Let’s acknowledge that Attitude Apparel’s CompetitionPlus.com is largely devoted to the professional categories of drag racing.  Let me also acknowledge that my primary areas of interest are those same pro classes and participants.  That does not mean, however, that I don’t have the utmost respect for sportsman racers, because by and large, it’s considerably more difficult to win in some of the sportsman classes than it may be in the pros.  As much as this might surprise some people, I actually know a bunch of sportsman racers, and they’ve been flooding my inbox with emails, and overloading my message machine with rants about what’s going on in their classes.

Making it as a sportsman racer is an iffy proposition.  The costs of competing are depressingly high when measured against the potential rewards, and 12 hours after you’ve run the quickest elapsed time ever in your class you’re going to find out that three other guys already ran quicker.  Your odds against obtaining a truly meaningful sponsor – one that’ll cover all your costs – are astronomically high.  So all in all, if you’re going to be a sportsman racer it’s going to have to be because you love it.  You love the work, the travel, the hassles, the cancelled qualifying sessions, the after midnight Sunday eliminations, the time away from the family, the lost jobs because you just had to be at that points meet at the other end of your division or the bracket race 700 miles south – all of it.  Because at the end of the day you get to climb into the car and try to prove you’re better than the other guy.

Let’s acknowledge that Attitude Apparel’s CompetitionPlus.com is largely devoted to the professional categories of drag racing.  Let me also acknowledge that my primary areas of interest are those same pro classes and participants.  That does not mean, however, that I don’t have the utmost respect for sportsman racers, because by and large, it’s considerably more difficult to win in some of the sportsman classes than it may be in the pros.  As much as this might surprise some people, I actually know a bunch of sportsman racers, and they’ve been flooding my inbox with emails, and overloading my message machine with rants about what’s going on in their classes.

Making it as a sportsman racer is an iffy proposition.  The costs of competing are depressingly high when measured against the potential rewards, and 12 hours after you’ve run the quickest elapsed time ever in your class you’re going to find out that three other guys already ran quicker.  Your odds against obtaining a truly meaningful sponsor – one that’ll cover all your costs – are astronomically high.  So all in all, if you’re going to be a sportsman racer it’s going to have to be because you love it.  You love the work, the travel, the hassles, the cancelled qualifying sessions, the after midnight Sunday eliminations, the time away from the family, the lost jobs because you just had to be at that points meet at the other end of your division or the bracket race 700 miles south – all of it.  Because at the end of the day you get to climb into the car and try to prove you’re better than the other guy. 

So why the hell would you do something so obviously stupid and dangerous that you’re not only risking yourself, but the person in the other lane and maybe even the spectators?

Let me ask this another way:  Is winning worth your life?

It’s more than a little ironic that the scenarios I’ll describe are nothing new, they’ve been going on for years.  Further, the racers who do these things know instinctively that they’re wrong in every sense of the word, yet they continue doing them.  Part of it is the racer mentality of invincibility and part of it’s the result of laziness.  Still another part of it is the always meaningless excuse that a piece of safety gear was just too expensive (but the same car owner never hesitates to buy the latest, unproven Gizmo just because he thinks it might make his car quicker).  And part of it’s actually the fault of both the alphabetized sanctioning bodies and the non-national event facilities, because they allow these things to go on without apparently even trying to stop them.

Where to start? 

Call them Super Comp, Super Pro or anything else you want, but by and large we’re talking about dragsters with automatic transmissions and carbureted engines.  There are an increasing number of drivers of these cars who either come to the starting line with their shoulder belts incredibly loose, or actually undo them after they leave the line.  They’ll then lean forward, with their heads in front of and sometimes even slightly above the front bar of the roll cage so that they can see where their opponent is. This reportedly enables them to judge their own shut-off point better, or it helps them run the other guy out by faking him into thinking they’re going to run further under power then they actually are.

The guys who do this stuff are not only breaking the written rules, they’re taking incredible risks with themselves and others.  If, as they’re looking the other way, something goes wrong with their own car the odds against them catching it are tremendously increased by their not being fully strapped tightly in.  If the car does impact the wall or, worse yet, the car in the other lane, those loosened belts could result in serious injury and – don’t laugh – the driver could also be ejected from the car.  At that point the best remedy is a sponge – to pick up the remains.

