On Wednesday afternoon, the National Hot Rod Association made a dramatic change to its Full Throttle Series, adding excitement and decreasing the danger factor. In Top-nitro Funny Car (which is the class Scott Kalitta drove in) and Nitro Top Fuel Dragster, the distance for each pass down the track has been decreased from a quarter-mile to a thousand feet. NHRA says this is an interim safety move for the remainder of the season, but experts inside the sport feel this will probably remain. This was the first immediate step toward safety the National Hot Road Association sanctioning body made since the explosive crash that took the life of Scott Kalitta, and it follows another step taken by another sanctioning body to make the sport safer.
Last month, at Knoll Gas Motorsports Park in Michigan, lightning literally struck the track's starting-line tree, forcing the American Drag Racing League to make a temporary decision for the event to hold arm-drop finals. Word is this will become a permanent thing in ADRL. That's right, PINKs style professional drag racing. Now, this should get fun. The American Drag Racing League will run it's inaugural 1-800-GO-GUARD.com U.S. Nationals at Maryland International Raceway on July 25-26, RacingForTheWin.com along with Maryland International Raceway will have complete comprehensive coverage of the racing action.
These moves may not be enough, but it's a step in the right direction. There remain many daunting tasks ahead for NHRA officials. For one, they're going to have to find ways to slow the cars down without making crew-chiefs change their playbooks altogether. And this, my friends, outlines the biggest fundamental problem with NHRA. The past 15-20 years, NHRA has grown in a way NASCAR racing has. It's become bigger, better, faster, more prestigious and more colorful than ever before.
Now, NHRA has become big-dollar racing. NHRA requires the big money and the big team backing to race. Where NHRA can take credit is in diversity. I've long said there is no sport in the world that is more diverse or colorful than drag racing. It remains the only sport where men and women of all racial backgrounds can race on an even ground. In changing the sport, NHRA's sanctioning body needs to move forward keeping this in mind.
There have been many stories of success for diverse candidates in drag racing, from Bunny Burkett to Shirley Muldowney to Erica Enders and now Ashley Force and Melanie Troxel. NHRA's diversity is something NASCAR can only dream about, and it's something IndyCar Series is still trying to grasp. IndyCar is still busy pumping up the fact that it was in their sport that Danica Patrick won a race. NHRA doesn't need to pump this; their fans know drag racing has an equal playing ground.
The thousand-foot rule will help even more. Not only does it mean longer shutdown lengths, it also means less mechanical failures. Most mechanical failures occur past the thousand foot mark. This, even in a year where Tim Wilkerson dominates in Funny Car, will even out the playing field even more and allow smaller teams a better chance to compete. Along with the task of slowing cars down, these are steps to make things safer and more competitive.
Earlier this year, Kevin Harvick announced he was looking at starting a 2-car field in the NHRA Nitro Top Fuel division. Some people speculated whether he and Bob Vandergriff were looking to create a Car of Tomorrow in NHRA, similar to that which NASCAR has. Perhaps, NHRA should bring in a little more financial incentive to get Kevin Harvick Incorporated into their series if, in fact, KHI can create a safer car. I mean, the safety record of the Car of Tomorrow in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series speaks for itself.
If you do not know this safety record I speak of, just watch Michael McDowell's vicious qualifying crash at the Texas Motor Speedway in April. McDowell's car got loose entering turn 1, he overcorrected it and the car went right and slammed into the outside SAFER barrier at over 185 mph. The car flipped over several times before coming to a rest on the apron. Michael McDowell not only survived the vicious wreck, he raced just two days later in the main event.
I know it may be a foreign concept to NHRA officials. I know people are going to read what I say and remind me this is drag racing, and I know people are going to write-off the following comments altogether. Perhaps, maybe NHRA should work with NASCAR and with its rivals over at Live Nation Motorsports to come up with better safety concepts to decrease speeds, increase competition and, ultimately, save lives. It's a sad statement about the sanctioning body that John Force Racing has more money invested in safety than their own sport does.
There's a lot to be learned about Scott Kalitta's death still, but fortunately, this time, the National Hot Rod Association is looking into ways to make the sport safer. Too bad the message wasn't clearer when Darrell Russell died at Gateway or when Eric Medlen was killed at Gainesville or when legend John Force nearly died at Dallas. But, still, at least the NHRA sanctioning body is looking into doing something this time around. Delayed action is better than no action.
A lot of work is still ahead for those investigating what went wrong. Not all the heat can be thrown on NHRA for this, the tracks also need to do their part. In a few weeks, the Full Throttle Series heads into Seattle, and the drivers are not going to be happy campers when they walk down to the top-end of the Pacific Raceways drag strip. In fact, in all honesty, I can't wait to hear what Tony Pedregon has to say. Pedregon has taken the lead, ever since the moments after Kalitta's tragic death, in vocally criticizing NHRA and NHRA-sanctioned tracks for not doing enough to make the sport safer. He blasted Englishtown for their track not having a long enough shutdown area.
While there is always the chance someone will die in a drag racing accident, it's best that the chance be reduced as much as possible. After all, racing on racetracks is always going to be safer than racing on the streets. Tragedy is never good, but it's better to learn from it and prevent it from happening again than it is to do nothing. The more steps we take towards safety, the more lives will be saved.
When I see tragedies like this in drag racing, I am always reminded of what happens when we take out the barriers, the gravel pits and the control all together and put these races on the streets. For me, personally, I will always be reminded of the illegal street racing crash that claimed the lives of eight people congregating on Maryland State Highway 210 in Accokeek. While there is room for improvement, the safety record on the track sure as hell beats the death toll of illegal drag racing on the streets.
For RacingForTheWin.com, I'm Andy Marquis reporting.
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written by Tim Zaegel, July 03, 2008
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