Robin Miller on Texas-style racing

[Jordi]

One point that is true and can't really be discussed is that while both the IRL and CART's Handford device provide exciting racing, CART's latest rendition of the device is way safer. At Fontana last year, cars were able to distance one from another, and it's surely more likely in the IRL to see cars interlocking wheels. I'm tired of seeing (yes, I do watch IRL whenever I can) incredibly close calls, more than anything in the mid ovals, 1'5 mile ovals.

I think IRL's safest track in Indy, at the moment. Cars are able to distance ones from the others normally, and there are the best and highest fences, not to mention the SAFER system.

[gttouring]

well what is keeping bruton smith and ISC from putting the tested nd true SAFER barriers?
And the better quality fences? shoddy if they don't.
and granted racing is dangerous, it is thrilling, and oval racing is more dangerous still, but Bull riding is very dangerous, and so is motorcyle dirttracking and every racing - it is imporving on the accident avoidance and accident protection that the sport needs. Larger side pods might work for the IRL cars, remeber in 99 was it the Michigan race with Montoya and andretti? passing what 59 times for the lead each and rubbing the 'firestone' off their tyres and leaveing 'donut' marks on their sidepods?
interlocking and touching wheels, absolutely, very great race if not the best oval race ever. N wheel flinging high sky champcars there... was it the drivers? or the lesser banking on the track?
in Cart's defense that year and the few before had the best pool of talent ever, and the result?
maybe it texas..or schekter, or...
remember that the drivers are a huge part of the equation and Hornish rarely messes like schekter and Niether does dixon, and brack rarely did until...

[dirtfan]

They're called nerf bars- all sprints, midgets etc. have them. they still won't keep a car from jumping over a rear wheel, though. If the bottom of your front wheel is going 200mph and the top of the other guy's rear wheel is going 400mph, you'll still go airborne if you hit him from the rear like Kenny did.

[gttouring]

oh yeah but Not Nerf bars as per Supermodifieds or Sprints or Midgets or SilverCrown, but side pods that almost eliminat the wheel interlocking , and perhaps a rear aero bit that forms a sort of bumper to the rears for ovals, and there you go.
Dirt racing is far more acrobatic when they wreck or bump, the sturdy cars there and even on asphalt for the supermods the wrecks are never soo crazy and drivers, I never hear of such freaky breaks nd deaths, although there have been, it is a testament to the sturdy construction of the cars 'old-style with the engine in front.'

[rustyfan]

Originally posted by gttouring
well what is keeping bruton smith and ISC from putting the tested nd true SAFER barriers?

The problem is that you can't just take one design of the SAFER barrier and slap it onto the walls of all tracks. Each track requires a different version of the barrier, due to the turn radius, banking and so on.

High-banked tracks in particular has been a slight problem so far, but now that they will add the SAFER barrier to the new Homestead I reckon more high-banked tracks will soon follow. Remember that the SAFER barrier is still a very new design, and they are still developing it as they get it installed on more and more tracks.

A SAFER barrier wouldn't have made much of a difference last Sunday at Texas though.

[paul-collins]

Going back to that Miller quote I posted about interlocking wheels, I notice he said "certain drivers." Sounds to me like he has some concerns about specific guys. Who might he be speculating about? As a casual observer, I note that last year Scheckter had a rep for crashes, but I've not been observant enough to be able to pick out any driver as reckless in IRL. (I have a better idea of who people might feel that way about in CART.)

[indycool]

Couple of points:
1. Miller's original column said the engine went into the stands. That's now been edited to reflect the fact it didn't, although the error was not pointed out in the edit.
2. Miller is a writer for cart.com, paid for by cart.com., who also writes a column for espn.com.

[Jordi]

Does anyone know how much debris did go to the stands, if any?

[indycool]

Jordi, have seen it debated for a couple of days and the best I can draw from what all the folks say is there's no question some went through the fence but there is a question of whether anything of significance actually reached the stands at that point and what velocity if any of it in fact, did.

[paul-collins]

Originally posted by indycool
Miller's original column said the engine went into the stands. That's now been edited to reflect the fact it didn't, although the error was not pointed out in the edit.

That's interesting, as he wasn't the only one to write that the engine went into the stands.

When I watched the video myself, I saw a flaming lump that shot across the track somewhat behind where the tub ended up spinning by itself. I thought at the time "there goes the engine" but decided I must have been mistaken.

Still, the photos of the hole in the fence are pretty scary. Any idea why the fencing is the way it is (as most commentary has called it "backwards")?

[indycool]

No, Paul, I really don't and I haven't seen it up close. As I understand the accident, though, the gate (not a fence) post at that location was the "immovable object" that the engine cowl hit, causing the car to degrade and the engine to shoot back across the race track to the INSIDE. Whether the fence would have done better, or did its job properly, I haven't seen or heard from anyone yet, although I've heard that theory. Another forum posted a 2001 story debating how the fence was built after Davey Hamilton's wreck there and there were two different schools of thought on it.

[laprecord]

I think it is worthy of note in this debate that during the lifespan of the Indy Racing League, despite an admittedly large number of injuries nobody has been killed in an IRL car (the late Scott Brayton lost his life at Indy in 1996 in an old CART car). By contrast, CART has lost three drivers.

With the IRL obviously featuring a significantly greater numbers of high-speed oval races, I would suggest that the number of serious injuries sustained indicates that the safety of the cars is good, as a number of those accidents might otherwise have cost a driver their life.