If you don’t think you could be tossed out of a dragster’s cockpit, think again.  The human body bends in marvelous ways, so it can certainly happen – and you can count up your broken bones later – if you’re still with us.

This is no exaggeration:  House organ newspapers have actually published photos of these clowns with their heads in front of the cage, and the Internet has been rife with further examples of their insanity.  Change that to stupidity.

Making the problem even worse is the youngest racers are picking up these incredibly dangerous habits.  A prominent track owner told us of an 11-year-old Jr. Dragster driver loosening his belts before the car left the line so he could look backward at the other car.  He lost control at about 80 MPH, crossed the centerline, barely missed the other car and almost hit the wall.  How does an 11-year-old learn to drive this way?  It had to be from an adult who put the prospect of winning before the safety of the child and the other kids racing.

That’s not all, not by a longshot.  Five years ago I watched the Super Comp winner at the U.S. Nationals climb out at the top end with a big smile on his face – and no socks on his feet, which were cloaked in canvas tennis shoes.  The NHRA guys charged with the responsibility for checking out the drivers before they moved up to the burnout box had clearly missed this guy, but when I started checking backwards I found out that the winner was far from the only driver who wasn’t wearing all the mandated gear.  There’d apparently been numerous others, none of whom had been stopped from running despite what they were or were not wearing.  And the racers themselves told me this, admitting that their own actions had been against the rules.

After the race I wrote a letter to a senior NHRA official, who responded verbally by saying they’d look into it.  If the more recent actions of NHRA Super Comp racers doesn’t convince you that absolutely nothing was done, I don’t know what will.

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I’ve watched more than a dozen drivers completely remove their helmets and start strapping them to their roll cages – before their cars ever made the turn-off.   I’ve seen at least a hundred do it while speeding down the return road at between 60 and 80 mph.  Gainesville is a great track at which to catch this act,  Man, it’s just s-o-o-o-o-o-o-o cool to be pulling off your helmet like that.  Demonstrates how truly super-duper you are because, after all, the way and when you strap that useless brain bucket to the cage is, well, everything.  Cool is far more important than safe – if you’re an unprintable reference to a human body part.

Just so we’re clear on this helmet and harness thing, numerous in-car TV shots from the Pro Stock ranks have shown the drivers unbuckling and removing their helmets before the turnoff, so this isn’t solely a sportsman racing issue.

No socks?  No problem.  I’ve had calls from almost a dozen serious bracket racers – and track operators -- who describe events in which they’ve seen drivers racing while wearing a cheap, single-layer, often unlabeled “fire” jacket, short pants and sneakers.  It happens all the time, and whenever one of these brainless blunders is approached about it, they shine it one with comments like, “These cars are too slow to be a problem,” or, “I’ve never crashed,” or something equally inane.  These are the individuals who apparently don’t believe that gasoline burns.  Who lets someone drive a dragster in short pants?  Answer: someone as dumb as the driver who wants to.

Track operators and sanctioning bodies, what the hell are you thinking?  Have you had no experience with liability suits?  Don’t you know how these things work?  Even I do, and I’m not a lawyer or legal expert.  Years ago a Comp racer sued NHRA after he drove without fire pants and got badly burned when his engine blew.  In all honesty I can’t remember how that one came out, but you can bet your butt NHRA spent a ton trying to defend themselves from something that was clearly, obviously and completely the racer’s own fault.  I know of at least two other cases that were somewhat similar that NHRA lost, and when they lose these kinds of actions it does no one any good.  NHRA’s liability insurance premiums go up, and if they go up high enough there’s spillover that could ultimately result in, yes, higher ticket prices or entry fees. 

Just so you know, in the cases NHRA lost there was little question of who was in the wrong, but regardless of that the jury found against the sanctioning body on the grounds that, despite their being technically innocent, they should have somehow stopped the people from doing things that ultimately harmed themselves.  I know, it makes no sense, but that’s how court cases can go.

You, Mr. Small Town Track Owner, could face the same kind of action.  If you don’t do everything in your power to protect people from themselves you could end up paying a high price for your lack of attention, never mind their lack of attention.  If one of your pantsless idiots ends up burned from his ankles to his – oh, man, I don’t even want to think about that – you could be blamed.  No jury of lay people is going to believe it’s all right for someone to drive a race car without readily available safety gear.  And if your track, unsanctioned though it may be, doesn’t have specific rules regarding safety gear, you’re likely to be that much more liable. 

