sure it NEVER ends up in a racecar again.
After looking at some $5000 NEXTEL CUP seats I think a crafty guy can build shoulder and head supports that will work while keeping your racing budget intact, ill post some links soon on this.
Daryl





[This message has been edited by 7'sRracing (edited January 05, 2004).]

gsbaker
01-06-2004, 03:27 PM
Originally posted by 7'sRracing:
...From the lack of responses from this very opinionated group of racers I deduce you all have been thinking hard about it.

My condolences to Billy's family and his team. I spoke with the chief of the safety crew that extricated Billy, and was told it was not a pretty sight.

Yes, we've been giving this a lot of thought, but have been hesitant to comment for two reasons. First, while research results of lateral impacts are very preliminary, they are beginning to point in the direction of designs that support the body at the hip and shoulder. It is believed that lateral support at the rib cage alone can force the ribs into the chest cavity causing internal injuries, and does nothing to protect the head and neck. Again, please keep in mind that this is all very preliminary.

Second, I'm hesitant to comment on the role of head and neck restraint products in lateral impacts because I am in the industry and am concerned that anything I say may be construed as a commercial comment. Let me just say that the new seat designs combined with a "head surround" severely confine the driver in the seat. This is great for impacts, but becomes ugly if you need to bail.

Please make certain that your head and neck restraint does not slow your egress from a burning car if you are using one of these seat/restraint designs. Bobby Labonte had to completely remove--not just disconnect--his head and neck restraint before he could exit a burning Winston Cup car last July.

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Gregg Baker, P.E.
Isaac, LLC
http://www.isaacdirect.com