I think I know how that happend to the Opel Speedster, racing hard on small winding roads in the Alps is dangerous. So since Speedy is posting here, he seemed to survived the accident and that counts...
Believe it or not, I wasn't racing. In fact, after I'd finished the sunset photo shoot at the top of the pass, I consciously thought that I had to be particularly careful in the dark. It was a fairly cold October evening and I put up the sidewindows and turned the heater on full (driving open). I gently cruised down, stopped briefly to capture the car in the moonlight, then took one hairpin at a steady pace (must have been under 40mph), went to turn in for the next and immediately felt that there was almost no turn-in from my steering input. It wasn't totally skidding, but it simply wasn't gripping properly*. I didn't want to brake and possibly lose more turn-in effect due to increased sideways slippage, so I just coaxed the car round as much as possible. seeing the edge in total blackness looming before me was not nice! I also had no idea what sort of drop lay below.
My mind raced and I thought that if i get it sideways as it goes over, there is more chance of hanging on a tree or boulder instead of possibly plumetting several hundred feet. I was virtually running parallel to the road when i left it. Continued on a slope for a moment then felt the car go over and just waited for the crash when I hit something hard. I can remember the reassuringly solid sound off the rollbar taking the impact. Wasn't aware of both side windows smashing. Rocks totally blocked my exit on the driver's side and the passenger side looked little better.
It was then that the smell of fuel became very strong and my desire to get out became even stronger! Squeezed out past the rocks cutting my hands and clothes. Couldn't understand why there was blood everywhere. Only found out later that the boulders I'd landed on had protruded into the cabin and smavcked me on the head. It was only a flesh wound, but if I was a quarter of an inch taller, it would have been at fractured skull. A little more and i would be probably a paraplegic or dead.
Was sewn back together (head and cut tendons in hand), and kept in hospital 24 hours due to concussion.
Got my wife to collect me and take me to the Lotus dealer "just to look"
at the Bemani Exige Cup that I'd seen freshly advertised a week before and thought, "That is my dream car". When I did the deal, she was not happy but finally accepted it.
As you can see, I'm very lucky to still be here, to have such a great car and, most of all, to have such a great wife! 👍
*The police report said they found no reason for the crash. Under Swiss law I was therefore fined (considerably) for failing to control a vehicle and also had to pay for all the costs.
It was only recently, whilst looking properly at the pics I took of the Speedster against the moon, moments before the crash, that I saw that there was dew on the lens.
I suspect that a fleeting layer of dew had been deposited on the road it may even have frozen (as my hands were quite cold holding the camera).
Put it this way, I'm not in a hurry to go driving on alpine passes in the dark again and I'm glad I didn't fall off at another part some of those drops are BIG! This is the same pass
