In as much as I hate to admit it.....I have been talking with some of my old buddies around the NASCAR scene and something is rotten in Denmark about the Earnhardt thing. We all know now that the combination of a purported incorrect installation of the belts system and the fact that a full face helmet would have helped as well.

People just aren't giving consistent answers if answers at all. I can't quite pin point it......and the Orlando paper is wanting the pics and reports on Dale's autopsy because they smell a rat too. They (the paper) is claiming that the statements made by NASCAR officials are inconsistent with several of the released findings. They also said that they would not publish the pics....but if they get them others will follow that will.

I am starting to get suspicious, too. What I know for sure is that the Simpson belt did not fail due to pulling forces or just equipment failure, but failed due to "cutting rupture". Along with other information that I have gleaned just milling around the few good men that I know....and I am getting the tales that the belt was indeed cut due to misapplication and the wrong installation angle. All of the teams have been somewhat briefed on the problem.....but all of the information is not completely out yet. I am afraid that I can't say anymore, it would be complete conjecture and heresay on my part to do such.....and with such an emotionally charged subject.....I would not want to start something or gossip!

But I will tell you the facts, Dale preferred to be a full 2 inches down in the car than other drivers and the steering wheel was the closest to him than any other driver (I don't know the compable distances). Have you ever looked at him in his car....he looked like he was 4 feet tall and slightly laid back driving this thing. And the incar cameras always shown him real close to the steering wheel. Mark Martin is second in my book on this close to the steering wheel thing...but he is a very small man. I have personally seen Dale in the car and he was always real close to the wheel and low. This worries me about the mounting angle of the Simpson hardware and the belt exit through the seat. This is the place that I will theorize that the belt got cut.

I am of the opinion that NASCAR would hide anything done that was supposed to be a rule/specification of theirs and they looked the other way and make up a real fuzzy story about this tragedy! And I know if Dale argued with them about something like he preferred his seating position to be a certain way, they probably would look past a minor infraction to let him have his way.

Anyway.....anybody else know or heard anything? I am extremely interested in this.......I have friends that are still out there competing.....sure hate to see anything happen to anyone else!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!God forbid!!!!!!

Steve Jack


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SOUTHEASTERN GOODGUYS REP

I know very little about the inner workings of Nascars and stock car racing in general.
I watch it and follow it and thats my extent.
However the atitude that I get from Nascar is disturbing.
Why would they not be standing front and center and saying "hey we've got to get to the bottom of this and find out what happened and make damn sure it doesn't happen again".
They seem to be hiding behind a corporate front.
Whats the deal?
Last Sunday when Darrell Waltrip was grilling Mike Shelton on the prerace show why was Shelton so evasive?
Lawsuits? Image? Corporate sponserships?
I don't understand it for one.
Are the drivers afraid to speak up?
I don't have any answers but I''d sure like to hear a few instead of the same old song and dance.
My 2 cents worth if that.



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Jeff Reid

Let the Man rest in peace and take your suspicions elsewhere!
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1937 Chevrolet 2 door master deluxe sedan
1947 Cadillac 4 door series 62 sedan
1941 Chevrolet special deluxe 4 door sedan for sale

If you ask me, I truely do believe that the man died with a smile on his face. He was doing what he loved to do, and living his dream. He lived to race. It is what he was. The man had nothing to prove, we all knew that he was and still is the best. I was always told that the things that you love are the things that'll kill ya. If I were in his shoes, I would love to go out like he did, living life to its fullest and loving every second of it.
-RedMan

AKLB.....in-so-far as letting the man rest in peace....I am all for that 150%. But, the issue hear is that having participated in the NASCAR realm......and having friends still out there on the track (both drivers and crew), don't you think it is wise to get to the bottom of the issue that actually killed the poor guy. We learn from our mistakes...let's not make another one.

I do believe that he went out on top and doing what he wanted and all that.....however, I for one will not stand still for the usual NASCAR marketing and spin BS. And if you don't think that that doesn't apply here....well son, you need to get an education in the real world of NASCAR and who runs it and how dynamically political this organization is and how they will spin things to their advantage whether it's the truth or not.

