Celli

Vaca-Dixon Enterprises, Durham J ones, Vaca Valley Raceway, Sports Car Club of America, Inc. and San Francisco Region Sports Car Club of America, the respective owners of tire track facilities and operators and sponsors of an automobile race (hereafter defendants), appeal from adverse judgments entered on jury verdicts in favor of each of the plaintiffs in three personal injury actions consolidated for trial. Plaintiffs, William Celli, Bob Reinfried and William Ribbs, Jr., were spectators at defendants’ sports car racing event and were injured during a practice run by a car that left the track and skidded into the infield area to which, each plaintiff had been admitted pursuant to a “pit pass” issued by defendants. The major contentions on appeal are that: 1) the trial court erred in refusing to admit the pit passes on the issues of liability and assumption of risk; 2) the release of liability agreements in the pit. passes were not void on their face or void as against public policy; and 3) the trial court failed to instruct the jury on contributory negligence.

The basic facts are not in dispute. On Saturday and Sunday, September 12 and 13, 1964, defendants sponsored a…