I absolutely love autocrossing. Standing in an empty parking lot as cars fly through, with drivers pushing their cars and tires to within centimeters of the cones that make up the makeshift course, is thrilling to watch. Then there’s getting behind the wheel yourself, knowing you only have just a handful of chances to put up a strong time without messing up—it gets my adrenaline pumping just thinking about it.
One quasi-participant of this weekend’s autocross event at a Rockingham Speedway course in North Carolina likely had their blood pumping extra-fast for a totally different reason. Video from the event published across social media on Saturday shows the driver of a Ford Taurus blasting through a part of the coned-off course and the gridding area while being chased by police.
While the course wasn’t technically active when the police pursuit cut through the event grounds, organizers confirmed to me that the driver of the fleeing car was penalized for several cone strikes, resulting in time being added to their final result.
Rockingham Is More Than Just An Oval
If you follow NASCAR, you probably know Rockingham Speedway as a D-shaped oval where V8-powered race cars fly around in circles, riding the steep banking. While the oval is certainly what the track is most famous for, it also has an infield section with left and right turns, which combine with the oval to make a nicely sized road course.
In addition to the main facility, Rockingham Speedway has a baby sibling oval on the property, just south of the main oval. This track is called “Little Rock,” and it has its own sliver of pavement that connects the track down the middle, so organizations can use it for more than just oval racing.
It was this smaller course where the Tar Heel Sports Car Club (THSCC), a motorsports club that hosts autocross, rallycross, track days, and karting events in the central North Carolina region, was hosting its second novice school and autocross event of the year last weekend. A novice school is basically just a chiller, less intensive version of an autocross day meant to give newbies a sense of what autocrossing is like, the rules, and how to squeeze the most out of your car.
It was on Saturday, during the novice school event, that the THSCC encountered its unwelcome flurry of guests. Video recorded by one of the attendees and published by the Ryan Cheek Racing Facebook page, uploaded a video showing a white Ford Taurus emerging from a nearby field onto a part of the track, before striking at least one cone on the course and turning into the staging area where all of the autocross cars were parked.
You can see people fleeing on foot just to get out of the way of the Taurus and the three police cars—a Tahoe, a Silverado, and what looks to be a Charger, I think, from the Richmond County Sheriff’s Department (warning, the language used in the video is a bit explicit):
If you can’t see the video in full, either hit the full screen button or click here. After zooming through the parking area, the Taurus hits the eastern part of the Little Rock oval, presumably to gain some momentum, before heading back in the direction it came, but not before striking at least one more cone on the way out.
The Aftermath
Curious to know what the hell happened here, I reached out to the THSCC to get some more details. The club’s president, Mark Beech, gave me a pleasantly detailed response that confirms no one from the club was hurt, and seems to explain how the chase ended up on the track, which is on a gated, private property, in the first place:
As you may be aware, some local law enforcement activities inadvertently crossed paths with our annual THSCC Novice Autocross School this past Saturday at Rockingham Speedway’s “Little Rock” facility. The person being pursued and the pursuers were not, in any way, affiliated with Tarheel Sports Car Club or our event.
First and foremost, the Tarheel Sports Car Club officers and staff would like to say we are glad no one (from our club, on site) was harmed during the incident. Safety is our top priority at autocross events.
The autocross site is normally accessed through secure gates. The incident occurred when, it appears, a police pursuit diverted off of a public road and continued running hundreds of yards through a sandy field behind the track where the white sedan in the video ran through a fence and entered the Rockingham Speedway “Little Rock” facility. The pursuit continued around the track, exiting at roughly the same place from which it entered and disappearing in a cloud of dust.
Fortunately, the incident in question happened between sessions, so there were minimal people on the track and no cars actively on course at the time.
As for the suspect, a representative for the Richmond County Sheriff’s Department told me over the phone that they eventually were arrested, but couldn’t share any more details at this time.
Before they were booked, the THSCC made sure to calculate how many cones the suspect struck. Sure, they weren’t invited and broke nearly every SCCA rule in the book, but they still ran (some of) the course and deserve to be scored. Going by the club’s analysis, it’s not looking good for the driver’s overall results.
It was noted that the driver of the white sedan hit 3 cones which incurred a 6 second time penalty before they were DNF’d for exceeding track limits. Also, due to the DNF, the driver was not eligible for FTD considerations. After a minimal amount of cleanup (sedan body parts included), our event was able to resume and ended successfully on schedule later in the day.
THSCC would also like to express thanks to the Richmond County Sheriff’s Department for their professionalism in handling this incident and in their subsequent interactions with the club.
We invite and encourage your readers to come out to one of our upcoming events to learn how to handle their car in what is (normally) a very secure, safe, and fun way to learn about the limits of your car in a safe, competitive and social environment.
Commenters were quick to make jokes about both the ridiculous nature of a police chase blasting through an active autocross event and the irony of someone “taking it to the track” to drive recklessly, while already being chased by police. Here are a few of the best I’ve seen:
If there’s a lesson here, it’s that you can never be too cautious about your environment. Whenever I’m chilling in the paddock during a track day or waiting near my car at an autocross event, it would never even cross my mind that someone could come flying through the lot at a scary speed, with a row of police cars in tow. Thankfully, it doesn’t seem like anyone needed to get hurt for us to learn that.
Top graphic image: Ryan Cheek Racing on Facebook
Unlawfully Borrowed Stock Class, I assume.
To be fair he didn’t DNF quite as bad as the one cop in the pickup (is a Silverado even SCCA eligible?) who pulled a U-turn mid course and headed out the entrance!
(I saw the video on Facebook yesterday so I saw more than sky.)
As a Safety Steward, I don’t even want to think of the paperwork I might have had to do if it went much worse. Also once he went 4 wheels off, it’s a DNF no matter how many cones he hit. ;^)
My Mac saw nothing but sky for most of the video, and there was no full screen option.
reload it, and it might just show all asphalt, like me after reloading 🙂
it played fine on my phone,
When I played it again on my Mac, I opened it in a new tab, and it was the full screen also.
Funny, your video box in chrome on PC is the wrong aspect ratio for the video, so it only shows top half or bottom half, unless you click for full screen view.