Should Motor Sport be allowed on public roads?

[AZOffaly]

I was heading down to Kerry at the weekend and I was for some mad reason thinking of the Rally of the Lakes, and how dangerous it must be to watch a rally on roads down there. Then I heard this on Sunday...

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/safety-procedures-up-to-standard-at-rally-where-car-ploughed-into-spectators-injuring-four-motorsport-ireland-chief-31354056.html

I'm not a major fan of motor sports, but are these sort of events really safe for spectators, and should they be allowed? This is not the controlled arena of an enclosed track (and even then there's been some horrific accidents with flying tyres etc at Nascar and the like) but on Public Roads, with people standing on hedges and corners. How is this safe in any way? I know people have been killed participating in the events, and while that is very sad at least they are in some way aware of the risks. But is a sport which is by it's nature so hard to monitor in terms of spectator safety actually worth having at all? I watch the programs on TV the odd time, and I can't believe how many risks the spectators seem to take, when cars are going out of control and hitting farm gates or ditches.

I'm sure we have a few petrol heads here, what are yer thoughts on the safety of car rallies and motorcycle rallies?

[Sidney]

I can't see any problems with this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AntTKfRO5po

[AZOffaly]

Jesus

[Denn Forever]

Thankfully things have improved since 1997.

Good stewarding and dangerous areas clearly marked.

[AZOffaly]

Even at that Denn, the incident I posted happened this weekend. Looks like no fatalities, but that's a miracle.

[thewobbler]

Where do you start drawing the line at what's safe AZ?

I've no interest whatsoever in motor sports, and I'd describe anyone who road races as clinically mad, but surely it's each to their own in the name of fun, as long as all combatants and spectators are there of their own free will, and aware of the potential for consequences.

Go to a regional hospital after any round of club fixtures and you'll find a small team of men on crutches. Take a group of 15 people skiing and the chances of all 15 coming back unscathed are next to none. Open a mountain bike trail in your area and there'll be a direct upsurge in cycling related injuries for that region. Allow middle aged people to go distance running or mountain running on hot days, and eventually one of them won't be coming back. Every year someone will die at sea when their recreational boat falls asunder. Play golf long enough and you will inevitably get struck by an errant ball (though hopefully in the arse). Or become a NH jockey if you really fancy dicing with death a couple of hundred times a year. And so on.

[AZOffaly]

It's the spectator safety really I'm on about I suppose. Lads getting injured participating in their various sports is just part of things, but you'd like to think you wouldn't be in physical danger from the sport if you just go watching.

That's what I see as being a bit dodgy. The motor sports fans seem to be taking their lives in their hands just watching it..

[GJL]

If they stand in the wrong area then spectators are indeed in danger. The problem lies with people using common sense. In every rally program it is explained where not to stand. The outside of a corner is a big no no. Going by what I seen this is exactly where the injured people where. A little bit of self responsibility is required. By the way when a motorsport event is taking place it is no longer a public road.

[Hardy]

If they stand in the wrong area then spectators are indeed in danger. The problem lies with people using common sense. In every rally program it is explained where not to stand. The outside of a corner is a big no no.

Marshals? Stewarding? Cattle prods?

[AZOffaly]

If they stand in the wrong area then spectators are indeed in danger. The problem lies with people using common sense. In every rally program it is explained where not to stand. The outside of a corner is a big no no. Going by what I seen this is exactly where the injured people where. A little bit of self responsibility is required. By the way when a motorsport event is taking place it is no longer a public road.

I don't mean a public road in that sense, I mean a 'regular' road, as in a boreen that normally cars would be doing 50k max on. With unsupervised viewing from every field and ditch in the countryside around.


That said, I somehow ended up behind one rally car and ahead of another in a 99 Nissan Almera heading for Mullingar, just outside Cloneyheigue in Tyrellspass. It was a bit bizarre. Number 34 in front, number 27 behind and me in the middle. They weren't racing in fairness, probably just going from stage to stage, but there were people looking at us

[thewobbler]

Ah I get that you were talking spectators AZ.

I marshalled quite a few rallies growing up and one thing I learned is that the type of people who will walk a couple of miles in pissing rain to watch a car go by every couple of minutes, are also inately pulled towards dangerous corners as though stuck in a tractor beam, have no ability to distinguish between warning signs and leaning posts, and are seemingly unable to decipher any noises being made by a man once he's wearing an orange or yellow bib.

It's what they want to do. Attending a rally is possibly the most boring thing on earth outside of going to mass. I can't blame them for trying to make it a little bit exciting.

[Tony Baloney]

It's definitely not safe for spectators. I took the wains a couple of years ago to see a Circuit of Ireland stage in Armagh. Anyone standing alongside a hedge or gate could quite easily be taken out if a car went out of control. Where we were standing it was however clearly marked where people couldn't stand and Marshall prevented people from standing or corners.

[J70]

The Donegal one used to come out our road years ago, but people got fed up with the ruined roads, bridges and hedges, and being scared shitless of a child or an animal getting onto the road. We used to be made sit well back,  like 30 yards back from the road, sitting up on a hill,  to watch it. I could never understand the morons who stand at the side of the road, often on roads so narrow they have the grassy median between the tyre tracks. The ignorance and complacency is mind boggling.

[omaghjoe]

This is hard one now for myself as I am a fan of motorsport although my father often gave out about it. He reckons that it creates a culture of speed and recklessness and young lads think that they will try their hand at it on the same road. There is no doubt that the motorsports especially those on public roads, which are the most popular in Ireland are directly responsible for dozens of deaths of competitors and indirectly responsible for probably 1000s of deaths (impossible to quantify of course) on our roads through the influence that they have exerted on young lads driving.

Its like the TT it is quite possibly the greatest race(s) in all of motorsport yet there is someone (usually about 3 or 4 actually) dies there every year. What do you do? Say no the thousands of people who want to see the race and those who want to race? Money overrides everything these days even H&S, so stopping it probably wont happen. Funnily enuff I was actually reading an article about it yesterday that said it would never spring up today due to H&S. But the flip side of that is you could say that about anything, in fact you could probably say it about motor vehicles in general.

Whats the solution? I dunno! But I am gonna enjoy them as long as they last. Although if they are banned I could see the reasoning as being fair enuff as well.

[Never beat the deeler]

Problem is that different people have different ideas as to what's dangerous - hazard perception is the buzz-phrase in the construction industry