It would be good to have those guys that went off with the Civic comment on what really happened, but I'm not sure if they frequent this forum or if they should really go thru what happened again...First thing that I do when I have a serious accident is to erase it from my mind immediately and they should too!
I remember seeing the car upside down for a brief second (on the third run of that stage), but then again it was quite a fast section, if I recall correctly a L5-over crest or over a bump or something, I remember we lifted all 4 wheels or at least the inside ones, then after about 100 meters the Civic was there, on the inside ditch upside down. It wasn't a pretty sight. They must have lifted off at the crest and lost control when landed and barrel rolled down the road. From the pictures seems like they were on a DOT street tire and seems to me like those would start fading after couple miles and the grip become "greasy".
Also I'm not quite sure if they did run the recce and if those guys were at their first event. Perhaps Bernie knows that.
If that's the case, maybe the lack of experience caused this accident? Really hard to say, just assuming here.
Should it be true that they were on their first event, the car was the right one, I mean it doesn't get any slower than a P car.
Perhaps they were pushing more than their experience allowed to?
I remember that car showed up late at the ceremonial start. Maybe those guys arrived late and missed the recce completely?
You CAN'T afford to start an event like last weekends without doing the recce. It's suicidal. You either do the recce or back the hell off during the Rally.
The above applies for many other events in N.A., including many RA events.
We started and finished this Rally very AWARE of our lack of experience on tarmac and really never pushed past 90%, we were just learning for the all weekend and treated those stages with a lot of respect.
Dave G was asking earlier on this thread if it's softer to roll on snow/mud/gravel that on tarmac. Absolutely. From personal experience, Ken and I had two rolls similar to each other, one at STPR 2006 and one at Rally Whangarei 2007 (Asia-Pacific). The one in Whangarei was on soft grass and felt like the car was literally wrapped in pillows while she was rolling, damage was minimal and we were basically pushing the panels and roof out at the end of the stage to make her look a bit prettier before the team saw her..
STPR 2006, car was a mess, windows, headlights, wing broken, corners rounded, and hitting the hard packed PA surface with the roof left us with some big headaches. Tarmac roll will be VERY destructive on a car and I'm not surprised that Civic looks in such a bad shape.
Problem is when most the rally except the junctions are pretty much flat out, there is no time for error. Seems the discussion and Alex's input has taught us the tarmac is unforgiving if you roll on it. We learned something.
