Cleetus McFarland is going to get somebody killed...

bearmtnmartin (Forum Supporter) said:

The epitome of success for a GRM member and certified car people should be a wildly successful YouTube channel where you get to quit your day job and spend all your time building, racing and destroying cars while making tons of money, to the point you have haters and multipage, heated discussions on web forums.

I think it would be better to do something similar but where your "haters" aren't constantly coming up with valid criticisms of safety issues you have control over?

TL/DR

I like the channel but not enough to do a pay per view or anything. I have watched it for many years.

The kid who got his back. etc. burned from coolant should have built a safer car. The channel learned from that.

They also learned from this accident as the video shows. I really wish they would think things through more thoroughly.

FF is slow, Bristol? Come on man. 

I sincerely hope he does not have a fatality at one of his events.

His business model is great. FF and Cleetus are separate entities. He pulls up other YouTubers. Amongst other things.

I wasn't impressed with Kevin's appoogy at all, he still said it was a good idea that turned out bad, but that was way too agressive for the safety level of the cars, and he has enough experience building cars to know that.  In nascar yeah you can wreck someone like that and they walk away, not so much in a slightly modified Crown Victoria.  It's interesting to look at the video Alex Taylor posted of practicing in a Crown Victoria race car to see how much better it was prepped than the cars Cleetus runs.  I unsubscribed from Cleetus's channel and a few others once a realized their views on certain things but I do still watch some of the others that participate in his events.

Being a casual fan and hater of all things "they're playing the good ol boys characters so let's base all my viewpoint on how they probably have a different political opinion than me" maybe op could have just kept it under his hat and said hey maybe we could have a reasonable discussion about why popularizing events like this could possibly be damaging amateur motorsports.. instead we got this 

If you think that basically a prettied up demo derby/"every Saturday night at your local Midwest short track" is gonna affect your obnoxious gatekept view of racing your just plain ignorant.

bearmtnmartin (Forum Supporter) said:

The epitome of success for a GRM member and certified car people should be a wildly successful YouTube channel where you get to quit your day job and spend all your time building, racing and destroying cars while making tons of money, to the point you have haters and multipage, heated discussions on web forums.

Eh, too much publicity for me.  I'd rather just be some guy with his own shop that is succesful enough that he gets to build whatever he wants whenever he wants.

I don't have a dog in this fight. I like cleetus. Everyone on that track was an adult. The end. 

I will say however I am wholly disappointed in the fact that we had to go swinging political out of the gate (Jan 6 vibes? COVID denier? Come on. ) I will also say I'm fairly disappointed people have let it go. If we're not talking about politics, we aren't talking about politics. The end. 

In reply to Mndsm :

Agree. 100% none of that was needed or should be welcomed.

I remember Randy Pobst's Vinwiki video about his race at the Freedom Factory being fun but Randy ultimately spent most of his time trying not to get wrecked by youtubers. He said they essentially drove like that did because "they don't know what that wall feels like". The safety concerns have been obvious for a while and were probably acceptable the first couple times they did these races with what was essentially a group of friends. Bringing more and more people and pro-drivers into it at bigger venues with very little safety prep was a bad move though.

In reply to GameboyRMH :

It looks like there was plenty of contact in that race and none of it raised an eyebrow. In a LeMons race any one of those contacts would've got you at least a stern talking to if not a black flag. Running a full-contact back-40 race on a big banked oval was sure to end in a wreck, the only question was how bad.

Bump drafting in corners is for experts, and at this level of racing almost indistinguishable from malice.

Funny you should make that comparison. It took a while for Lemons to get where it is today. Early races made that one look tame. I think a race I competed in was the tipping point. The competitor's ingenuity outpaced the rules. Many cars looked like they drove over from a Mad Max set, with bars and armor welded over the the outside of the cars. Grand Turismo turns work really well in real life, at least for the car on the inside. It was a hell of a lot of fun, but definitely safety 3rd. We got away with it because most of the cars were slow and on a short track, but we were topping 80 on the straight.  Plenty fast enough to get hurt. 

While he's crazy busy with his empire and growing family, I'm afraid Garrett may hurt himself or others worse if he waded back into the 1320 late night street racing world.  While his Crown Vic racing cages are cringey, a handful of people at Bristol and the tracks parent corporation let the event happen.  His Bradenton events have more fire and rescue staff each time out.

There may be some night where he races a 2000hp something on an empty road "in Mexico" and hits a civilian.

Thats the ending I'm worried about.

Mndsm said:

I don't have a dog in this fight. I like cleetus. Everyone on that track was an adult. The end. 

 

I will say however I am wholly disappointed in the fact that we had to go swinging political out of the gate (Jan 6 vibes? COVID denier? Come on. ) I will also say I'm fairly disappointed people have let it go. If we're not talking about politics, we aren't talking about politics. The end. 

Cleetus dfd post a COVID denial video, so while I understand it's not worth discussion on the internet at this point it's not an inaccurate statement to mention it.

Tk8398 said:

Mndsm said:

I don't have a dog in this fight. I like cleetus. Everyone on that track was an adult. The end. 

