FYI: VIR Oak Tree Turn reconfigured (with photos)

[ajmr2]

http://virnow.com/files/2013/08/Chan...08-01-13-2.pdf

[Drew M]

I've never driven VIR. I'm curious to find out why all the changes have been done in light of the tree falling, and why it had an effect on the 'incidents.'

[Matt93SE]

Never been to VIR myself either, but a corner station located in the center of the turn blocks visibility of the back-side of the turn for incoming traffic. If there is a car spun/stalled center-track on the other side of the corner station, a driver has very little time to react and avoid, even if they see the yellow flag and know there's coming up.

Moving the flag stations to the outside of the turn(s)- close enough to the track to still be easily visible- sounds like a better situation to me.

But again, this is the $0.02 from a guy that's never been there.

[Knestis]

We could never see the exit of Oak Tree from the little chute leading into it.

There was always some chance of getting into the back of that station on the inside of the turn, if something silly happened late in South Bend. However, the crew was substantially protected - quite frankly - by the tree that's no longer there.

Tree gone = protection gone, I think.

K

[callard]

Sigh,I will miss the tree but not the Armco. More than one car has been totaled by hitting the iron on the right after completing the turn (but not necessarily in control) Now it looks pretty safe and with a much better field of vision.
Progress and a good solution.

[evanwebb]

Having just done the Chumpcar weekend at VIR, my opinion of non-Oak Tree corner now is that it sucks. No good visual references and the angle seems weird now. And the corner has no character whatsoever now without the tree. I hope VIR does something to make it other than the barren wasteland that it is now.