Dan Wheldon was killed today in a 15 car accident in lap 13 at Las Vegas speedway. Thoughts and prayers are with family and friends.
Woah... Did not watch the race and have not read anything yet so this might be a bit premature... Was it caused by the non-regulars looking to get that huge payday?
It is for real... God bless Dan and all his family and friends... I'm stunned, horrific multi car accident....
Speculation is Yes, driver interviews during red flag many stated that was way too agressive driving early in race. Wheldon had started last and if he could finish first he would share a 5 million dollar prize with a fan, Wheldon had moved up 10 spots in 13 laps, his car was launched during the accident and went cockpit first into fence above the wall. Race has be cancled
RIP Dan Wheldon [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCHvMQWJ33A]IndyCar Las Vegas 2011 Dan Wheldon killed - YouTube[/ame]
Racing on high banked one and half mile banked tracks with Indy cars is like stock cars at Daytona and Talladega. The cars can run flat all the way around; if the driver lifts they lose position. David Poole a writer for the Charlotte Observer wrote a article a few years ago about this in reference to Talladega. In this case Dan did not check up when someone got sideways running three wide when they shouldn’t be doing that stuff on the 12th lap. He got launched into the fence head first. The stock cars figured out how to keep the cars on the ground. Indy car needs to do the same thing. Beyond that lower the banks or reduce the grip so they have to step on the brakes going into the corner.
....enter the much maligned restrictor plate at the super speedways in Sprint Cup. But it was the open wheel tires that launched his car into the air, not the Aero or speed in themselves.
Watched a bunch of the YT videos before they got yanked due to copyright infringement. There were multiple cars that ended up airborne. One that started out the melee about 8 car lengths behind Weldon flew even further through the air, like a sail plane, and also ended up against the wall but right-side up. In the case of #77, not much chance of surviving cockpit-first into the catch fence at that speed and angle. RIP to a great guy and one of the faces of Indy Car. Thoughts and prayers with his family. What a terrible way to end the season. Feel bad for all of the teams.
If interested, view video of the announcement, the tribute laps, etc, on speedtv.com. VIDEO: Dan Wheldon Tribute
I was at the track today. Everyone (myself included) reacted with great horror to the wreck and a solemn silence after the news was annouced. I was looking forward to seeing a good race and saw this. It is a shame and my thoughts are with his family. Im still a bit awed by what I saw.
Sad day indeed... To be honest I'm surprised that this is the first death in IRL since 2006 Too easy for cars to get airborne, which make for great highlights till this happens...
I agree up to a point about the tire contact getting the car air born, but once in the air they need to think about how to keep it from getting so high. With stock cars all the side plates and roof flaps keep the cars from sailing through the air and into the catch fences. Restrictor plates or any attempt to limit the power leads directly to the problem. If you can run flat out backing out of the gas means you lose position. The car needs to be able to be controlled with the gas. NASCAR of late has given the cars bigger restrictor plates, although that created the two by two racing. If they had to back out of the gas going in the corner, they can’t run three abreast all the way around. The racing is better because we get to see who can drive the car down in the corner the hardest, or get on the throttle the soonest coming out of the corner. On these tracks they are driving around at over 220 mph flat out. They are trying to use the air to get an advantage over the other driver: side drafting, drafting to loosen the lead car, drafting to slingshot around, and moving around to upset the trailing car. I would rather see who has the guts to trail brake into the apex in turn one at Indy from 240 mph.
As long as you have open wheels the possibility of someone going airborne will exist. I see no way to keep that from happening. Maybe the answer is to study catch fencing & find a way to make it less lethal. It is there for the spectators with good reason, but there must be a better way. Last year Webber hit kovalainen in Spain at much lower speed & was launched. Luckily without injury. So one doesn't need to be going 200+ to launch.
Stock cars at lower speeds use to get in the catch fences. They fixed the problem. A bigger issue is changing the racing so the cars don't run flat out all the way around.
