Any crash on a street course is going to be nasty. I recall see a video from the Isle of Mann where the crasher and his bike are air born for a good period and even go over a wooden stake fence. Its all about the sudden stop at the end. :shock:
Isle of Man, and Northwest are both nuts. But Cookstown 100 and Mid Antrim 150 blow those two out of the water. The speeds are not quite as high, but the courses are f'n CRAZY rough, more narrow, and more stuff to hit if you miss a corner.
I read a book, "Track Secrets of Champion Road Racers" and at least one of the racers from the 'street' days of GP mentioned using the curbing (of sidewalks and whatnot else) as a berm to finish off a turn.
Its done on race tracks all the time too. Barber comes to mind, Mid ohio too I think. Any track with a rounded enough curbing to use, it is used as a berm by the fast guys
******** Any track with a rounded enough curbing to use, it is used as a berm by the fast guys ******** I would not be that guy.
I dont consider myself all THAT fast, but I have done it at Barber. at exit of the last turn onto the front straight, and on exit of the kink (t9 I think) after the rollercoaster. It is sketchy feeling at first for sure.
Remember in the case of the rider in the book, the berm is the right angle corner between the side walk and the road. This is sudden/abrupt etc... not like the curbing at some of the tracks you mention. Mess it up and your going high side in a very bad way. Some race tracks also saw-tooth or add speed bumps to the curbing to entice vehicles to stay on the intended track. NJMP has saw-toothed curbing and Road America has speed bumps. For those that haven't ridden RA (WI) all those black lines running perpendiculat to the direction of the motorcycles before and after the Toyota bridge (and other places) are nasty at speed and having experienced these first hand have given me a higher appreciation for the AMA pros that use "all the track" at RA; especially Mat and Ben when they are (were) still leaned way over finishing the corner. It's my opinion that these 'speed bumps' are the reason Aaron Yates lost the chain in the one superbike race last year.
Most of them are now at least somewhat saw toothed or bumped. I get what you are saying, but the technique is similar. The areas I am talking about the curbing is not flat at all with the track (think last turn at Laguna... it is saw toothed but flat. You wont berm that) so the sudden "impact" with the curbing lets you change direction with it. I do agree though that a square curb would be worse. I think the northwest is pretty rounded though.... not quite square, but still worse than any "real" track.