You can stick you head in the sand if you want to, but regardless of what NASCAR says, it doesn't always do the right thing and moreover I could sit here and suggest at least a dozen safety related improvements to the car or procedures for the safety of drivers, crew and spectators that NASCAR WON'T EVEN CONSIDER, just because they just say so. Believe me, they are still the good ole boys of yesteryear!

This isn't about criticising Dale E either, if the record shows that it was his own fault. I am only suspicious of the information that will come out, because I KNOW WHAT HAPPENED and it doesn't jive with the junk that NASCAR is spewing.

My main motivation for this is to help prevent this from happening again.....period!!!
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SOUTHEASTERN GOODGUYS REP

Folks,
I gotta put in my two cents here.
I'm not much of a NASCAR fan. In fact, I don't know or care all that much about it. I'm MUCH more into NHRA.
Be that as it may, I'm saddened by the death of a competitor of the calibre of Dale. I am all for the safety measures that are invoked to protect the driver, the crew, the fan.
If there IS something amiss or fishy then I want to know about it too.
In the NHRA it's NEVER an issue finding out what happened to one of our folks. If the NASCAR people are hiding something, covering their collective asses, whatever, then a pox upon them.
Jim
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Time is natures way of keeping everything from happening at once.

I'm with you on this one, Steve. "The safest race cars in the world" have killed 4 drivers in less than a year, yet the mere suggestion that the safety of the cars might be improved has been met with indignation. Considering how forward-thinking the major open wheel series have gotten on safety I find their attitude disturbing. As a fan of NASCAR for almost 30 years, before I could even drive, that bothers me a lot.

I know that some think that focusing on safety right now is somehow disrespectful of Earnhardt. I respect those opinions but don't really understand them. In the '70's about 7% of the drivers in each of the major racing series ended up dead every year. If people had turned their backs on safety then in "respect" for the dead we'd still be experiencing that tragic level of deaths. Thank God there were people dedicated to advancing the safety of the sport back then. In my mind the best way to honor the memory of those who have died doing what they love is to try to keep others from dying in the same way.

I think the BIG problem is that the cars are designed to be solid, as in 'hit the wall and pound it out and get in some more laps'...

Indy cars had problems with drivers hitting the walls in the '50's, from what I've read. The old roadsters would bounce off the walls (sound familiar??!!) with minimal damage and the drivers would be injured badly or killed, yet the car could continue the race with little work...

NASCAR needs to look at the safety improvements that CART and IRL have with the open wheel cars, and apply these BASIC principles to their teams under them. If not, the teams should have the good sense to BOYCOTT Nascar until the safety terms are agreed upon.

It's not worth anyone else getting killed for ANY sponsor to hawk their wares on national TV.

Fact one. A car that breaks up into smithereens in a crash, or in lesser cases DEFORMS with crush zones AIDS the driver escaping severe injury or death by slowing his body down more gradually than if it's built like a tank (or in this case, the current NASCAR cage design/layout). A disintegrating car carries it's kinetic energy AWAY from the driver's body by shedding parts and getting the driver/safety cage to weigh less while doing so.

Fact two. It's not the crash into the wall that kills, it's the secondary collisions that cause deadly injury. By secondary I mean the driver's own body weight slamming against the belts (kinetic energy equals the driver's weight times the SQUARE of the speed) and also the driver's own organs being slammed into structures such as the skull and ribcage.

ANYTHING that can be done to take kinetic energy away from the driver/safety cage package should be done... no, MUST be done to prevent more needless deaths. These superspeedway cars above all others should be built similar to CART/IRL safety rules, ie.- a 'safety cage' surrounding the driver's seat/steering/pedal box area, and the rest of the chassis built to allow crumple zones or shear points in the chassis in case of accident.

How about implementing a cage/central chassis structure to protect the driver (any team's most valuable and irreplaceable asset) with front and rear subframes that bolt onto the central assembly and are designed to shear away in case of impact? Would not take too much extra effort to allow for this in building up the rolling chassis assembly when a new car is fabricated.

Nobody gives a damn about the sponsor's TV coverage when a driver dies in an otherwise complete car. Until they are designed to crash and absorb impact energy, more drivers will die, that's a fact. If NASCAR chooses to cover up what's happened or turn the other cheek when drivers want safer cars, it's up to the teams as a collective whole to tell NASCAR to 'kiss my a$$, we ain't racing these cars ANYMORE until we KNOW they will give (my) driver the best chance to walk away from a killer crash'...

