CELEBRITY SOBRIETY CHALLENGE EVENT
(DRUNK-DRIVING DEMONSTRATION AT ATLANTA MOTOR SPEEDWAY)
(Hampton, GA) The event-staff at Atlanta Motor Speedway is teaming-up with Georgia law enforcement this holiday season for a lesson behind-the-wheel that should never be repeated on the open road. It’s a dramatic drunk-driving experiment to be conducted in the controlled environment of an AMS closed course. And when the drinking and driving are done, the experience should serve as an eye-opener for any motorist who doesn’t know the meaning of You Drink, You Drive. You Lose.
Participants in the Holiday Sobriety Challenge will consume anywhere from one-to-three glasses of wine or beer when the experiment begins. Then the volunteers will submit to standard field sobriety tests.. the kind law enforcement officers across Georgia will actually be conducting as part of Operation Zero Tolerance (OZT) this December holiday season.
After the breathalyzer tests are administered by Georgia State Troopers, the celebrity volunteers in vehicles will attempt to negotiate their way safely through the closed driving course set-up by Atlanta Motor Speedway. In each car, the test-drivers will be accompanied by an instructor from the Xtreme Measures Teen Driving School.
Results from each participant will then be recorded and analyzed by the driving school instructors and the Georgia State Patrol. Final results from the driving test will be released during a news conference at the conclusion of the Holiday Sobriety Challenge event. Representatives from Mothers Against Drunk Drivers, Team Georgia and the Governor’s Office of Highway Safety will be available for comment.
While Atlanta Motor Speedway’s sister track has hosted similar Sobriety Challenge events for the past seven years, more than 70-percent of their participants failed the driving test, even when drivers had Blood-Alcohol-Content (BAC) levels well below the .08 legal limit. Every thirty minutes someone dies in a drunk driving crash in this country.
“Motor vehicle crash fatalities here outnumber Georgia’s murder rate by nearly three-to-one says Governor’s Office of Highway Safety Director Bob Dallas. “Alcohol slows reaction time, whether you’ve had one drink or three. You’re an impaired driver well before you hit the legal limit,” says GSP Trooper Larry Schnall.
The media-only event runs Friday, Dec. 10 from 11AM-2PM and is closed to the public. For more information call Angela Revell at AMS Public Affairs at 770-946-3950/51. Celebrity drivers include WSB radio traffic reporter Capt. Herb Emory, Georgia Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, rapper Da Brat, Star 94’s Jonathan Hyla and Hot 107.9’s DJ Nabs.
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Governor’s Office of Highway Safety
34 Peachtree Street—Suite 1600—One Park Tower—Atlanta, Georgia 30303
Visit us on the web at www.georgiahighwaysafety.org
Sonny Perdue, Governor Robert F. Dallas, Director