Anyone who saw Brack's crash couldn't fail to be impressed with how good a job the car did at protecting him, bearing in mind the unimaginable energy of the accident.

[macdaddy]

Welcome to the forum, laprecord!

Nobody can argue the safety of Brack's chassis.

You note that "the number of serious injuries sustained indicates that the safety of the cars is good." Yet it would seem to me that in previous years (original gearboxes) the spinal-injury rate was unexplainably high. It would seem that the latest round of chassis have pretty much addressed the design flaws.

[Down F0rce]

Originally posted by paul-collins
Any idea why the fencing is the way it is (as most commentary has called it "backwards")?

I think it is because the fence is behind the floodlights, when it should be the other way round.

[paul-collins]

Originally posted by laprecord
With the IRL obviously featuring a significantly greater numbers of high-speed oval races, I would suggest that the number of serious injuries sustained indicates that the safety of the cars is good, as a number of those accidents might otherwise have cost a driver their life.

If you accept that the number of accidents is fixed for this type of racing, then this is reasonable.

My feeling is that the number of accidents per race is still something that can be reduced. I think I've been over this territory already, though.

[paul-collins]

Originally posted by indycool
As I understand the accident, though, the gate (not a fence) post at that location was the "immovable object" that the engine cowl hit, causing the car to degrade and the engine to shoot back across the race track to the INSIDE. Whether the fence would have done better, or did its job properly, I haven't seen or heard from anyone yet...

That picture suggests to me that if it weren't for the gate, the entire car might've made it into the stands...

[macdaddy]

That picture is pretty scary, Paul. First time I've seen it.

[indycool]

Again, it takes a better expert than me by a long shot, but if you look at the picture, the fence is compromised but two fence posts dissipated the energy BEFORE the car hit the gate post, which stopped everything. They're bent up and the fence itself is torn but from the angle where the car hit the gatepost, it was down low.

Would like to know from someone who knows on this -- as I'm sure experts are looking at it -- what they think would've happened if not for the gate post....would the car have gone through or rolled up in the fence?

In Bobby Allison's car at Talladega in the late '80s, Richard Petty's car at Daytona in the same time period and Alessandro Zampedri's car at Indy in '96, the fence contained the car from the grandstands, even with the enormous energy involved.

Paul, good shot for us to talk about.......

[dirtfan]

Looks like a pretty wimpy fence to me, where are the cables anchored in the wall like at Phoenix, Perris(local dirt bullring) and most most other tracks? I see one with the wheel hanging from it, but it seems they stop because of the gate. If an Indycar can do this to the fence, think what a NASCAR tank could do!
As far as the press getting the engine story wrong, A Sprint took a crazy bounce at Perris, jumped the 8' infield fence, and landed on a couple standing in the pits (they had signed the waiver acknowledging the infield was dangerous); the local TV stations all reported that two cars landed in the grandstand. Never believe a reporter.

[rustyfan]

The early IndyCar chassis' were flawed when it comes to the rear end (and the gearbox in particular) which didn't dispearse nearly enough energy in backwards crashes. They even admit as much in the Speed! Crash! Rescue! & Speedway Survival documentries.

It's a bit better these days, but in my opinion they could still make it better.

As for the fence, I doubt Kenny would have landed in the stands even if that big post hadn't been there. As long as the fence takes up the first hit and stops the initial direction of movement (which it did), it's enough for the car to change direction even if the fence itself is torn down. Bobby Allison in 1987 at Talladega and Geoffrey Bodine in 2000 at Daytona are prime examples of this. Granted Bodine hit at a rather shallow angle, but the hole at Texas after Kenny's crash is nothing compared to the hole at Daytona after Bodine tore it down. And unlike IndyCar races (looked like they had the four lower rows cleared), you have spectators sitting all the way down during stock-car races, and no one was seriously injured by debris in that crash (which is pretty remarkable considering how much debris and fire there were flying around).

The biggest danger, as I see it when it comes to the crash at Texas, had been for the people that might have been walking down low on their way to their seats or whatever, but I doubt anyone in the actual stands (especially if they had cleared the four lower rows there as well, which they probably would have done) would have been seriously injured.

[paul-collins]

I wonder if the bulge into the spectator area may in fact look worse because of the gate placement - that is, because the fence ended at that point, changing the dynamics from that of bending stress in the structure (creating tension in a direction orthogonal to the applied stress) to more of a direct tension scenario...

[indycool]

Could be, Paul....I'm just not an expert on those kinds of things. Here's a story from today's Indianapolis Star with Brian Barnhart and Eddie Gossage talking about it.

http://www.indystar.com/print/articl...-8479-036.html

[rustyfan]

Thanks for the link indycool - that's a very interesting and informative read.

Man, just under 200G's... what's the record anyway?

[paul-collins]

Good link. That photo shows the "flaming lump" I referred to in a previous post in this thread - think that's the motor?

Also good to hear that no "sizeable" debris ended up in the stands (whatever that means - bullets aren't sizeable, are they?). I'd hope a full disclosure of the investigation would happen, but I'm not holding my breath.

On the whole, a lucky man Kenny is. 200 G's!

[indycool]

200 Gs is the most I've ever heard. I can remember in the early '90s when Bryan Herta crashed at Indy and they measured it something like 80 Gs and thought it was a huge hit.