Bob Barnard Track Engineering

I wrote this a few weeks ago when feeling the need more strongly than usual that something must be done about track safety. I put it aside to allow cooler reflection, but the carnage continues. Last weekend at Reno Fearnly Speedway two driver were killed. Now I do not know the whole circumstances, so it may be a "racing incident," but it keeps up the average. So here is what I wrote.

DEATHS AT THE TRACK            (with acknowledgement to the Charlotte Observer)

 All forms of sport are inherently dangerous to the competitor and sometimes the spectator. We expect that our sportsmen will push themselves and their equipment to the limit, and inevitably beyond. In most sports that is unlikely to result in a fatal accident, but in a few it certainly has the potential to. Hemmingway said “there are only three sports, mountain climbing, bullfighting and motor racing, the rest are just games.” We can add to that a few others such as ocean yacht racing, but you get the drift.

Motor racing involves metal objects, often heavy, traveling at high speed. Once out of control a huge amount of stored energy is released with potentially tragic consequences. We have seen in times gone by spectators standing at roadside while competitors in the Mille Miglia or Targa Florio race by at 200 mph. In some countries you still can, especially in rallying, but in most situations now a proper barrier and fence system is in place to safeguard drivers and spectators from a reoccurrence of the tragic accident at Le Mans in 1955 when a Mercedes flew into the crowd killing 83 people. Mercedes withdrew from racing for over thirty years as a result, and if safety had not improved then we would like as not be racing now in most countries. Switzerland has banned it for years.

But we have learned from that and other racing incidents which has lead to the development of better barriers further away from the track, stronger and higher fences, safer cars to absorb impact, and better equipment for the driver. Emergency response systems including on-site medical centers, response teams with the correct equipment and procedures, and race control augmented with CCTV and light systems for faster reaction. All in the name of safety.

This has resulted in dramatic reductions in the deaths of competitors at the top level of the sport. It is now such a rare occurrence that it is world news, with strong reactions including calls for racing to be stopped. Look at the response to Earnhardt Snr. and lately Dan Wheldon at Las Vegas.     

But what happens below that top level, under the radar? There are close to 3000 motor sport facilities of all types in the US, very few of which make it on TV or rate make news, even when people, including children, are dying or being maimed on those tracks. Who heard of the 6, 9 and 12 year olds who have been killed in kart races in the last few years, or the 8 year old horribly burned in a kart accident due to lack of fast response? How about the young man who lost an eye at a back-yard demolition derby, or the eighteen year old killed by flying concrete from an incorrect barrier? I could go on, and these are just incidents I know of.

That is a big part of the problem, no one is watching, or if they are they do not care enough to do something about it. Road accident statistics are collected assiduously, but accidents at race tracks; well that’s just part of the risk. Yes, racing is dangerous, but it should not be fatal. This is not just a sport, it is a business, but who is regulating it? No one.

The Charlotte Observer, as the home of NASCAR, does attempt to track fatalities and has done for the last ten years. They have an average of 22 deaths a year, but they do not include all forms of motor sport, and my gut feeling it is more like one a week. What makes this unacceptable is most if not all these are preventable, and preventable without closing down tracks or putting them out of business. Knowledge is the key, just as lack of knowledge is the root cause of the problem. Lack of knowledge of how a track should be designed, constructed and operated.

America vs. the World

Worldwide motor sport is governed by bodies such as The Federation Internationale De L’Automobile, FIA, which includes the Commission Internationale De Karting, CIK. These govern most 4 wheel motor sport, while the Federation Internationale De Motocyclisme, FIM, governs 2 wheel sport. These bodies are represented in each member country by the Association Sportive Nationale, ASN, who rely on the rules developed for the sport over years of experience and research by the International Sanctioning Bodies. The ASN will govern all the sports activities in their country based on these rules and with regard to their local conditions and culture, and include licensing competitors and officials, approving vehicle designs, sanctioning events, and inspecting and licensing tracks.

Most of these rules are available to anyone, often downloadable off the website, but the rules for how to design and construct a track are not. In fact they have not been published by the FIA since 1987. They are considered too complex and dangerous for inexperienced individuals to obtain and use, so there are now “Internal Guidelines” with limited access. So track owners could be forgiven for not knowing there are rules, as most profess to me when told their track does not comply. But, it should be obvious to anyone watching events on TV that there must be standards, how else do new tracks get built like The Circuit of The Americas?

So what happens here in the US? Nothing, anyone can go out and build himself a race track and open it. Who is the ASN, the one controlling body for motor racing in the US? For motor cycle racing we have The American Motorcycle Association, AMA, who are the FIM Member, but they are not alone in sanctioning races. There are other national series like WERA, and lots of regional organizations doing their own thing, with no standards I have seen, and no system for inspection and licensing.

