GT Racing - GT1, GT3, Blancpain Endurance Series & National GT SeriesSports Cars 

I'm an huge fan of GT3 and frequently visit VLN races. Having spun quite a few laps on road cars on the Nordschleife myself, the GT3 drives are bat**** crazy to drive the cars at such high pace around the track. I believe the cars are much too potent for the VLN. Now respect that this is the opinion of someone who has never driven any car with higher aerodynamic parts installed.

I highly doubt the the VLN would suffer much from a potential ban of GT3 cars. Many of the prominent manufacturers have cars specifically developed towards the VLN. Mercedes has a customer targeted CLA, Porsche just recently unveiled the GT4 Cayman and has the CUP 911, and BMW could easily upgrade the already existing M235 (also built with VLN in mind). Many of the attending teams that race GT3 cars already have lower spec cars prepped that also race VLN.

I think the GT3 cars are safe enough to run on the Nordschleife, what bothers me most is the sheer difference in performance the GT3s bring in comparison to the other attending classes. The track is much too narrow to accommodate for such speed differences.
 
Honest question here - am I the only person who gets worried sick when watching any kind of GT3 race? There's something after Spa 24 last year that just gives me uneasy feelings whenever I watch them. It just feels like a massive accident waiting to happen.
 
hsv
Honest question here - am I the only person who gets worried sick when watching any kind of GT3 race? There's something after Spa 24 last year that just gives me uneasy feelings whenever I watch them. It just feels like a massive accident waiting to happen.
I'm always worried sick racing GT3 on iRacing :lol:

Like any series that's privateer based, it will have more cars which means more action and a higher probability of a big nasty crash.

All series and sanctioning bodies still seem to ignore the problem of air channeling through the car upon a large amount of air getting underneath. That and track safety are the big safety issues that need to be improved asap
 
hsv
Honest question here - am I the only person who gets worried sick when watching any kind of GT3 race? There's something after Spa 24 last year that just gives me uneasy feelings whenever I watch them. It just feels like a massive accident waiting to happen.

I don't. Taking into account frequency and severity of accidents, it doesn't really worry me;

I worry for spectators FAR more in rallying disciplines (NO protection, often very little common sense, blind corners and drivers on the limit on extremely dynamic surfaces).
I worry much more for drivers in high speed open wheel series thanks to the seemingly small amount of protection offered by the cars (If GT3 makes you worry, just watch Kubica's crash at Canada again).
The capacity for huge high energy crashes is much greater in something like NASCAR (20-30 tonnes of cars travelling at 150mph+ in a "big one")

-- yet all things considered we don't see that many severe accidents in motorsport. For sure there's an argument that says 1 is too many, but as a "thing" motor sport is inherently dangerous to humans. It will only ever be totally safe when the cars are all radio controlled and everyone spectates from home, for me, all things considered, GT3 is in the zone I think is acceptable.
 
I worry for spectators FAR more in rallying disciplines (NO protection, often very little common sense, blind corners and drivers on the limit on extremely dynamic surfaces).
I worry much more for drivers in high speed open wheel series thanks to the seemingly small amount of protection offered by the cars (If GT3 makes you worry, just watch Kubica's crash at Canada again).
The capacity for huge high energy crashes is much greater in something like NASCAR (20-30 tonnes of cars travelling at 150mph+ in a "big one")
I watch pretty much every discipline of motorsport in the world, and none makes me feel as uneasy as top level GT racing. I can't explain it; it's just a weird feeling.
 
The biggest problem in this thread seems to be misinformation. A few pages ago there was talk of running even faster cars? What?

There's also this idea that the class naming system is still relevant to performance classifications from years gone by which is again not true so people really need to get their facts straight.

Personally, I think it's a travesty that this was allowed to happen and to be honest it's our own fault. GT3 has seen a meteoric rise in popularity and manufacturer involvement which inevitably results in speeds increasing.

Thus we have been blind to the increasing danger these cars pose simply because the racing has been so good and if it's going well don't rock the boat right?

This isn't the first time we've seen massive accidents here (see the SLS crash i think last year?) nor is it the first time we've seen massive accidents in GT3 (see Spa 24, Nur 24 (BMW over a barrier) and so on). The cars are simply much, much faster than they were even a few years ago.

Whilst watching the Bathurst 12hours I was thinking that some of the speeds looked simply insane and i'm amazed that an almighty accident didn't occur there (oh wait, it did last year with the GT-R).

You can argue all you like about how we used to have 1000hp cars in the 80's but this isn't the 80's and there are very good reasons why we decided that those cars were too fast.

