Bob Barnard Track Engineering

The actions of the medical staff at Misano at the weekend have raised a red flag to Paolo Giovagnoli, the prosecutor of Rimini, the City where the track is located. I had forgotten, goodness knows how, that the Italian authorities always investigate a death at a race track. Italian law is different to most countries in that if someone dies then there must be somebody at fault, even if that person is the one that died. Remember Jim Clark's problems after Von Tripps went into the crowd at Monza, and the Williams team after Senna died? The Race Director and the Medical Chief will both be under the gun for the death of Tomizawa. The prosecutor is particularly looking at the handling of the riders at the scene, something we all want investigated.

Martin Whitmarsh, head of McLaren racing and boss of FOTA says that F1 needs to market itself, what billion dollar business does not promote itself? Sounds like a good idea at first hearing, but when I think more about it I wonder what use it is trying to market a product that is not that good at the moment. Yes the season has been better than we expected, but us diehard F1 fans will watch it anyway. It is the new fans Martin is looking to capture. But it is not as if F1 lacks exposure, it is on the TV across the world every two weeks on average. You would have to live in a cave not to notice it. And the TV companies that buy the rights spend lots of time telling us and promoting when it is on, so what more does Martin want? I think of the Olympics and The World Cup. I do not see FIFA buying ads, it is the World Cup sponsors that do that, and the same with the Olympics. Now F1 has very few series sponsors, and those there are do  not seem to spend anything on promoting the fact. I see a similar theme with NASCAR with SPEED and Sprint promoting the heck out of it. So sorry Martin, in the end I do not see that you really have a point.

Talking about having a product you can promote. Watch the video of Chandook's laps of the new Korean track. http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/86449. As Chandook says, it looks like a street circuit, and not a good one at that. And boy, is there some work left to do, particularly the top course of asphalt. 90 days curing time anybody? Three good straights, but an awful lot of just one corner after another, follow the leader stuff. Show off your product on that. As readers will know I believe you cannot show off your product if you do not take it to the best venues.

The Race Director, Paul Butler, who I know and respect, but have not seen him in that role personally, and the Medical Chief have both defended their decisions not to red flag the race yesterday. I know from personal experience the pressures in Race Control during an event, split second decisions that have to be lived with later. I accept that they acted in what they saw as the best interests of all the riders, just disagree that they were the right ones. The doctor said that it was safer to get Tomizawa off the track so the medics could work without bikes going by, well if you red flagged it then that would have been the case. Paul said that he kept the race going as the track was cleared quickly. I think that is the point that most of us watching were appalled about, they literally dragged those poor guys off the track, dropping Tomizawa in their haste. I know that if you asked the other riders and the spectators at home and at the track, they would rather have the delay than watch that again.

We now learn that Tomizawa had a cardiac arrest out on the track, hardly the story that was being given out to the commentators and the teams. This is where you get the feeling that "the show must go on." Not sure I would have cancelled the MotoGP race, but I might have stopped the Moto2 right there.

It's nice to read that the makers of helmets and other rider protection continue to work on improvements to prevent this type of injury. The accident itself is almost certainly unavoidable, a rider can lose the front end, or the rear as in this case, and in a pack is impossible to miss for the guys behind. Helmets are amazing already, look at Massa's survival last year, and the leathers and body armor get better all the time. I hope that something can be found to protect riders in this situation, but it is hard to see how that is possible without making them heavier or bulkier, so more dangerous than the problem we have now.

I'm not sure what Tilke is saying when he says that his track designs "will be more on the 'edge' in the future in a bid to help promote better racing and more excitement." To me it sounds as if he is going to make them less safe, but that cannot be, surely? After designing all the GP tracks for the last decade how is it he says he now knows how to make them more exciting? He defends his designs by saying he has to work to factors such as land availability, local geography and the budget that track owners are willing to put forward. Well duh! Those are the factors every designer, architect or engineer faces every day. I've never noticed the budget being a restraint for Herman, and the land and topography neither. He says that the extent of run off is dictated by the FIA, and he is correct that it moves the spectator away from the action, but I think the criticisms are about the lack of action, not that it is too far away. Apparently Bernie is giving him more rein to make the tracks interesting , and giving him some good ideas. I'm sure we all look forward to seeing them.

