What happened to the 69 DSE Car?
 

I saw this posted on the DSE site but does not say how it happened. What a bummer..
http://www.detroitspeed.com/projects...amaro-pg1.html

Your link just takes you to the DSE Build thread for this car --- and a quick check of DSE news has no mention of anything "wrong" or having happened to the car.

Greg, put your glasses on. :_paranoid Looks like they smashed it into a tree or something. There's pics right in the link.

well it looks like it hit tree or a pole
it seems like driver is ok
so somebody has to have some video

I can't remember where I read it, but I believe Stacy hit a pole while racing. She was fine. Just wish I could remember where I read about it.

They posted to facebook a couple days ago:

http://www.facebook.com/#!/photo.php...type=1&theater

http://a8.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphot...96331856_n.jpg

"Thank You from Stacy Tucker

I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone who attended RTTH VII for their help and concern during my ‘incident’ on the autocross during the Top 10 Shootout. I was very excited to be 4th out of 78 cars going into the Top 10 Shootout and unfortunately had a racing incident. When any of these cars are raced, these things will happen at some time. This happened to be my time at Pigeon Forge. Thank you for everyone’s concern. It is nice to know we have so many friends in the Pro-Touring community. I am just fine thanks to the engineering and build quality of the vehicle. The car is already in the shop, torn apart, and will be better and faster than before. The entire DSE Team is jumping in to have it on the track for me in no time. Thanks, also, to everyone here at DSE for their extra hard work so I can participate in these events. See everyone soon at the next event!"

AH HA!! Missed it completely!

I didn't go thru the photos -- and then when I went to the "news" section and there was no mention... I didn't check any further.

Just shoot me!

LOL

Looks like a good excuse for some carbon fiber or aluminuminuminum.:rolleyes:

That little lady pushes harder than mostly anyone I know in the pro-touring circuit and when you ride the edge long enough,,, sooner or later you cross that line.... It happen, she fine and we're all real happy she's ok...

Frankly another real life testimonial to just how good/safe the DSE products are... They test them hard as this wasn't a little nudge/ bump from what I heard (I was off preparing the evening BBQ when it happened to be clear)....

All the video was confiscated.And was not allowed to be show on the web.

Kids, don't text while auto-xing.

I've always thought it was a little dangerous to run a autocross in a parking lot with poles and trees.

The couple I've been to were held at airfield's so cones would be the only thing to hit.

Glad Stacy was ok!

Insurance reasons?

Most SCCA Solo events have a Safety Steward that approves the course design and placement on the site. Using a parking lot with curbs, poles, trees, and other obstructions presents an entirely different animal to a course designer.

Incidents like this do happen at autocross events. It's very rare, though.

Mary Pozzi

In a round about, obtuse way... Maybe. The Tucker's don't seem to have any issues telling the story though...

Especially courses where speeds can exceed 50 mph... At that point you're really pushing the envelope for "fun" style autocrosses and safety should be a prime consideration. No matter where you hold these there will always be danger points - its up to the organizer and course designer to ensure that they do their best to minimize the risks. Ultimately it's also up to the participant to decide it they want to run it.

A This could/should be a learning experience and is a good example of how competitive motorsports can be dangerous - even at our level. There was an incident at the GG show this weekend where a cars throttle got stuck at WOT going through the finish line. If it weren't for the skill of the driver - depressing the clutch before killing the ignition - it could have been scary. As it was it was a good reminder that you need to be aware of what can happen and think about what you would do in the same circumstances.

^^^^^^^^^^^^ Having lived/worked around many race car/tracks... this is super good advice!

Yep, you have a split second to react in these tight venues. A stuck throttle or a loss of brakes and you're screwed. At a local SCCA event, a throttle stuck on a miata and ended up a set of steps and almost through a building. The whole self tech thing is a load of bull sheet. EVERYBODY shoudl be subject to an inspection by a knowledgable racer with tech experience. If nothing else, two sets of eyes are always better than one.

Guys, we are hauling ass in these protouring cars. Every time I get out on the road course, I"m reminded of the importance of quality parts and maintenence. These aren't factory engineered cars. Things do work there way loose and wear out prematurely. We are pushing these things to the max!

i saw it on there facebook page...and was like "holy crap" glad stacy's ok...feel sure they'll have the 69 maro back rolling in no time!

Umm..yeah, the photos of the wreckage are on DSE's web site.

Props to DSE for posting them there.

Its great to hear Stacy is ok. Time to run the roll bar from the firewall to the front for some extra support in case this happens again. :yes: I was actually surprised they didnt already have a full roll bar in this car.
Its also awesome she was able to get in the top 4 out of 78 cars. Thats something to be proud of for sure.
And for those that mentioned insurance, most dont cover auto X or road track events. At least not any in my area.