The cars need a drastic increase in minimum weight and a big reduction of aero to bring them back down to the speed of which a gentleman racer should be (which is actually what the point of this class was in the first place). Likewise, just because the nur is a historic circuit doesn't mean we shouldn't fix its problems, that hump needs to be flattened and the spectator area removed and made inaccessible for both the drivers sake and the spectators sake.

The warning signs of an accident like this were clear, we and the governing bodies have been stupid to ignore them. It angers me even more that it was the GT-R that did this since it's been visibily clear that the front lifts a huge amount with this particular car and nothing was done to fix it.
 
Not really just a GT-R thing, any GT-3 car could have suffer the same faith under the same conditions and factors...

 
A new video has emerged of the crash which shows a lot more of the incident, the car actually went over the camera persons head.
 
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... Likewise, just because the nur is a historic circuit doesn't mean we shouldn't fix its problems, that hump needs to be flattened and the spectator area removed and made inaccessible for both the drivers sake and the spectators sake.

While I agree that the Nordschleife isn't up to top safety standards, bringing it up to par is near impossible. The first reason is the already unstable financial situation. Even with Capricorn as the new owner, the financial future of the Ring is still not safe. Funding for such safety updates are not available. Another difficulty is German bureaucracy. The Nürburgring is in the middle of a wildlife preservation park, as is most of the Eifel. The use of heavy machinery and construction permits are very expensive and need justification in these preservation zones.

In the past few years, the only car having repeat problems with too much uplift at Flugplatz was the GT-R.

Her are a few things that may be sensible updates to improve safety:
-Increase guardrail height. There have been tons of incidents with cars bouncing on top of them in the last few years. They are only hip height on most places.
-Use dampening impact absorbers that have been developed in other racing series (I believe SGT in Suzuka's Spoon corner has them) instead of rebounding tyres.

Edit: The above video (now removed) clearly shows that the GTR only launched into spectators because the center of gravity was above the "impact absorbing" barriers and got launched by the tyre's rebounding. If the car wasn't upright at the time, the safety fences would have caught the oncoming car. I seriously would not expect a car to launch 3m into the air.
 
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Jav
Not really just a GT-R thing, any GT-3 car could have suffer the same faith under the same conditions and factors...



Yes but again, why when there was repeated evidence of cars lifting was nothing done until the ferrari went over? This is exactly what I'm talking about, people happily stood by waiting for an accident to happen, how exactly is this ok?!


While I agree that the Nordschleife isn't up to top safety standards, bringing it up to par is near impossible. The first reason is the already unstable financial situation. Even with Capricorn as the new owner, the financial future of the Ring is still not safe. Funding for such safety updates are not available. Another difficulty is German bureaucracy. The Nürburgring is in the middle of a wildlife preservation park, as is most of the Eifel. The use of heavy machinery and construction permits are very expensive and need justification in these preservation zones.

In the past few years, the only car having repeat problems with too much uplift at Flugplatz was the GT-R.

Her are a few things that may be sensible updates to improve safety:
-Increase guardrail height. There have been tons of incidents with cars bouncing on top of them in the last few years. They are only hip height on most places.
-Use dampening impact absorbers that have been developed in other racing series (I believe SGT in Suzuka's Spoon corner has them) instead of rebounding tyres.

Edit: The above video (now removed) clearly shows that the GTR only launched into spectators because the center of gravity was above the "impact absorbing" barriers and got launched by the tyre's rebounding. If the car wasn't upright at the time, the safety fences would have caught the oncoming car. I seriously would not expect a car to launch 3m into the air.

Agreed but as you say the GT-R had repeated issues with this but again nothing was done until this. How can we think this is acceptable? Freak accident sure but unpredictable? Not at all.

On the point of CofG yes but we don't usually know what path a car will take once it's began going off the road so just because under normal circumstances we wouldn't expect there to be a car going over the fence doesn't mean we shouldn't be prepared for it. Raising the fence and improving the barriers are all good points but I still think it's a fundamental car/class problem of inappropriately fast cars, inexperienced drivers (this is not specific to this accident but see other GT3 accidents) and an ageing circuit design. Surely the best thing to do short term is to ballast the cars and run smaller restrictors whilst all the other problems (aero, etc) can be worked on in the background.

I think the long term solution is preventing these blowover accidents happening period but that will likely require an extensive aerodynamic study in a wind tunnel.
 
