quote:

Originally posted by Big Steve:

quote:

Originally posted by Richard Hammond:

quote:

Originally posted by Bucky:

quote:

Originally posted by Big Steve:
Wow sounds like Ryan Herem is in for a long recovery process and I wish him the very best

What is amazing to me is the extent of his injuries compared to what Ryan Newman received in his Daytona 500 crash. Newman had no broken bones, no internal injuries just a head injury that sounds like a very severe concussion and walked out of the hospital is 2 days after hitting the wall head on at 185 MPH then getting hit in the drivers side roll cage by another car.

That's a fair point.

That's an apples to watermelons comparison. Cup cars are 10 times safer than any drag car around period. NASCAR has a special R&D center just to test and inspect every aspect of the cars running today. They also have crash boxes on every car.

It was never my intent to compare the safety of a 50K S/G car to a Nascar cup car, your right there is no comparison,cup cars crash all the time so they are designed to crash and millions have been spent to protect the driver, where a sportsman drag car rarely crashes but when they do they do a pretty good job "most" of the time protecting the driver IMO. I was just noting the difference in the injuries which is amazing and proves the safety difference.

I get what you are saying. But the sad part is that 50k race car is capable of pretty much the same speeds as a cup car. And most of the cars have the absolute worse seats in racing.I've seen more than one racer that has crashed ending up broken backs,pelvis and other body injuries. That really shouldn't be happening with today's race car technology.

You guys DO realize there are no convertible Cup cars right??

Just because NHRA wants to grow up to be Nascar someday doesn't mean the racecars have anything to due with each other for Christ's sake

You fuc'ers would argue over a broken branch off a pine tree....

quote:

Originally posted by imakehp:
You guys DO realize there are no convertible Cup cars right??

Just because NHRA wants to grow up to be Nascar someday doesn't mean the racecars have anything to due with each other for Christ's sake

You fuc'ers would argue over a broken branch off a pine tree....

This is a discussion about the injury to a fellow racer. If it helps any other drag racer from getting injured it definitely helps. I’d love to see NHRA grow up to be NASCAR with their multi billion dollar tv contracts.

I agree with Dave, there is a world of difference between the construction level of a NASCAR Cup Series car and a drag race car, it's like comparing a Stealth Bomber to a Piper Cub.

Not to knock chassis builders but the application requirements are totally different.

Bob

ps: I frequently agree with Dave, he's bigger and a LOT meaner than me!

Richard is right about the seats, though. T/F, funny car and P/S have much better seats with much better protection. Some of our seats in the sportsman classes are nothing more than shells to sit in. Very little side protection.

I would think that better seats are the area where drag cars could improve the most. Look at the seats (including head rests) in a high-level stock car compared to a typical drag car.


That said, I bet those NASCAR seats cost as much as some people have in their whole bracket car.

quote:

Originally posted by SlyFox:
I would think that better seats are the area where drag cars could improve the most. Look at the seats (including head rests) in a high-level stock car compared to a typical drag car.


That said, I bet those NASCAR seats cost as much as some people have in their whole bracket car.

Last I heard the carbon fiber cup seat which are made at Hendrick motorsports cost 15k. But I'm not saying everyone has to have one of those seats. There are plenty of reasonably priced seats that are very safe. Compared to those crap carbon fiber shells or those garbage plastic seats.

At a minimum I would think a pour in seat would be a huge step up in safety for any race car. That and make sure your belts are installed correctly and pulled as tight as you can get them.

Dave is right, NASCAR verses Super Gas is like comparing apples to oranges. Minimum weight for a NASCAR car is 3,450, minimum weight for a Super Gas car is 2,100. Why don't we just focus on Ryan's full and speedy recovery.

quote:

Originally posted by Larry Scarth:
Dave is right, NASCAR verses Super Gas is like comparing apples to oranges. Minimum weight for a NASCAR car is 3,450, minimum weight for a Super Gas car is 2,100. Why don't we just focus on Ryan's full and speedy recovery.

If you think your race car is safe as it is that's fine. Maybe it is. But I'm sure there are other racers out there that will read these comments and make some needed changes for the better. So we don't have these threads popping up after a weekend at the track.

No drag racer is ever going to build a cup car for drag racing...EVER.....We make it a point to build them as light as possible...always have, always will....That's why NHRA has to make rules telling us how to do it as safe as possible....

quote:

Originally posted by imakehp:
No drag racer is ever going to build a cup car for drag racing...EVER.....We make it a point to build them as light as possible...always have, always will....That's why NHRA has to make rules telling us how to do it as safe as possible....

No one is saying you need to build a cup car. But maybe people should take some safety pointers from NASCAR. This is all about driver safety. The only rule NHRA has about seats is how they are mounted and even that is a weak rule. I get tired of seeing these threads about yet another drag racer is injured in a crash. When possibly it could have been avoided.

Wonder what the incident rate of injury for stock car racing is compared to that of drag racing. Those guys get hurt too and not just on the big stage.

Wishing Ryan a full recovery for sure, but whenever one of these instances happen I too am curious as to what the cause was. Was it a parts failure? I have seen many times something letting go during a run and not feeling the effects of it until the shutdown. I am sure we have all seen the effects of a tire being cut running over some small piece of debris on the track that struck the tire just right.

So while we continue to wish a full recovery to Ryan, it begs to question the cause so YES these instances may become less frequent. And YES making the drivers a little safer inside the car is part of that discussion.