One of my favorite cars at the ECTA’s season opening meet at the famed Ohio Mile in Wilmington was the belly tank lakester of Ron San Giovanni. Powered by a flathead V8 that appears to be wearing a hat which looks very similar to an 8-71 blower, it sounds the business and can wick up to more than 170mph by the end of the mile long course. On Ron’s first run, things were looking good as he made a clean lap with respect to the front half of the course, but things went awfully wrong for him in the shutdown area. Just as he crosses the timing trap at the end of the course, the car launches into a series of spins that show you a cool panorama of the facility. He then gets into the grass and thankfully stays on all fours. It sure was wild to watch it go down from the announcer’s stand. In true racer fashion, Ron got it cleaned up and hit the track again, running 170mph later in the afternoon with no spinning dramatics. That was cool to see.
PRESS PLAY BELOW TO SEE SOME CRAZY IN-CAR VIDEO FROM THE ECTA MEET AT THE OHIO MILE – WHAT IT IS LIKE TO SPIN A LAKESTER AT TERMINAL VELOCITY! CRAZY STUFF!
I simply cannot imagine taking an out of control ride at that speed!!!
It is flat out amazing to me that he didn’t roll it over!!!
I have to ask, is there much a driver can do in this situation, or just hold on?
On the tech side of things…did this spin ruin that set of tires?
interesting info in the comments section of the vid, by the wife of the driver explaining what happened, one of those, ‘Oops’ situations… “It was driver error… Look at the video again, notice the oil pressure gauge. My husband Ron saw it and thought he had no oil pressure. So after the finish line he wanted to put it in neutral but accidentally threw it in 2nd gear. Tires locked up and spun him around. He is Ok, Lakester is OK. The wire came off of the oil sender. He came back to the pits, attached the wire, and ran again. This run was 171.89 mph. Second run was 170 mph. “
Watch the oil pressure gauge at about 1:19
Crazy run…
Had to rewind it about a dozen times. Amazing that a flathead was running 6500rpm, with a buzz to 8k!! And it lived!!
Always curious what would happen if a driver in that situation simply kept the steering straight, would the car spin but not move over to the grass? WILD.
And YUP… that was the fire truck that was buried up to the axles a little bit later…
I noticed the oil pressure go to zero at 1:20,my first thought was he oiled the tires when the sensor poped off. The comment above explains what happened.
Whoohoo!!!! lol
Tech question ? Did that spin ruin his fireproof underwear ??