Things are much more complicated on 4 wheels. We have an ASN, but we do not like to be restricted by choices, so we form a committee. The Automobile Competition Committee of the United States, ACCUS, a body almost nobody involved in the sport have ever heard of. And why should they? Unless you wish to drive overseas or run an International event you can get along very well without them. ACCUS is an office in Colorado with some lovely ladies and The Chairman, Nick Craw. Mr. Craw is a very important and busy man at the FIA, being the President of the Senate, the FIA governing body. Unfortunately ACCUS seems to be a body involved with looking out to the rest of the world, and leaves the organization of racing in the US to its committee members; NASCAR, USAC, Grand Am, SCCA, NHRA, IMSA, Indycar and WKA. In short the top level motor sport sanctioning bodies and WKA, a karting body. Of these NASCAR is basically run on tracks owned by two main groups, ISC and SMI who have their own engineering and officials in-house, and presumably have standards and systems known to them, but not generally available, and each track has its own character. USAC has plenty of rules, but no track rules. Grand Am is part of NASCAR. SCCA, The Sports Car Club of America, has a program of sorts to inspect and OK tracks, but lacks the clout to force changes. NHRA does have standards and IMSA piggybacks on the FIA by requiring a FIA Level 2 standard track, but even that is open to interpretation here in the US. Indycar does track work in-house, but what it is based on who knows looking at some of them. WKA like the other US kart sanctioning bodies does not have standards for tracks, despite the CIK rules being available.

So, at this top level, involving perhaps 200 of the 3000 facilities some form of standard/inspection is involved. Below that there are numerous national series, such as NASA, and regional series just out there operating. I watched an ARCA race from Toledo last weekend and that track was just plain awful. Most of these facilities are owned by Mom & Pop, local businessmen or clubs with no knowledge or experience, and this is where the majority of the racing takes place. When I raised the issue of licensing tracks at a recent deposition I was basically chastised as suggesting something “un-American.” Well my hairdresser is licensed, and she is nowhere near as dangerous as these tracks.

The only inspection of most of these is by a local fire marshal, who is not looking at the track, and by the insurers, who without being rude mainly do not know what they are looking at and concentrate it seems on grandstands and the like. Often the track owner fills in the insurance form! So the person who built it or runs it without knowing how is marking himself, and sending it to someone in an office to approve who has not seen it and is not trained either. You would think that the insurer would have a large vested interest in making sure the venue is safe, but having seen what they insure that would seem not to be the case. And if they have no standards to judge against how can you inspect and approve or reject a track anyway?

This is the root cause of the problem. People in the business do know these International standards exist, but tell me “we do not follow those here in the US.” Why? I asked one attorney after that statement if Americans were less worthy of protection, to which he replied he was asking the questions. Why does the FIA not publish their standards when the CIK, a part of their organization, publish rules for kart tracks? Is the FIA afraid of being sued for having incorrect standards? Who is going to be able to substantiate that, stand up in court and say they know better? I don’t agree with everything they do, but that is a difference of professional opinion, and certainly not anything I would dare to provide an opposing opinion on.

Even when standards are available they are not used. The International Kart Federation, IKF, who are not international but based on the west coast and sanction local series, are more than happy to quote the CIK as the standard for parts of the design of the kart. On a random page of their rules I found seven occasions when they quoted CIK, but see nothing incongruous in not requiring the track, as important in terms of safety as the kart, to follow CIK rules. How does this make any sense?

The only State where tracks are licensed and subject to design rules is New Jersey, and as lacking in some places as they are, at least they try. The National Fire Protection Authority, NFPA, has worked with the insurers and industry to prepare NFPA 610, a “Guide for Emergency and Safety Operations at Motorsports Venues.” Now as the name implies this does not address the track, but the equipment and systems that should be in place to effectively respond to an emergency. Unfortunately, like ACCUS, most track people I talk to have never heard of the document.

So we go on killing and maiming people, both on the track and in the grandstands, for the lack of knowledge being made available and standards enforced to do things the correct way, which does not mean a more expensive way.

How Do We Fix This?

Unfortunately not easily or quickly, the scale of the problem is too large and the resources available to tackle it too small. How do we find enough people who know what they should be looking at to go and inspect 3000 race tracks? Who do they report to? God forbid we let the Government, either State or Federal, get into the act, but they will if we don’t. ACCUS has shown no desire to do it, and does not have the resources, and all the committee members have their own show to run and I am sure do not want to take on the responsibility of inspecting tracks for other series.

Along with this goes the problem of unprofessional management, and by that I do not mean paid. An amateur still has a responsibility to do things in a professional manner even if it is for no pay. Otherwise don’t do it, you are putting lives at risk. The SCCA has an excellent training program for its volunteer workers who are the ones you actually see flag waiving and in race control at most professional races. The usual excuse I get from tracks is they cannot afford to fix things as they are a club of volunteers, or a track not making money. Most of the fixes can be done by volunteers or track maintenance, the piece that is lacking is the knowledge. Nearly all motor sport other than the very top level is run by volunteers or not-for-profit, even if they try to.

The one group that is large enough, has the clout to do it, the vested interest to do it, and should be going to all these facilities anyway, is the insurance industry. I have had this conversation of course, they are a small group of specialists, and their argument is that the market is “too soft” and tracks will just go to some fly-by-night insurer if they require them to spend money to upgrade things. That is a risk, but most track owners should be smart enough to know that when they have an incident then it is going to be one of this group that will be there when the cheap guy is not.

Besides, we will not fix everything overnight, but we have to start sometime and it should be now. We need a system in place to go to tracks and assess their safety for both competitor and spectator, and agree a program with the track to undertake the improvements over a reasonable period, with an emphasis on proven simple, effective measures that volunteers or track crew can do. Properly built and installed tire walls, barriers, and catch fences, properly designed curbs, groomed and adequate run-off areas would be a great start. Let’s expand the NFPA 610 to lay out operational procedures for correctly managing a facility and running events, not just when we’ve had the accident. Involve the already available training programs and manuals of the SCCA. I know the people in this business; they love the sport and are always willing to teach others. We know how to fix this; we just have to care enough to start.