Spirit of Daytona DP crashes at Daytona testing

"BullManUGA" (BullManUGA) 11/19/2013 at 14:24 • Filed to: TUSC

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Reports are that Richard Westbrook lost it going into turn 1 and flipped into the catchfencing and rolled a few times. Ouch. He's been checked and released from the medical center and is fine.

The car didn't have the front diveplanes on it but they were running the new wing and the large diffuser on the rear.

JEM > BullManUGA 11/19/2013 at 14:30

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Well, if this happened on the last few laps and took out half a dozen other race cars, then it would sort of be living up to it's name/NASCAR heritage.

Converse > BullManUGA 11/19/2013 at 14:40

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I'm sure this is going to launch a bunch of questions. Like, were the Continental's overloaded by the downforce level? Was the downforce level (mandated by IMSA for the test) too high? Is the Prototype class now more dangerous because of the ramrodding of regulations to "equalize" two very different types of machines? Etc.

Either way, I'm glad Westy is ok. That sounds like a wild ride. With the high amount of driver injuries of late, it's nice to hear of someone making it out all right. Let's keep that trend going.

whaden > BullManUGA 11/19/2013 at 14:50

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I'm wondering if the downforce was unbalanced toward the rear without the dive planes up front. This possibly caused a bad understeer situation. Not an expert, though.