Dan Wheldon

[markfarrell9572]

Tonight motor racing lost a truly great driver and ambassador.  I just wat to say RIP Dan and thank you for years of great racing.

[Dare]

This one really got to me.Wheldon was one of my favorite Indy
drivers.This isn't supposed to happen anymore

http://www.indycar.com/news/show/55-izod-indycar-series/50911-wheldon-dies-from-crash-injuries/

[Canada Darrell™]

That was ugly, I'm speechless.

[Ian]

Sad sad happening, saw it on tv this morning, not a nice thing to wake up to.

[John S]

You gave your life doing what you loved to do, we'll remember your exciting racing and fantastic wins, R.I.P. Dan. 

[stealthhaggis]

Horrible crash, no chance, poor lad. RIP and thoughts are with his family.

[Wizzo]

I only saw this on the news this morning - very sad news indeed. This is a sharp wake up call to how dangerous all motorsport really is, despite recent improvements in safety.

RIP Dan Wheldon

[Dare]

High speeds and concrete walls with no runoff areas,maybe
it's time for IRL to do race on road courses only

[cosworth151]

I was watching the race. About two hours after the crash, they held a drivers only meeting. The looks on the faces of the drivers as they left the meeting told it all.

It wasn't the concrete walls. They were covered with the SAFER barriers. It was the chain link catch fences above the walls that did the damage. The top of Dan's car hit the fence and skidded along it.

I think they need to take a long look at the why the race was set up. Many of the drivers hadn't driven IndyCars in quite some time. Putting 34 cars with less than up-to-date drivers on a 1 1/2 mile "flat out, no lift" oval wasn't the wisest idea.

Dare is right. This isn't supposed to happen any more. But it does. And it always will. No amount of regulation or safety equipment can totally change that.

The good thing is that it is such a rare occurrence today. Those of us who grew up in the 50's and 60's remember when it was commonplace. Eddie Sachs. Fireball Roberts. Lorenzo Bandini. Tony Bettenhausen. Joe Weatherly. Wolfgang von Tripps. Jimmy Clark. So many, many others. It sometimes seemed that we couldn't go a week without loosing another driver. When we talk about "the good old days" of racing, we conveniently forget that part.

R.I.P., Dan. Thanks for everything.

[romephius]

I was told about a massive crash tonight when I got home from work by a 17 year old housemate.... she said it was cool.... I immediately told her off for saying such a thing. Now having seen the footage... I'm left feeling sickened and tearful, seeing a young driver lose his life. To think people are so calous about such things. 

My deepest sympathies and condolences to his family, friends, fans and all who enjoy incident free racing.  Yet another driver to be listed in the history books as a legend.... for the most tragic of reasons.

Rest in peace Mr Wheldon. 

[Ian]

Rom, I don't know if 'cool' in Aussie is the same with the younger generation as it seems to be in the UK. A lttle while ago when John Surtees's son got killed by that loose wheel, I was reading about it on here when Kyle(my son, almost 14)who was reading it too said 'cool', I said to him "What's bloody good about that," he said he just meant 'okay'.

[stealthhaggis]

High speeds and concrete walls with no runoff areas,maybe
it's time for IRL to do race on road courses only

It needs to be looked at, it is ridiculous that this is the best solution to these types of tracks, if they want to race their they must come up with a better solution than a concrete wall and a fence.

[markfarrell9572]

[Canada Darrell™]

Like Cos has said, the concrete walls at ovals these days are lined with SAFER barriers which are bloody good doing what they were designed to do. At any event that requires fans to be protected, including F1 road courses, it's the fence that can be the dangerous part.

Other than governing the speed down to the point where most fans wouldn't bother watching I can't think of another way to keep the cars on the track area in the event of a major crash such as we witnessed yesterday. At these speeds people will die..eventually..regardless of whatever safety policies are implemented.

[stealthhaggis]

I know they have the safety wall and people would still watch if speeds were slower Just off the top of my head, they could raise the height of the wall, move the walls back, increase the size of track the cars can race on, make an area around the track which can act as a run off. But I'm sure they would say it would cost too much and put spectators too far away etc etc, rather a guy died every 4.25 years blah blah. Seriously, it's time American open wheel racing got serious about safety. Need I mention the grass that is still at these circuits, I mean come on for goodness sake, grass?! IndyCar, it's time you got into the modern era and acted like a grown up, look at F1 and learn!