Aston Martin Driver Allan Simonsen Killed In Le Mans Crash

[dem00n]

I stopped watching a while ago, pretty sad about this...

http://jalopnik.com/le-mans-driver-a...rash-541288338

[charged86]

That sucks it wiggled lose. Happened in milliseconds

[mashal]

Rumble strips of death. Cars suspension looked funky/wobbly

[im2fr-s]

Very sad! 2 words...safer barriers.

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[Deki]

Originally Posted by im2fr-s

Very sad! 2 words...safer barriers.

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The stuff they got now is over 25 years old. Unacceptable.

[FnFast]

It's terrible. They were talking about this towards the night when a few more crashes happened how they use soo much metal guardrails and how speeds of these cars are ever getting faster with stuff that was sufficient for cars 10-20 years ago.

[GTB/ZR-1]

Very unfortunate incident--he was too wide, went completely over the strips, tried to correct & the car hooked violently straight into the wall @ 140ish? That was kind of a freak accident the way it happened @ that part of the track.

As soon as I saw the car on camera sitting there w/o doors & no driver movement, I knew it was very, very bad. I actually thought to myself that it was fatal right then & there.

RIP...

[jkonquer]

I was watching that race as it happened, very sad. This is what considered a "freak" accident. Something that you can almost never prevent.

[Gunman]

One report I read, is that he was talking to the track workers as they got him out of the car, but I haven't seen anything to verify that, not like it matters.

The problem with safer barrier, is that was on part of the street circuit, so the wall needs to be temporary. Tire barrier, and not having the armco attached directly to the tree he hit would help a lot. In fact, I'm surprised the FIA/ACO didn't have tire barrier there. Thankfully our guys are all coming home safe.

My sympathies to the family.

[mav1178]

Two angles:

• Onboard Corvette: [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q623g1mKpdE"]Le Mans 24h 2013 Allan Simonsen #95 Aston Martin Crash - YouTube[/ame] (you can see how wet the track still was and how he drops 2 wheels onto the rumble strip)
• 3rd party vantage point, showing the spin of the Ferrari and how Allan spun:

Basically, Ferrari spun, everyone was in close quarters, and Allan lifted and the car had instant oversteer on the painted part of the track (a lot of moisture on the side), then the car corrected. I don't care how good of a driver you are, sometimes when you're at such a high speed going into Tertre Rouge you simply run out of room to correct yourself.


The Ferrari spun on the inside corner. Allan had to spin to the outside to avoid the Ferrari... and, well, it was a sad day.


Of note: this is a fan tribute left where he hit. Note the skid marks and the tree... and remember that Aston Martins are RHD in race configuration.




Godspeed, Allan. And kudos to Tom Kristensen for dedicating this race to Allan, even after the passing of his own father earlier this year.


-alex