June Sprints

[kart_racer_44]

Additional onboard video from Dean Oppermann's FE POV.

http://youtu.be/bDvBTmleYn4

[racerdad2]

Nice editing ! Fun to watch... Not a happy ending... Still, a great video... What software do you use ?

[kart_racer_44]

PM Sent

[mikey]

Ok I've seen the videos you guys posted and read all the posts.. I'll offer my probably unwelcome opinion as an outside observer. I don't know any of the three involved.

Perhaps the best reality posted in an early post was that there IS enough room for three cars through that section of RA as long as all three drivers are on board.

It looks like Dean and Denny were both on board, but Kevin was not. Denny certainly was the most aggressive, but in Dean's video it is apparent that right after Kevin gives the point by to Dean, Kevin does not hold his line and moves another couple feet to the right. Difficult to synchronize the multiple videos, but it appears this move to the right occurs at the time Denny is already trapped, putting Kevin's front right wheel inbetween Denny's two left wheels and ultimately Denny's left rear makes contact with Kevin's front right.

Avoidable? Perhaps. But I think Denny had just as much rights to room on the right as Dean had rights to room on the left. Had Kevin maintained a more center line, I think this could have come out just fine. Denny could have possibly backed off, but I think he would have had to make that decision before Kevin's last move further right and that wouldn't make sense in a racer's mind because there WAS room before then to get through. Two hands on the wheel would have been smarter for Kevin, it was obvious Dean wasn't going to wait for a point by (who would?) anyway.

Its racing. My observations can't be fully proven true without Denny's video, but at the end of the day, I think the person most at fault was Kevin, but I don't see enough fault to blame any of the three. It also appeared there may have been more room on the left that Dean could have moved further over and Kevin might not have felt the need to move further right.

All in all, pay to play at the amateur level. It is what it is.

[JByers]

Ok I've seen the videos you guys posted and read all the posts.. I'll offer my probably unwelcome opinion as an outside observer. I don't know any of the three involved.

Perhaps the best reality posted in an early post was that there IS enough room for three cars through that section of RA as long as all three drivers are on board.

It looks like Dean and Denny were both on board, but Kevin was not. Denny certainly was the most aggressive, but in Dean's video it is apparent that right after Kevin gives the point by to Dean, Kevin does not hold his line and moves another couple feet to the right. Difficult to synchronize the multiple videos, but it appears this move to the right occurs at the time Denny is already trapped, putting Kevin's front right wheel inbetween Denny's two left wheels and ultimately Denny's left rear makes contact with Kevin's front right.

Avoidable? Perhaps. But I think Denny had just as much rights to room on the right as Dean had rights to room on the left. Had Kevin maintained a more center line, I think this could have come out just fine. Denny could have possibly backed off, but I think he would have had to make that decision before Kevin's last move further right and that wouldn't make sense in a racer's mind because there WAS room before then to get through. Two hands on the wheel would have been smarter for Kevin, it was obvious Dean wasn't going to wait for a point by (who would?) anyway.

Its racing. My observations can't be fully proven true without Denny's video, but at the end of the day, I think the person most at fault was Kevin, but I don't see enough fault to blame any of the three. It also appeared there may have been more room on the left that Dean could have moved further over and Kevin might not have felt the need to move further right.

All in all, pay to play at the amateur level. It is what it is.

Mikey,
I support and agree with your observation. After all aggressive driving puts you in places you wish you weren't in.

(5) 2013 races entered - One win, One second and three DNF's due to mistakes by others while driving aggressively.

Flame away -------

Jason

[dc]

You guys are 100% correct.

Having watched enough spec class races with Keith and talked to him enough about the pitfalls of a class where the whole field can be covered by a few tenths, there are two ways to go about racing in a class like FE.

One, drive aggressively and get through the alphabet soup of other classes in your race group. Denny and Dean are both very good at this method, and very fast because of it. As you can see form some of their in-car videos, they also tend to have much higher repair bills because of it.

Two, pick and chose your holes, pass when it's clean, and wait for potentially other class cars that might clog up goof close battles in FE. I have watched videos from Keith's in-car of back-market FCs, FAs or even sports racers get in between a couple of fast and competitive FEs and ruin a whole race for someone not playing the aggressive game. It's not cool.

Frankly, I don't care for either version, which is why I am not behind the wheel to have to make those decisions. Would have I put my car where Denny did? No, probably not. Nor would I have been happy to have gotten trapped behind a slow car from another class and lost sight of faster cars in my class that I knew I couldn't catch up to again. No win, either way.


Racing incident from my viewpoint. The FM probably had no business at the June Sprints yet, but that's another topic altogether. Sucks for Dean and Denny, but they both made the decisions to compete in FE using the first method. You pays your moneys, you takes your chances, right?




Hopefully lessons were learned by everyone, at the very least.

[Tifosi]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llllL...ature=youtu.be

[racerdad2]

You had the room, after all, you're racing FM just didn't look to the right... He probably thought everyone would pass him on the left... So, a rookie mistake, nothing more... I am impressed at how tough those FE's are.

[kflyer]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llllL...ature=youtu.be

Wow. I stand corrected and must admit that I closed in on Denny. I appologize for not seeing him. In the interest of moving on I will not post anything else on this subject.

-Kevin

[Darryl Wills]

Mikey, You obviously have NO knowledge of Road America... Flaming Kevin for driving the racing line is just dead wrong...The racing line veers to the left to setup for a right hand turn at the bottom of the hill.

Kevin has a National license and has more car races under his belt than half of the field...What does "not experienced enough to be at the June Sprint" mean?? It was just another National race not the Runoffs...

Denny chose to place his car into a disappearing wedge and the gamble did not pay off. I would have probably taken the same chance...