 

I will say however I am wholly disappointed in the fact that we had to go swinging political out of the gate (Jan 6 vibes? COVID denier? Come on. ) I will also say I'm fairly disappointed people have let it go. If we're not talking about politics, we aren't talking about politics. The end. 

Cleetus dfd post a COVID denial video, so while I understand it's not worth discussion on the internet at this point it's not an inaccurate statement to mention it.

So saying you aren't gonna get the jab is being a covid denier? Plus, either way, it has nothing to do with the discussion of what happened at Bristol, other than to try and paint him in a certain light, so just stop. 

mikeatrpi said:

I unsubscribed from Kevin after he retaliated into kyle busch at mullets.  I'm sure he's a talented dude but he seems too eager to show that to the world.

So I'm guessing you missed he and Busch hanging out and having a good time after the race?

In reply to Tk8398 :

What does that have to do with cars?  I don't give a fig what church he goes to or if he eats meat or not. How is any of that relevant?

Outraged people always need to be outraged.

racerfink said:

Tk8398 said:

Mndsm said:

I don't have a dog in this fight. I like cleetus. Everyone on that track was an adult. The end. 

 

I will say however I am wholly disappointed in the fact that we had to go swinging political out of the gate (Jan 6 vibes? COVID denier? Come on. ) I will also say I'm fairly disappointed people have let it go. If we're not talking about politics, we aren't talking about politics. The end. 

Cleetus dfd post a COVID denial video, so while I understand it's not worth discussion on the internet at this point it's not an inaccurate statement to mention it.

So saying you aren't gonna get the jab is being a covid denier? Plus, either way, it has nothing to do with the discussion of what happened at Bristol, other than to try and paint him in a certain light, so just stop. 

He also got the 'Vid. He survived. I never saw him deny it.

Watching people unknowingly risk their lives for internet fame?  No, thanks. 
 

(seeing people do stuff like that, they may be adults, but I really don't think they know much about what they are doing.  It's why saftery rules progressed )

Crxpilot said:

While he's crazy busy with his empire and growing family, I'm afraid Garrett may hurt himself or others worse if he waded back into the 1320 late night street racing world.  While his Crown Vic racing cages are cringey, a handful of people at Bristol and the tracks parent corporation let the event happen.  His Bradenton events have more fire and rescue staff each time out.

There may be some night where he races a 2000hp something on an empty road "in Mexico" and hits a civilian.

Thats the ending I'm worried about.

I remember watching the one TX2K DVD that 1320Video did where the one Supra they were riding in lifted a head gasket, put water under the left tire and then spun 90 degrees and slammed into a K-rail at a high rate of speed, and the DVD just abruptly ended there. That was really startling. There was also that video two or three years ago where Kyle was riding in the guys Audi RS3 that caught fire. The whole front end was engulfed in flames, they were still moving at a high rate of speed, and it cooked the master cylinder so it had no brakes. I remember watching them coasting along with the flames getting closer to the compartment and hearing the panic in Kyle's voice as they tried to figure out a way to get stopped. That was a really terrifying video to watch.

Crxpilot said:

While he's crazy busy with his empire and growing family, I'm afraid Garrett may hurt himself or others worse if he waded back into the 1320 late night street racing world.  While his Crown Vic racing cages are cringey, a handful of people at Bristol and the tracks parent corporation let the event happen.  His Bradenton events have more fire and rescue staff each time out.

There may be some night where he races a 2000hp something on an empty road "in Mexico" and hits a civilian.

Thats the ending I'm worried about.

I've been watching Cleetus since a little before he bought the Freedom Factory. Since I've been watching it seems like he's really avoided doing anything too dumb on public roads, definitely nowhere close to the 1320 street racing stuff. I doubt he'd get back into any of that as it's probably not great for his business/image and seems like a good way to lose his big sponsors.

Also to the OP, it's kind of mind blowing that for the simple fact that he used the word 'Freedom' in the name of his race track that you'd instantly say that it gives of Jan. 6th vibes, literally for using a single word...

In reply to Tk8398 :

you guys are still trying to make the political slander work as a talking point 7 pages later? This forum is devolving into facebook levels of petty political slants and mindless being right just to be right.  God forbid someone has a different set of life experiences and has a different point of view than you.

Was going to reply, but I don't want to be seen as political. Sorry that I'm not interested in seeing people unknowingly risk their lives. 

Any involvement in motorsport at any level is watching people KNOWINGLY risk their lives. Not one person on this or any other racetrack is ignorant of what they're doing. 

alfadriver said:

Was going to reply, but I don't want to be seen as political. Sorry that I'm not interested in seeing people unknowingly risk their lives. 

Just for emphasis

alfadriver said:

Was going to reply, but I don't want to be seen as political. Sorry that I'm not interested in seeing people unknowingly risk their lives. 

+1,  There are those who view saving people from their own (usually ignorant or misinformed) decisions as overreach, but I respectfully disagree. Saving lives or saving people from injury is a worthwhile pursuit. Its not a political statement that my personal morals place that as a worthwhile pursuit.  (and yes, morals can AND SHOULD be decoupled from politics and religion in this context)