As mentioned above, you should always be prepared for brake failure or WOT. Always have that in the back of your mind and be ready to respond instantly. I actually had this happen in my driveway this weekend with the Mustang. I was just driving up and down the driveway and when I went to go forward the throttle stuck almost wide open! I slammed the brakes and hit the shifter into neutral. Could have been a disaster. Just always keep that in mind and be prepared for it. And build your cars in preparation for an accident.

I believe they were speaking of event insurance and not car insurance.

As I said - "The Tucker's don't seem to have any issues telling the story though"...

Yup accidents happen and as I said you should build your cars to be prepared for the accident. Especially the interior to protect the driver and passengers.

There is no reason at all for anyone to try and "hide" what happened. In fact they should do an article about this to help others learn about safety while building their cars. They could go in detail about the speed of the accident, the parts damaged, and how well the interior safety equipment held up. We always read about the builds and the money put into the cars but an article about the damage from an accident, and the areas to reinforce would be a great read for the majority of the community. :thumbsup:

Not to get way off track here but I'm a HUGE fan of self tech sheets. I also believe in personal responsibility and Darwinism. I look my car over every time I take it out to make sure it is good. I find lose bolts all the time. I re-torque all my critical fasteners, check brake pads, and just look the car over after every track event. This winter I’ll pull the engine, trans and diff to have them checked out. If my car breaks it is my fault! Not some clip board totting tech guy that did not see my rear caliper bolt was finger tight.

I love events like the last one I went to at Gingerman. The registration and Tech process took 2 minutes. I paid my money signed the drivers sheet, turned in my “self” tech sheet the tech guy looked at my helmet and I was done.

I also believe many of this “Pro-Touring” Auto-Xs are a little dangerous and sold as “safe”. There have been a number of incidents at Goodguys events and some at shoot-outs. I think there have been more cars damaged Auto-Xing than doing the road course stuff.

Auto-Xing is great! I started out Auto-Xing due to the fact it was cheap and attainable. When I work with new people we always start out Auto-Xing. It is where we are going to get new people participating in events. So we should attempt to make them fun and as safe as possible.

One thing we could do is communize our rules to make it easier for new people. Goodguys event allow 180 tread wear and Optima events want 200 as an example. It would be very nice if this winter some of the major players got together and set common set of rules.

Back to the DSE Car. Stacy is a very good driver and all their cars are prepared top notch. She was unhurt because they have good cars with good safety equipment. I have seen a couple DSE front sub-framed Camaro involved in accidents and the sub-frames showed great toughness in absorbing the impact. I’m very happy she is OK and the car is on the mend and I’m sure the Blue ‘69 DSE test car will be back on track with Stacy at the wheel soon. :thumbsup:

Mark

My only counter to that Mark is the fact that not all involved in this hobby are GM engineers or master techs like myself. Some rarely turn their own wrench or pop the hood except to puff out their chest. While a majority are capable of teching their own cars, I still think an SCCA type tech improves safety even if it prevents one accident.

There are good reasons for this also. I recognize that there are pros and cons to release of some information, however IN GENERAL (to be clear, not making any statements about this event) once things get out in the public domain there is no longer any control, and it is getting more and more difficult to satisfy event insurance, liability, legal, and venue restrictions. Problem is that on the web things tend to spiral out of control and often out of context - and in some cases this could result in less events being possible. It's all well and good when things are discussed here. Right up until the point where the underwriter discovers a thread and refuses future liability coverage. Then we'll be reducing the number of (well run) events rather than increasing them. Just something to think about.

Exactly. When the promoters can't get insurance and the events are cancelled, where will we all be? Remember, a lot of these events were started to give all of us a venue to have SAFE fun with our vehicles with out having to build race cars. I've done that, that is not what my Dad and I are in this for. But, we would like to be able to drive it hard in a controlled atmosphere. As Mark said your safety is mainly your own concern. I also agree with Todd. Some out there have more money than knowledge. That is where a good tech official can help. Part of safety also is knowing what your vehicle is capable of and knowing it's limits. This whole subject in my opinion has the potential to ruin this Pro-Touring "movement" if you will. If this can not be worked through, there are going to be a ton of 6 figure race cars for the street that don't have a sand box to play in. Chances are they will not meet any sanctioning body rules completely and there won't be enough to create a class. Who's ready to to put their 150K Camaro on the track wheel to wheel instead of against the clock?
Just my .02! :cheers:

People are making this seem like a car tech, or self preparation problem, it isn't. This collision occurred at RTTH7 autocross. Here is a video of the event:

Parts of that make me CRINGE. This autocross should have never happened, the course wasn't safe, and the venue wasn't adequate for the type of course. This should have never been run to begin with, and it was only a matter of time until something of this nature occurred.

