It’s been almost half a century since the Nürburgring was abandoned as a major racing track due to its dangerous nature. The so-called “Green Hell”, a name given by the legendary Jackie Stewart, remains a place of pilgrimage for motorsport fans from around the world.
And it is because Nürburgring has a peculiarity: for a fee, anyone can drive on the asphalt where legendary drivers in history once risked their lives and, unfortunately, some lost them. But on this occasion we are not going to review the glorious afternoons or the disasters, but rather a scene that has made our hair stand on end.
An on-board camera shows us a scene in which, with the Nürburgring as the setting, disaster is about to happen. As we said, you can enter the German track by taking out a ticket and the track works as if it were a road with no speed limits, but with some rules.
At the Nürburgring you have to overtake on the left
The main thing is that all overtaking must be done on the left side. It doesn’t matter where the corner is, you overtake on the left no matter what. That said, it’s time to analyse the action between the Porsche and the Ducati Panigale V4.
After several linked curves we see how the Porsche 718 GT4 RS and the person carrying the camera approach a motorcycle at speed, which appears at minute 7:30. It doesn’t take long for them to be on top of it and only 12 seconds later, the Porsche driver takes advantage of the fact that the motorcycle is going inside the curve to overtake on the outside.
But when the car is in the middle of the manoeuvre, the motorcycle goes back to the outside, as it was not moving away but taking a line. The quick reaction of both makes the collision only a graze. The Porsche leaves the road, the motorcycle moves away and nobody loses control, so everything ends up as a scare.
Who is to blame? Well, the truth is that it is difficult to determine just one culprit, and after analyzing the action on several occasions, we can say that for us it would be 50-50. That is, both could have avoided the situation. A situation that, on the other hand, can happen on the track.
On the one hand, we have the Porsche, which is going much faster than the motorcycle. It sees it, knows that it is approaching, knows that it has more speed when going through the curve, more braking capacity and decides to overtake it without knowing whether the motorcycle rider has seen it or not. We can say that, at best, it is being optimistic and does not value the action taking into account the other party involved.
On the other hand, there is the motorcycle rider. While it is true that he is ahead, it is also true that there are a few seconds in which he seems to stay a little longer inside the curve, moving to the right side and, perhaps, not having noticed the car behind him. And that is the point that the rider could have improved, because at the Nürburgring there are many types of vehicles, some slower and others faster, and you have to be as attentive as possible to who is coming from behind and who is ahead, something that is not easy on a motorcycle and at those speeds.
So, for us, it would be an action that both could have avoided, taking into account the other users. The best thing is that nobody has to regret anything. The disaster was very close, also when the motorcycle user cut the gas and crossed the track after the incident without looking to see if another car was coming behind the first car (something common at the Nürburgring). And you, what do you think?
