BJR Racing
Well-Known Member
NHRA has announced that they will be racing to 1,000 feet for the next few events due to the loss of Scott Kalitta, as this came from (PRO) The fuel racers teams and crew members as stated on NHRA.COM.
If what I've read is true, not much would have saved Scott Kalitta as he was appparently unconscious when he went through the sand into the wall - longer shutdown area or otherwise.
Hard to agree that all of a sudden the tracks are questionable, the percentages of accidents of this type are pretty low. They've been at 330 for a while now. Seems like it might be a PR move, but the thought is probably correct - safety first.
Hopefully there won't be any more fatalities for a LONG time.
As Jim Head said that most tracks were built for 250 MPH tops with the room to stop the cars, but with the 330 MPH cars it's a detriment on brakes and chutes. Something had too happen, look I'm in favor of more speed but safety has to come into play, and until they can get the safety there I'm for saving lives!
I don't think racing to 1000 ft will save any engines. They will just wind them tighter quicker. The effect it will have is the top end speeds will be a little lower as they can only get going so fast so quick, it's physics. Something they might want to consider is taking all or some of the air systems out of the clutch. That would sure make it harder to get them going the speeds they are.
Wasn't there another incident with a T/A F/C this past weekend where a car went through the sandtrap and on into the field beyond and he managed to get it stopped before it hit a tree. The next day the tree was gone.
Jack
The solution, I believe, is just to modernise the places that the fast guys race.
This may seem a bit trivial in light of losing Scott Kalitta, but I am sure there is some team that will be effected:
Before this rule was in place weren't points awarded for setting a new National Record? Has NHRA said how this will be addressed...or just not going to recognize low ETs for the rest of the year? I know this is not a concern at Bandimere, but what about other tracks?