This is the first in a new series of articles for Car Articles, where I examine incidents that happen during racing. Some articles will be common to motorsport events of various types, others will be specific to particular types of racing. I’ve named the new section Racing 101.
So, safety cars. The purpose of a safety car, as the name suggests, is to help in maintaining a safe environment and track conditions. Normally, a safety car is driven by an experienced driver of the circuit, so he or she has knowledge of the various twists, turns and straights and the best way in which to take them when controlling a high number of vehicles behind.
If a racing incident occurs that is not severe enough to end the race, but does require the use of yellow flags, the safety car is deployed to slow the racing vehicles down. This serves two purposes: firstly it controls the speed of the vehicles and secondly it gives the opportunity for race stewards to deal with whatever incident has taken place.
You may notice, when watching Formula 1 for example, that the safety car comes out and the cars seem to ‘bunch up’ behind. This is true to a certain extent, but there are some strict conditions that must be adhered to by racing drivers. They are:
1) No overtaking the safety car
2) No overtaking (e.g. you must remain in your current position)
3) The car (or bike) must be travelling at a safe speed under yellow flagged conditions
The race leader should be behind the safety car – so if it emerges and backmarkers are behind, they must pass until the car in the lead is positioned correctly. In many motorsport events, the ‘pack’ must stay in formation until the safety car has extinguished the orange lights positioned on the roof and they have passed the start finish line.
In some sports (such as Formula 1), any laps behind the safety car count, whilst those of the BTCC for example do not.
There is the first of your tips to help you understand some of the rules, terms and incidents that can happen when on a race track.
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