These two drivers sound like they have history and that can definitely raise the emotional quotient up on any on track contact.

Racing incident..flaming a new driver for spending his time and money to be at this race wreaks of a foul stench and you people should be ashamed of yourselves.

[mikey]

Mikey, You obviously have NO knowledge of Road America... Flaming Kevin for driving the racing line is just dead wrong...The racing line veers to the left to setup for a right hand turn at the bottom of the hill.

Kevin has a National license and has more car races under his belt than half of the field...What does "not experienced enough to be at the June Sprint" mean?? It was just another National race not the Runoffs...

Denny chose to place his car into a disappearing wedge and the gamble did not pay off. I would have probably taken the same chance...

These two drivers sound like they have history and that can definitely raise the emotional quotient up on any on track contact.

Racing incident..flaming a new driver for spending his time and money to be at this race wreaks of a foul stench and you people should be ashamed of yourselves.

Darryl,
You obviously have no knowledge of me and you're a bit late now.. Kevin already manned up. You should watch Denny's video, it confirms everything I theorized. Not that it matters, but I've got more than a thousand laps at Road America.
And while you're at it, consider these other two points:

1) Kevin's right hand was never even on the steering wheel while Denny was on his right (see Kevin's video).

2) FE front wheels are wider than rear wheels. The front wheels got by fine but the rear contacted Kevin's front, because he moved over while Denny was right next to him! He couldn't watch both sides and unfortunately he was looking left at Dean.

As I said, amateur racing is what it is. Kevin took responsibility, I think his post should have been the last one, unless Dean wanted to apologize for flaming Denny, but either way, you coming in to flame me for whatever reason is pointless.

[Colin Marklein]

Darryl,
You obviously have no knowledge of me and you're a bit late now.. Kevin already manned up. You should watch Denny's video, it confirms everything I theorized. Not that it matters, but I've got more than a thousand laps at Road America.
And while you're at it, consider these other two points:

1) Kevin's right hand was never even on the steering wheel while Denny was on his right (see Kevin's video).

2) FE front wheels are wider than rear wheels. The front wheels got by fine but the rear contacted Kevin's front, because he moved over while Denny was right next to him! He couldn't watch both sides and unfortunately he was looking left at Dean.

As I said, amateur racing is what it is. Kevin took responsibility, I think his post should have been the last one, unless Dean wanted to apologize for flaming Denny, but either way, you coming in to flame me for whatever reason is pointless.

[Cole_Bosanoz]

Unfortunately with 50+ formula cars on track at once with varied talent behind the wheel this is almost always going to happen.

[gcoffin]

Correct Cole. Then you combine two spec open wheel classes and start selling parts.

Anyone who has ever raced in a spec class knows if you can park the car behind you behind a slower car that has plenty of grunt in a straight line......well your race just got a whole lot easier......just like the guy you are trying to park knows he has got to keep from getting parked to have any chance to keep up or passing. True in any class, just more so in spec classes.

[Marshall Mauney]

Kevin has a National license and has more car races under his belt than half of the field...What does "not experienced enough to be at the June Sprint" mean??

I think this may have been a misconception from focusing on what happened from T6 forward in Kevin's video. Speaking for myself, when I saw the FM off-line, slow, and lifting heavily in T7, my assumption was that he was a FM back-marker who wasn't up to speed yet. A quick check of qualifying times supported that assumption - but in fairness we all know that qualifying doesn't always go to plan.

It was only when I looked at Dean's longer video and saw what happened in T6 in front of Kevin, and that Dean was to his left at the entry of T6 that I realized what really happened - Kevin wasn't just a moving chicane, but got caught out by trying to avoid the spinning FC.

[thread creep]

I am going to ask, though, why we had three FMs so far off the pace - at a Majors event (I would argue that Majors aren't "just another national"). Even excluding Kevin for his stated difficulties, there were two more behind him qualified at more than 11 seconds off the pole time. Now, not all of us are as fast as you and Scott Rettich are (myself clearly included), but that still seems like a lot in a spec class. Comparably, the FE spread was about half what the FM spread was. Our slowest car got hit and damaged by a FA in practice, then only got one Q session to get his car sorted - but yet was still well within 5% of the pole time. What's causing that difference? It seems that the double yellow bunching the front of FE with the back of FM just made matters worse....

[dc]

Kevin has a National license and has more car races under his belt than half of the field...What does "not experienced enough to be at the June Sprint" mean?

I don't believe this to be true, actually.

His own YouTube video channel shows his "first time in a FM" only late last fall, and his "first SCCA race" less than a month ago. I don't care how many track days you do with a Country Club race track in a street car, that's not anywhere close to racing at the June Sprints. We all know, it's not just another National event. There also seems to be some question of how he acquired his National license so quickly after going through his Driver' School less than 7 weeks before the Sprints, and his first SCCA race not that much after that.

Regardless, three cars all trying to fit in one space is physically not possible. With the mix of experience and aggressiveness in that combination, something bad was bound to happen.

[kflyer]

Doug, I've been racing dirt modifieds for 20 yrs. unfortunately dirt oval is nothing close to road racing and they don't have mirrors.

I must say that I'm a big boy and can take the criticism but I do however feel that I had every right to be at Road America. I learned a lot last weekend and I'm sure Denny and Dean did as well. IMO it's time to move on.

-Kevin

[Jnovak]

I also think that we all have better things to do with our time on this earth.

[racerdad2]

I, for one, want to apologize. We can forget that we're commenting about 'real' people, not 'pros' we're watching on TV who can't here us... And, I want to thank you for posting your video. I'm just starting & your video gave me a 'reality check'... It's very busy out there. I seriously doubt I'd have expected anyone on the outside....