Think you're right on target, Doc. How many times has Carps lectured that an old car can make mincemeat of a new car in an accident, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the occupants of the old car are safer? Some feel that the tendency of open wheel cars to shed parts in an accident endangers the spectators and drivers of other cars, and there's a certain amount of truth in that. A stock car could have crush zones included without shedding parts because you're working in a much larger, enclosed body envelope. I'm not real familiar with NASCAR Featherlite Modifieds, but I've heard that they had a rash of driver deaths in front-end crashes about ten years ago. They solved the problem by using curved frame ends at the front which cause the frame rails to bend in a frontal crash.

Hey there Doc,

You editorial comments are exactly what I have posted at several sites. You have hit the nail on the head. The frames and cages do not have any crush space or REAL design for such and are so rigid that you literally puree the driver (or parts thereof) when it hits an obsticle.

The open wheel circuit has done so much more in crush and break-away design that they are more safe (hard to believe) for drivers these days (even though the debris that flies off these cars is lethal to anyone nearby.....as we found out at the Austrailian GP). These cars use carbon fiber technology thoughout the intregrated design of the car. It's time NASCAR get off it's keaster and do some of the same. This takes away weight and mass....has elasticity 50 times that of steel..... It will been without breaking and absorb energy at a fantastic rate. This also would lighten the car up so as to allow smaller engines or carbs for less power. This would enhance driver safety in the cases where cars plummet into cars! Still being in the ring of safety made from carbon fiber, yet having to deal with less energy and mass. Sounds good to me.

But all this sounds great....but I doubt that the good NASCAR people will take heed and do anything about it. They think that their product is too popular to go and start changing the very thing that got them their, and are too lazy to attempt it.

Drivers, crew and team owners can only do so much and demand so much. This is NASCAR's product and they are just a by-product of the company. Many of the newer drivers are afraid to speak up. They can make their own adjustments by implimenting safety gear etc, but the ultimate responsibility lays in the hands of NASCAR.

Steve Jack
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SOUTHEASTERN GOODGUYS REP

I don't know if this is the time that something is finally get changed, but it could be. Some of the drivers, including Terry Labonte are getting more vocal and Larry Mac and Darrell Waltrip at Fox are demonstrating that they aren't willing to be muzzled by NASCAR control.

What puzzles me is the reaction of some fans. Steve, I sent you the URL for the fan board I most frequent. The group there is deeply divided over the need to talk about safety. Some want to talk about this and feel that too many lives lost in a short time show the need for change. Others seem to feel that talking about the need for changes in the cars is somehow disrespectful to Earnhardt. That's the part I don't get. It seems to me that the highest honor would be to say that the sport is no longer willing to tolerate losses like this without making changes to prevent the same thing from happening again.

Finally, the board that I'm speaking of includes the mother-in-law of a Winston Cup driver as a regular contributor. She's a lifer in the racing world and brings a lot of good knowledge about the workings of the organization. She's not said a lot on the safety issue, probably for political reasons, but occasionally pipes up to indicate that there's stuff going on here that the public isn't being allowed to know. She will say that a lot of people in the garage are very upset the unwillingness to make changes for safety but are afraid to take a stand for fear of bringing down NASCAR's wrath.

HOTRODSRJ
The only thing I see wrong with your picture logic, is the fact that Dales own family don't want them published.
Why would they want to hide pictures that would show that Dale was killed because of faulty safety equipment, or improper installation?
Bob H.

Well,I woundn't want just anyone to come along and do what they are proposing to do..so I don't blame her in that way. I think the settlement is a good compromise and keeps the others out, however I think someone, before it's all over with, unfortunately will get them....it's the law and you or I could not keep our own autopsy private in that state. I predict that the Enquirer or one of those would do it.....and do it under the pretense that they too want to investigate. I have already heard rumors to that move, but I don't know who is involved.

I do believe that NASCAR is too close to the Earnhardt family to just trust the word of the family. I think Theresa would tow the line for NASCAR esp with a step son still involved up to his eyeballs.

The talk in the garage is that Dale killed himself and let it go. We will see what the rest of the year brings, but it's simply stupid not to improve the tracks, cars and rules no matter what the cost is....they can afford it.

Steve Jack
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SOUTHEASTERN GOODGUYS REP