[dfwgator]

Reminds me of the crash that killed Dale Earnhardt. By most standards the crash didn’t look all that bad, in that you didn’t see the car tear apart. But that was precisely the problem, all of that force went to Earhardt’s body.

[HamiltonJay]

Well the problem was his harness failed.. you can’t smack your body into something moving at 100MPH+ and live.

[Tarpon]

Yep, you are quite right. The crash head-on into the wall, not survivable — Unless you were extremely lucky. Most drivers know that, and most speedways make a major effort to minimize head-on impacts into barriers. A glancing impact is far more likely to be survivable, no matter what the car.

Not many know what happens in a crash, which is why I wrote my short missive. As an engineer, it is an outright insult the crap that is pushed by the media that is provable not true.

I recently had a blowout, at 70 mph, if it were not for my racing years, we may not have survived -- steady as she goes, no sudden brake application, no steering input. Brake only after the speed was way down. The car had all the stability gadgets, but it was really hairy for a few seconds. The wife was petrified ... head to toe. I immediately went to the tire store and bought new top tier tires all around.

If you haven't seen it, Top Gear did some crash testing of these little suicide clown cars and make the same points. Watch until the bitter end.