Make it easy on yourself, and either say goodbye to all your stuff, or start paying attention to more than how many cars came through the gate tonight.  Get with a few of your more intelligent regulars – you know, the guys who actually wear  firesuits and helmets and keep them on until they’ve made the turnoff at the top end – and write some simplistic rules that outline what’s required in safety gear.  Then add the all-important part about keeping your belts tight throughout the run, no leaning forward, none of that stupidity.  Then go further.  Call some of your fellow track operators and try to get them to work with you, so that if you suspend someone for a safety violation the suspension will include more than just your place.  Sit that racer down long enough and effectively enough so that he figures out that he either races safely or not at all.

Don’t think track operators aren’t paying attention to what’s going on at their facilities.  There are track operator’s meetings slated for this summer, and my sources tell me that at more than one of them it’s going to be suggested that the tracks start enforcing common sense safety rules.  Racers caught loosening their belts, removing their helmets early, trying to climb in without the proper wearing apparel or anything else along those lines could face suspensions.  The suspensions will “travel,” too.  In other words, a safety rules violation suspension could be Division-wide and possibly even area wide if the sanctioned tracks can work out the details with those facilities that operate on their own.

Every motorsports sanctioning body rulebook has been written in the blood of those who paid the ultimate price.  Clutch cans improved after Mike Sorokin died in The Surfers car.  Firesuits got better after Gas Ronda’s horrendous fire in his Mustang Funny Car at the old Beeline track.  Roll cages got more effective bracing after Darrell Russell’s death.  Tracks themselves were physically altered after Scott Kalitta’s passing.  If the tracks and sanctioning bodies don’t start falling on the jerks who do the idiotic things outlined here like the proverbial ton of bricks, they’re liable to be forced into making major changes by a tragedy – one that could easily be avoided.

I don’t know about you, but I have no interest in ever reading a newspaper story like this:

Four Dead, 12 Injured In Drag Strip Accident

ANYWHERE, U.S. 8/1/10  One race car driver and three spectators were fatally injured last night at Podunk Hollow Dragway after the driver of one car lost control, crossed the racing surface and crashed into his opponent. The wreckage from both cars then vaulted the Armco retaining barrier, striking and killing three fans, including a 4-year-old attending her first race with her mother, who also died at the scene.  None of the names of the deceased have been released pending notification of family members.

In addition to the dead a dozen others, including spectators and participants, were injured by the flying wreckage.  Two were treated on the scene and released, but the other 10 remain in area hospitals.  Five of those are reported to be in serious condition.

The driver of the second car, whose name has also been withheld by the authorities, remains hospitalized in grave condition at Podunk Memorial after suffering third degree burns over his lower extremities. In addition to the burns the driver suffered two broken arms, a shattered pelvis and various internal injuries.

Medical personnel who assisted in removing him from the car reported that he appeared to have been racing in short pants, and was not wearing socks. 

“We haven’t completed our investigation yet,” acknowledged Dunham County Sheriff Paul Johnston, “but it appears that the driver who survived was not wearing the mandated safety equipment when the accident took place.”

Witnesses on the scene said the driver of the car which initiated the accident appeared to have taken off his safety harnesses, as he was sitting so far forward in the car that much of his upper body was exposed when the crash occurred.  “It looked to me like he didn’t have complete control of the car,” said another witness, who requested anonymity.  “It all happened so fast, but it looked to me like, when the car started moving around, he couldn’t get a good grip on the steering wheel to keep it in his lane.”

Racing was halted after the accident, and did not continue.  Track owner Elwood P. Suggs immediately left the race track grounds following the accident, and calls to both his residence and local attorney have not been returned.

Decades ago Bell Automotive ran a series of terrifically pointed magazine ads that were spot-on.  “If you’ve got a $10 head, buy a $10 helmet.”  Racers actually responded to that one.  So why, when they’re dirt cheap in comparison to the financial loss of being hospitalized and maybe even permanently injured, would anyone forego a full firesuit in favor of short pants?  Why would anyone undo their harnesses so they could see the car in the other lane, when doing so could result in death or dismemberment?  Why would anyone remove their helmet when their car – with them sitting pretty much out in the open – is still going maybe 100 miles an hour?

I know the answer.

Because they’re an unprintable human body part – the one that each and every one of us has.