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      09-20-2008, 07:43 AM   #1
dawgdog
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Who is insured?

I am essentially a novice driver having attended two BMW skills days, and 3 lapping days at the local track. At first I wasn't too concerned about the insurance issue, but in my 3 track days 3 cars have gone off the track. Two of these, a new Z4M and a Dodge Viper were totalled, and a Suburu WRX was badly damaged.

Since I am now driving a farily expensive car I am getting a little nervous. My insurance carrier clearly rules out coverage, and I am considering switching to one with language more friendly though with 5 cars being insured, two young drivers, and a signficant umbrella I have not found one yet that is in the same price range.

I will probably take out insurance offered on Motorsportsreg.com for the event I am attending next week, and then try to get this all sorted out.
Just curious about what more experienced drivers are doing.
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      09-20-2008, 08:02 AM   #2
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Beware of regular insurance policies that don't "seem" exclude track driving. I know a person who kept on asking his insurance agent every year, and was "told" he was covered. There was some gray language in the policy but nothing explicit in his policy that ruled out coverage. Then he totalled his car. The company refused to pay. He is now suing them.
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      10-26-2008, 12:41 PM   #3
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Well, this is something you have to think about. If you go to a BMW or Porsche club sponsored event (probably other makes too) you will always have an instructor in the car with you.

You are unlikely to find any regular insurance that will provide track coverage, and I've always operated on the assumption that you have no coverage at any kind of track event. Some people suggest you take off your license plates and tape over your vin, but if you do this and have a claim (i.e. "I crashed on the street"), basically you are committing fraud. Evidently you can find some track insurance but it is supposedly very expensive.

Yes, you should be careful as you'll find that many of the "offs" occur in the first session of the day. Unfortunately, even expert drivers can have bad luck. You probably will go off if the car in front of you loses oil or radiator fluid on the track at a critical section and you are the next car to approach.

Another type of event that is much safer on the equipment you might try is an autocross. This is how I started but once you switch over to high speed track events it's hard to go back.

If you car is financed and it's totaled, at a track event, are you prepared to pay until the loan is all paid off but you no longer have the car? Something to think about. You might also try some driver education events where they provide the cars (Audi, Porsche, BMW, Skip Barber and others), until you have enough experience to feel "safe" but it will never be without risk.
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      10-26-2008, 07:19 PM   #4
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Couple more thoughts.
If you saw those three crashes at one event, I would probably avoid those organizers. I've seen an much as one crash every 2 events but usually less often.

Also, no one should be driving 10/10 at a driver's ed event. You should be driving 8/10 so you have some leeway if you hit a slick patch or other hazard. Also, if the track organizers notice more than one or two cars going off during a session, they should get the drivers back together and have a little "chat."

It's in their best interest to maintain the insurance for the event. Finally, the corner workers should be reporting drivers who seem to be driving too hard or taking too many risks. Event organizers can't prevent all mishaps but they should have a pretty good handle as to what's going on and if things are getting out of control bring it back in.
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      10-26-2008, 07:54 PM   #5
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Quote:
Originally Posted by VictorH View Post
Evidently you can find some track insurance but it is supposedly very expensive.
Yes, you can. It costs about $50 per $10k coverage per event (not day, per HPDE event).

http://hpdeins.locktonaffinity.com/Default.aspx?cID=31

It's supposed to be a reputable underwriter. I haven't had any claims, so I can speak from experience, but my BMW CCA chapter links to it.
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      10-26-2008, 08:13 PM   #6
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saw this one 1addicts.com

ny times article about this issue

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/19/au...INSURE.html?em
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      10-26-2008, 08:16 PM   #7
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ny times article

Wheelspin
Car Insurance May Not Cover You at the Track
Shelby American Automobile Club

CHECK THE POLICY Some insurers no longer cover drivers who participate in track events like these in Utah, above, and Virginia.

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By ROY FURCHGOTT
Published: October 17, 2008

IT’S no secret that insurance companies don’t like the people they cover to drive fast. So it shouldn’t be a surprise that the industry has been removing a policy loophole that insured drivers on racetracks.
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Finding an Insurer (October 19, 2008)
Shelby American Automobile Club

That has left weekend warriors uninsured if they participate in track days or attend high-performance driving schools. Jerry Kunzman, executive director of the National Auto Sport Association, said that participation at its track events had jumped fivefold since 2003 and that many of those drivers had no idea they were not covered..

“Maybe 25 or 30 percent have done the research, the middle third just assumes they are covered, and the top third just don’t have a clue,” he said.

What’s happened is that many insurers have redefined the term “racing.” Policies have long had exclusions for racing, but it was defined as a “timed event.”