Another terrible accident mars the MotoGP world this weekend with the death of Shoya Tomizawa. Much like Indy last week the track had nothing to do with the accident or the injuries, he was struck by other riders, but the manner in which the incident was dealt with has rightly caused outrage amongst motorcycle enthusiasts.

Anyone at any level of competition deserves the very highest standard of race management and officiating. Obviously a MotoGP event is operating under a high level of pressure, but that is no excuse for what we saw today. The race should have been red flagged to give the safety crews the time to deal with the riders properly, not drag them off the track, dropping Tomizawa at one point, so that the race could go on. The World Superbike race at Nurburgring showed how it should have been handled. I personally do not like red flagging races, too often I see it for no good reason, but when you see that crash it is impossible to think Shoya was not critically injured. How the message was put out that he did not have life threatening injuries is beyond me.

The TV coverage clearly showed a level of care way below what should be expected by riders. If you have a "spade" stretcher, as they did, it is made to come to pieces to slide under a fallen rider to prevent possible spinal damage, not for the rider to be rolled over and dumped on it! Thankfully Redding did not have serious injuries, but no thanks to the medical crew. I saw a comment that it was not the marshals causing the problem, but the medical team. In Italy, the home of Clinca Mobile and Dr. Costa, I am astounded at their performance. As a race organizer I have always made it my business to make sure I had the best available people working the tower and the track, and have made myself very unpopular for it.

When I went to Laguna to promote the Bike GP the medical was one of the high priorities to improve. I took the excellent Medical Chief to another GP to show him his job was to manage and train the medical team, not treat patients. I found the best corner workers, even talking to the SCCA at one point, yes the car guys. When I ran Phillip Island I brought in the pit lane crew from the F1GP, as the local motorcycle marshals had no experience of running a pit lane in these situations. In fact I really annoyed the first motorcycle club to use PI after I restored it. They ran that race very "loosely" as it was "only a club race." I asked where the switch was in their head that they would throw when they walked through the gate at the GP? They walked off and said they would not be coming to the GP, thankfully. Marshals and race officials need to run every race as a GP, that is what the riders are doing, they are learning their craft, and not going that much slower with less experience while they are doing it. It heartened me that after the GP this same club had the guts to come and say that they now understood, and could they please have another chance.

Then there are the corner workers who only turn up race day. Sorry, you need to be here all day every day to learn what to expect under stressful situations. Practice just like the riders. And no moving around to different stations during the week. I don't care if it is more fun, but learn what happens at that station and be anticipating it. Channel Nine used to have their cameramen out there covering the practice from the first turn of a wheel, even if they were not filming, just so they got up to speed. They understood.

What we saw today at Misano was unforgivable, and the FIM needs to take action. If the promoter cannot organize it better than that then he should not have a race, or the FIM needs to step in and train these people and manage the medical.  I am continually amazed that in this day and age when we know so much about how to stage a race properly, we continue to see a lack of care about reaching the highest standards, whether it is track construction or management. There are knowledgeable professionals out there, but too many would be track owners and promoters think they do not need to know, or think they can do it better. Who is enforcing the standards?

Oh yes, Tony Elias won the race, extending his points lead in Moto2, and Pedrosa won the MotoGP race from Lorenzo and Rossi, keeping his championship hopes alive. At the WSBK at Nurburgring the interest for me is not who won, but why Corser was suddenly so far off the pace, and why Leon Haslam is struggling after a great start to the season?

No one seems very impressed with the state of the Korean GP track, with Bernie joking that it will go ahead, even if they have to use tents. That will be the day. Now you could sell tickets to that!