This little rant is just intended to getting you thinking about safety in racing and how everyone from track manager to racer can do something about it. Talk about it, remember that life is precious and we are for the most part doing this for fun.

After seeing some video from the U.S. recently I felt it is time to comment on safety. I had intended to write something after Bob Griffith had his nasty crash on the West coast. It was a miracle that he walked away from the shattered wreck of his newly supercharged Camaro, but a lot had to do with equipment in the car and on Bob himself. In this video I just saw, we as a sport were lucky the racecar did not end up in the spectator area, it could have been catastrophic. Something like that could have been very bad for the sport of drag racing. Recently in the U.K a spectator got killed by something flying off a car as the chutes came out. This is a sure way to get bad press, never mind the implications to the poor spectator and his grieving family. It is every body’s responsibility to race safe, but just how do we do it?

How many times have you heard someone say “The track is crap! It is dangerous out there”, how often do you see them turn around and head back to their pit area? Almost never! Let me say this, the final responsibility absolutely rests with the racer. If you feel the track is not safe, don’t go down it, talk to the promoter or track manager, and let him know your concerns. Don’t worry about your buddies calling you out, it is your butt in the car, it is your investment and your life. Having said that I think it is high time tracks have some sort of SFI tag applied to them. We have these tags all over our racecars and safety equipment; I think it is time for tracks to be certified to run cars to a certain elapsed time and no further. The better the facilities, the faster the cutoff E.T. would be. The things to be considered in grading the facility should be number of E.M.T. present, the track surface, the retaining walls, the ability to get a major trauma victim to hospital in a timely fashion and similar criteria. Providing a safe environment for racing is the tracks responsibility but s#$! happens and it is up to the racer to take responsibility for his actions and not race if he feels it is not safe. Imagine what would happen if the whole field took action and did not race, the track would have to do something about the problem. The best way for improvement is dialogue, talk to the track and discuss any problems, things may change.

I have heard people laugh when they see some of my photos from Santa Pod where two guys in firesuits stand on the line with fire extinguishers. I’ll tell you what, I’d be glad of those two guys if I ever needed to be pulled out of a burning car. Another interesting thing in the U.K. was the track spotters were out for everything from Super Gas on, they realize a slow car can drop oil and the next guy can hit it. Maybe it is because the U.K. is more biased to road racing, where safety seems to be a higher priority. Having come from that arena I know the tech and safety regulations are far stiffer than drag racing seems to be. Maybe we can learn from other forms of motorsport. Has anyone talked about the safer barrier in drag racing? It seems to work in NASCAR. It sure is time for steel barriers to disappear from drag racing. They are a bit like a formula car, they work great on the first impact, but on the next one they just fall away, creating a launch pad. You have no control over a car launched by a barrier. Even concrete retaining walls control the car, stopping it from going further and deflecting it back into its own lane. The concrete wall should become the absolute minimum standard for all racetracks.

It seems to me that racers will put money into going faster before investing in greater safety. Patrick Budd had a great point in one of his RPM articles. “If you can, buy one piece of safety equipment you do not need every year”, good point Patrick, that one piece of equipment can be a Hans Device or fire system, something your class does not mandate. For those of you only having to wear a fire jacket, seriously think about getting the pants and gloves to go with it, think about what you are protecting. If you don’t think you need it, think about your family, think about picking up your little daughter and not being able to because of the severe injuries caused by a fire to your hands. You also have to be able to protect others as well as yourselves. How many of you have a fire extinguisher in your trailer or on your support vehicle. I recently saw a dragster have a nitrous explosion in the staging lanes and someone from the starting line had to run over and put it out as none of the support vehicles in the lanes had an extinguisher on board. Remember, next time it may be you needing the help, as the Boy Scouts say ‘Be Prepared”

Above all race safe!