High-performance driver education neatly avoided that definition. Although cars may take laps at top speed, they aren’t timed.

At many schools, including those held by the Porsche Club of America and the BMW Car Club of America, students are required to attend classroom sessions. On the track, drivers get one-on-one tutoring from an instructor under controlled conditions. The cars are generally sent around the track in small groups with passing limited to straightaways — and only when the driver being passed signals that doing so is all right. So because these runs were not timed, many drivers were covered by their normal automobile policies.

That loophole did not escape the attention of insurers — some clubs practically taunted them in their newsletters. “There was a period of time when clubs were openly flouting this. ‘Take driver’s education and your insurance will cover you. Drive your car the way it was meant to be driven,’” said McKeel Hagerty, chief executive of the Hagerty Insurance Agency, an automotive specialty insurer.

So the industry began to add a new exclusion to its policies in the late 1990s, with most companies adding it within the last few years. Instead of trying to define racing, policies exclude damage at any location that could accommodate racing, timed or not. That eliminated coverage during high-performance driving schools and track days.

Chris Soignier of Austin, Tex., will not be taking his Porsche Cayman to the track, which he had done with his previous cars. When he read his renewal notice from Progressive Insurance last November, he found that the Cayman was not covered on the track.

“I don’t feel like I’m that much at risk, but the magnitude of the loss is too great for me to be comfortable,” he said.

Not all drivers got word of the change, or, like Mr. Soignier, read their new policy. Also, because insurance is regulated by the state, exemptions in Michigan, for example, may differ from those in California.

To make matters worse, asking insurers to clarify coverage could result in a nasty surprise. Mike Barr, a dentist from Palm Beach, Fla., called the insurer USAA to see if his policy covered his Subaru WRX STi on the track.

“Some months later I got a letter from USAA saying they were going to discontinue coverage,” he said.” “They dropped me because I asked about” performance driving schools. “They confirmed it verbally when I called to inquire further.” A USAA spokesman said Dr. Barr was canceled for “several reasons,” but would not elaborate.

Some drivers reduce their exposure by getting an inexpensive track car. As an insurance underwriter for Chubb insurance in Whitehouse Station, N.J., you’d think Eugene Lim would be averse to risk, and he is. But he is also a driving aficionado who is qualified as a high-performance driving instructor. After 40 track days in his Acura NSX, Mr. Lim discovered he was uninsured on the track. So he bought what is essentially a disposable car. “When I got really serious, I bought a turbo Miata. Six thousand dollars would still hurt, but it’s not my NSX,” which was worth about $45,000.

Such a growing market would seem to be an opportunity — and it is. Specialty insurers have tried offering high-performance-school insurance.

“It was a difficult program,” said Laura Bergan, vice president for marketing at American Collectors Insurance. “Difficult as in, we were paying a lot of claims.” American phased out its performance-school coverage last year.

American, like other insurers who have tried the insurance, ran into a series of hurdles. To attract a pool of clients and spread risk, the policies were priced low — an average of $500 to $750 a year, Ms. Bergan said. The number of claims wasn’t a problem, but the cost of the claims was. “Most of the claims were total losses,” she said.

Other companies tried higher pricing, but found few takers.

Cost is not the only barrier. Many drivers don’t think they’ll crash, and unlike regular car insurance, track insurance is not mandated by states. Drivers often confuse track insurance provided by clubs, which in most cases covers only liability and injury, with collision insurance.

The growing market still attracts new insurers. Laura Hauenstein, president of the WSIB Insurance Agency of Jackson, Mich., which specializes in motorsports coverage, was initially against offering performance-school insurance. She changed her mind three years ago when WSIB found a way to streamline the underwriting process.

“I would say we had 100, the first year or two, but this year we put ads in Porsche Panorama,” she said. “My numbers might be off — it could be 500.”

The WSIB premium is 3 percent of the car’s value. The deductible is $2,500, or 4 percent of the car’s value, whichever is greater. So an experienced driver on an approved track with a $100,000 Porsche 911 Carrera S would pay $3,000 to cover 10 events in one year, with a deductible of $4,000. Other companies, like K & K Insurance Group of Fort Wayne, Ind., and Motorsports Insurance Services of Los Angeles, have begun to offer the insurance, but use a more complex formula to price it.

Gene Cottingham, former chief financial officer of Champ Car World Series, which held open-wheel races, knows what track accidents can cost. So he insured his modified 2006 Mustang GT pace car for $40,000. The $1,200 premium seemed high at first, but “when you spread that cost over five to six weekends, it’s really not that much money,” he said.

“The purpose of insurance for me,” he added, “is peace of mind.”
More Articles in Automobiles » A version of this article appeared in print on October 19, 2008, on page AU2 of the New York edition.
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