I totally agree with Third Reign and most all of the those whom have commented. I'm an American, moreover, only been able to travel to say Germany 3-times, I feel the GT3 Class needs to lose those gnarly speeds and get back to at least 3-4 years ago under those specs. Secondly, the "Ring" is almost an impossible situation to fix. Knowing that it sits right next to wildlife reserves, thus the cost to obtain permits would be through the roof, I've calculated that a minumum of 20-25, maybe 30 million Euros to bring the most difficult, most advanced, and lastly most breathaking race course in the word up too somewhat respectable safety specs. I'm just a 30 year old Emergency Room physician in Los Angeles, California currently, but I have friends who would gladly put significant amounts of money to make this a more spectator friendly as well as racer friendly event(s)! The only problem is.... Where can myself and my friends go to help this sport get better or more frankly-give certain amount of means to expedite fixing these problems wherever fixing needs to commence at the most? Moreover, cheers to all of those who made compelling arguments about these recent horiffic events that have taken place! Third Reign, thank you again for bring this topic to a forum....
 
Considering the DMSB have banned GT3 Cup cars, I don't really think GT3 could be made slow enough to meet their safety standards.

Ultimately, a section of track known for cars getting air might need to be greatly scrutinized.
 
Considering the DMSB have banned GT3 Cup cars, I don't really think GT3 could be made slow enough to meet their safety standards.
All cars of a similar type have been suspended because of the nature of the investigation. It's not as though they've picked out cars they feel are "too fast", rather just suspended all GT cars as a bottom line. They don't know where the line to draw on safety is, nor do they know yet the main contributing factors in the crash, so they can't really draw a line in terms of classes other than suspending all GT related cars to be on the safe side.
Ultimately, a section of track known for cars getting air might need to be greatly scrutinized.
Since the car had taken off before it reached the crest, and many tracks around the world have steady inclines incorporated into them, I highly doubt that'll be a likely result.

The "blame the track" stance is a bit like sticking F1 or LMP1 cars on a kart track and then marching round saying how unsuitable the track is. If the track is considered perfectly safe for some cars (the karts in the analogy), then surely it's common sense that pushing the envelope on the car side will only result in something unsafe? Would you proceed to completely butcher a perfectly usable race track just so insanely fast cars could drive there without issue? Not every race track in the world needs to be suitable for absolutely every category of racing possible. It'd be a nice world if it was that way, but the reality is, it'd be a waste of time, money and effort. I get that people hail this era of GT racing, and the Nurburgring is seen as some untouchable in the motorsport world. But, the fact is, we started off perfectly fine. We've watched the cars evolve before our eyes, but nobody's been able to put their foot down because they're scared of hurting this "golden era". The sad thing is, not putting the foot down and drawing a line, may just be what hurts it more than anything else.

All I can say is, 2014 Spa 24. Modern endurance racing is just a giant sprint. Everybody goes flat out from start to finish. Having 80-odd pseudo-silhouette GT cars, with about half the field being gentleman drivers, produced just about what could be expected - a string of massive, some near-fatal incidents. Spa is a track suitable for the highest classes of motorsport. Are we going to triple the width of the track, take out all the tricky corners, just for their sake?

The bottom line is, there has to be a point where we say stop. If we don't say stop, we end up with jumped-up closed roof prototypes. I would much rather see GT3 take a slight dip in manufacturer interest than watch them die altogether because someone couldn't draw a line. Yes, the category is booming - but it can't rise forever. There has to be some kind of cliff it falls off in the end. I would rather it goes out of a lack of interest, like S2000, for example, instead of a dangerous mess like Group B.
 
I heard on Radio Le Mans last night that they have lifted the ban on SP10. That's GT4 cars.

Also that taking part in two VLN races are required for entry to the N24.
 
I heard on Radio Le Mans last night that they have lifted the ban on SP10. That's GT4 cars.

Also that taking part in two VLN races are required for entry to the N24.
I hope that if the ban stands it ends up just standing for GT-3 cars and faster or equally fast, so many awesome cars worth watching are being punished right now. Ultimately I hope the ban is completely lifted and they adress the safety aspects in some key areas of the track... (Not the track layout but catch fencing/barriers)
 
I don't think it's a safety issue for drivers, more for spectators really. A GT3 car can take a serious hit as we've seen, I don't think a DTM car is put together less well.
They're certainly more fragile; the shower of parts would be a nasty one for fans. But, a DTM car on the 'Ring would likely go off the track with a little bit more pelt than a GT3...
 
On the spectator side, a simple extension of the fence (perhaps doubling the height of it and adding additional supporting poles running into the ground) would work.
 

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