Anyone Else Watch The Indy 500?

[Still hand Bill]

Never been on Indy, but raced at plenty of other tracks, road America, Daytona, Brainard, heartland park, Laguna seca to name a few.   On the high banks of Daytona it takes 90-100 mph before a motorcycle is perpendicular to the banking.  It’s steep.  When you are way up above the nascar stripe, all you see in front of you is wall.  Have to look to the left to see the corner.  Glad I did it when I was young, not sure I would ride 150 mph in the rain again.  

[Captain Bill Burt]

13 hours ago, Blackwater 53393 said:

I’ve mentioned before here that I was part of RJ Reynolds/WINSTON’s original efforts to put on infield shows at NASCAR events.

 

Schoolmarm and I got to travel to numerous NASCAR events and I even performed on the infield stage.  We sometimes traveled on the bus with the band, but often, I drove our personal vehicle or a van to haul other members of the band and crew back and forth from hotels to the tracks.

 

If I had a separate vehicle, the track issued personal credentials as well as a pass for the vehicle. I often had vehicle passes to places that I couldn’t go on foot! 
 

At Taledega, Watkins Glen, and Pocono, I got passes that allowed the vehicle on the track when there was no sanctioned activity, (races, qualifying, parades, or spectator events) so I got to make laps in Schoolmarm’s Camaro at Pocono and Taladega and we raced golf carts and mules, (ATVs used for transportation around the infield) at Watkins Glen!

 

A stock vehicle is pretty iffy in the turns on a super speedway! If it’ll go fast enough on the straightaways, it’ll probably slide badly in the turns unless it’s one of the more well equipped high performance models. Axle bearings, spindles, and suspension pieces on your daily driver aren’t made for repeated laps.

 

Schoolmarm’s Camaro was NOT one of those high performance vehicles! It DID have high performance tires and wheels, but it didn’t run more than about 108 mph flat out and was pretty boring on those 2.5 mile tracks!

 

I do wish that I’d driven it to Watkins Glen, but it might be better that I didn’t!  

Small world. My performance car is a Camaro SS 1LE (track package). 180+ mph top speed and can handle well over 1G of lateral acceleration. Extra oil, transmission, differential and water coolers. Electronic rear end, track tires (though wearing all seasons now).  It’s even warrantied to track. It’s a sleeper. 

 

Unfortunately legal opportunities to push it to the limit are very rare, but I suspect it could handle a NASCAR track.

What’s the minimum speed to make those turns without sliding down?

 

[Blackwater 53393]

Her Camaro was a 1990, plain Jane 305 with throttle body injection and a 700R4 transmission. I had put a set of 16” Corvette wheels and the Z speed rated Goodyear “gator-backs” on it for looks.  There was NOTHING else done to the car..

 

I’ve no idea what the minimum speed on the banking is.  I have seen pictures taken of vehicles parked on the turns, but all of those were race cars.  The track crews drive what are basically factory pickup trucks around, towing the jet dryers and those air jet units and stuff at low speeds. 
 

I was pushing that old Camaro as hard as it would go!  The rev limiter would shut it down at around 108 mph and I wasn’t slowing down in the turns! I also wasn’t looking at the speedometer…

 

I’ve driven a Suzuki powered “shifter cart” around the Nashville Fairgrounds Speedway and they said that I was running over 130 mph on that thing!  THAT was an experience!

 

I suspect that some of the instances where we see cars sliding down off the banking are the result of losing traction and inertia taking over, but I HAVE seen cars sliding off of banking in the past when it was wet or when they’d lost traction for some other reason.  You’ll occasionally hear one of the commentators mention that they are running 55 mph under caution.  They don’t seem to have trouble making it around the turns.

 

You ask an interesting question and I don’t have a clue!!

[Cypress Sun]

2 hours ago, Captain Bill Burt said:

Small world. My performance car is a Camaro SS 1LE (track package). 180+ mph top speed and can handle well over 1G of lateral acceleration. Extra oil, transmission, differential and water coolers. Electronic rear end, track tires (though wearing all seasons now).  It’s even warrantied to track. It’s a sleeper. 

 

Unfortunately legal opportunities to push it to the limit are very rare, but I suspect it could handle a NASCAR track.

What’s the minimum speed to make those turns without sliding down?

 

 

The high banks at the Daytona and Talladega tracks are 31 degrees. Bristol used to be 33 degrees but I don't know what it is now that they ruined it. Like Blackwater stated, the safety vehicles traverse the high banks without sliding down the track and most of them are considerably heavier, with slimmer tires, than your Camaro.

 

You might inquire about running the road course that the 24 Hours of Daytona cars run. You'd get the best of both worlds, running the high banks and the flat lefts/rights of the road course.

 

Keep in mind that the NASCAR race cars have a ton of aerodynamic features that allow the cars to cut the air more efficiently and force the cars down on the track for more grip. They also have a ton of safety features that your Camaro, and 99.99% of all other vehicles, don't have. Flexible fuel cells, roll cages, racing seats, safety harnesses, blah, blah. 

 

If I were to take a street car to a track like Daytona, I'd be more worried about sliding UP the turns than down the turns.

 

Do you know the difference between a tight car and a loose car? In a tight car, you see what you're going to hit when you crash.

 

Many years ago, a local race track used to have "Fan Participation Night". You could drive your street vehicle however your wanted around the track...conservatively or bttw. I watched more than one "daddy bought him a xxx" get destroyed by people that had no idea what they were doing. One of the destroyed cars was a 1969 Corvette. I didn't know that Vettes had THAT much fiberglass on them or should I say, used to have that much fiberglass on them.

 

These days, I'll bet that most race tracks won't allow walk-in type, non-racing licensed drivers or cars to play on their tracks. Too much liability and Morgan/Morgans for that I suppose.

[Utah Bob #35998]

Nope