To give the entire story since everyone is beating around the bush here, the event promoter is Bill Howell. Bill started a thread on Pro Touring about how he knew that these cars, and courses were unsafe, and that we might need to require more rules, and better safety equipment. He then later deleted the thread, I'm assuming so that when something like this happened the insurance carrier wouldn't see that he had concerns, and he could limit his liability.

I think this falls into the 6P's category. Proper Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance. In this case someone with experience, such as a SCCA steward, could have drastically changed this course, or even ruled the venue inadequate and prevented this entire thing.


To be fair, Bill did promote the RTTC2 event that I went to, and the courses were exceptionally well designed. The autocross and road course both were safe, fun, and challenging.

Is everyone forgetting what we are doing here, racing is not for the faint of heart. If this stuff scares you, take up knitting. I ran the event, there was nothing unsafe about it. Stacy is an EXCELLENT driver, and Detroit Speed builds the best equiptment on the market. Unfortunatly, if you push the car hard enough, sooner or later your going to go off road. That's racing. Ron

James, I have a question...

Did you attend this event?

No. Ill be the first to admit that I'm being a keyboard commando, but I stick behind my comments.

WOW, really?
First, it is amazing to me that you can watch a video and from across the country determine the course was unsafe. A multi-time national SCCA champion set it up, over 780 runs were made in 6 hours, and suddenly, with one incident, it should have never happened?
Second, I never, in the thread you mentioned, said courses or cars were unsafe. I started a thread, to get people involved in how we could improve things. We have gone, in 6 years from static car shows to full on road racing in our cars. Some say we don't need roll bars, others think we can never do enough to be safe enough and should stop all competition. In my position, I want to be as safe as we can reasonably be without killing the hobby. Once I gleaned all the info I was looking for, I moved the thread, not deleted. Anyone with proper authority can view it.
Third, no one, including myself, ever tried to HIDE the event or the incident. In fact, DSE posted pictures of the car the very next day. I did ask people not to post up video or pictures of the car until DSE had the chance to tell the story as they saw fit. After they did, the story pretty much died until this thread, and just as I suspected, keyboard warriors have gone from the facts about the wreck to their own speculation about how they would have done things different, how this was just horrible and blah, blah, blah when in fact they are just running their mouth about something they don't know what they are talking about. And yes, this is the very thing that some unknowing insurance agent could read and have issue with. In my case, my people knew about it that afternoon. Total damage was hurt front end on camaro and one dead tree (6 inches around) and one broken 4x4 post.
Fourth, new safety measures are in store for all the event I do next year, however, none are based on this incident. This was a freak deal, as most racing incidents are, and I am not sure what could have been done different to prevent it. However, if it did have to happen, I am thankful it happened to a car and team that is probably the most prepared and safety conscious team out there. A true testament to that is that Stacy walked away and never missed a beat the rest of the weekend.

If we are going to do anything other than sit at a static car show, these things will happen. To learn from it is what we should be striving to do and do better next time. To want videos, pictures and countless Monday Morning Quarterbacks out there to sensationalize something way out of proportion serves no good purpose.

If you like events and want them to continue, move on. If you want to jeopardize them, keep posting opinions in threads like this.

I agree with Mark about self inspections and think anyone serious enough to push their car to it's limits should be also. However, I am amazed when I see cars that don't even have the battery secure show up to autocross???? The trouble is Mark has forgot more about car safety and proper maintenance than most of us will ever learn. So until everyone thinks like him, we will have to do more than take their word about their car if they are planning on running it at an event.

If anyone wants to discuss this with me further, PM, email me at [email protected] or call me @ 865.850.8228. I have nothing to hide but I refuse to discuss it further in this format.

Well said Bill!

Darren

Thanks Bill. I for one greatly appreciate what you've done to grow these events, they're a lot of fun. :thumbsup:

Perfect Bill! Kudos to you!

If it was all someone else's fault --- then I'm thinking DSE might have been the ones to say so... and so far they haven't. DONE!

Talked about you today btw just in case your ears were ringing! Dr Renner and I were having a nice chat and said how much we hoped RTTC would be coming up!! Such fun events!!

XOXO

Thanks Guys.
Greg, just between us, there will be 2 RTTC style events in 2012, just don't tell anyone else right now...:thumbsup:

You just did, you goof! <ducks for cover>

Mary Pozzi

Excellent post Bill. Speaking as some one who was tired of cruises that entailed parking in a lot and driving high end one flip to open lawn chairs, I applaud what you have done for this hobby. Also as someone with a racing background I know the challenges you face in putting these events together. I can't wait for our project to be completed and participate in many of your events. They better continue or you'll have to answer for the extra thousands that have been spent to get the truck out of the parking lot! :lol: :thumbsup: :cheers: