Motorsport: Safe, Yet Potentially Deadly

This piece is written in the wake of a fatal accident that cost a young Indonesian rider Afridza Munandar's life at the Asia Talent Cup race in Sepang Circuit, Malaysia last weekend (in conjunction with the MotoGP Malaysian Grand Prix). Before that, on August, French F2 driver Anthoine Hubert succumbed to his injuries sustained as the result of a crash at Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium, at the Eau Rouge-Raidillon section of the track. This marked the first on-track fatality since Ayrton Senna's fatal wreck at Imola back in 1994. As for two-wheeled racing, the last fatal crash that happened across a weekend was Luis Salom's high-speed slam into turn 12 at Catalunya Circuit in Barcelona, during the Moto2 second free practice back in 2016. But when it comes to fatal crash during a race itself, we have to mention a three-bike pile-up between Marco Simoncelli, Colin Edwards and Valentino Rossi at Malaysia in 2011. The force of the crash even dislodged Simoncelli's helmet off. He was later pronounced dead because of the injuries sustained, and cancelling the race altogether. Although being a fan of motorsport (or auto racing as they would called it in the US), I have to admit, this is the most dangerous sport ever done by humankind. There are countless cases of on-track fatalities happened across the history of the sport, and usually ended with some sort of improvements and rule changes in regards of the safety of the drivers and riders.

Perhaps the most famous example of safety improvement after the death of a driver was the afromentioned Senna crash and Dale Earnhardt's fatal last lap wreck at turn 4 of the 2001 Daytona 500 race. Earnhardt succumbed to his spinal cord injury sustained at the crash. This ultimately made the use of Head and Neck Support Device (HANS) mandatory across all racing discipline governed by FIA (Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile) and NASCAR (National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing). Earnhardt himself refused to wear one, citing discomfort. Some races were forced to change venue after the death of a competitor, as evidenced by Daijiro Kato's high-speed impact at 130R bend of Suzuka Circuit that ultimately claimed his life. Since then, the MotoGP Japanese Grand Prix is held at Twin Ring Motegi. Firesuits was strengthen to withstand over 9000 degrees of soaring heat after the famous 1976 Nurburgring crash involving Niki Lauda, who went on to return to the F1 circuit at Monza exactly six weeks after the incident. And after a heavy crash at the same track as Kato's incident during the 2014 F1 Japanese Grand Prix that eventually costed Jules Bianchi his life, the halo (a single protective bar installed in front of the cockpit to protect the drivers from flying debris) was made mandatory by the FIA across all single-seater, open-wheeled racing discipline. And already this single bar demonstrated the capability of saving a driver from a potential fatal accident, like when Charles Leclerc almost squashed by Fernando Alonso, who was bumped by a brake-locked #27 Renault car of Nico Hulkenberg at Spa last year.

Big crashes always happen in every racing series. Formula E is a fairly new series, but already has two near fatal wrecks in the form of a tangle between Nick Heidfeld and Nico Prost during the final lap of the inaugural FE race at Beijing, China, and a horror shunt between Nelson Piquet Jr and Jean-Eric Vergne at Mexico City earlier this year. NASCAR also has its fair share of big wrecks, dubbed 'the Big One', usually occured on races at Talladega and Daytona. But probably the most well-remembered big (and horror) wreck happened at either of those tracks was the final lap of the 2014 Coke Zero 400 at Daytona, when Austin Dillon (#3 DOW Chevrolet SS of Richard Childress Racing) was punted in the rear bumper and subsequently flown across the field and landed in the trackside catchfencing on the outside of the tri-oval. Another instance was back in 2017 when Joey Logano lost control of his #22 AAA Insurance Team Penske Ford Fusion and hooked the #10 Stewart-Haas Ford of Danica Patrick in the process at Kansas with 67 laps remaining, which subsequently collected the speeding Aric Almirola, resulted in a violent crash between the #22 of Logano, #10 of Partick and the #43 machine of Almirola. While Logano and Patrick walked away unharmed, Almirola complained about his back and had to be extracted from the heavily wrecked #43 Smithfield Ford Fusion of Richard Petty Motorsports (RPM). He was awake and alert. In Formula 1 however, the biggest (and the messiest) recorded wreck was the start of the 1998 Belgian Grand Prix at Spa during an extreme downpour. The crashed claimed as many as thirteen cars, instigated by David Coulthard who lost control of his McLaren. Another instance of crahses in wet conditions happened at the start of the Singapore Grand Prix in 2017. Max Verstappen (#33 Red Bull Racing) squeezed in a sandwich by both Sebastian Vettel and Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari, sending both Verstappen and Raikkonen into the wall, with Fernando Alonso collected along the way. Vettel retired 3 corners later on the same lap.

While these crashes happened because of either outside factor or driver errors, some wrecks happened because of driver shenanigans. The NASCAR Chase For The Sprint Cup round for 2015 season was marred by a feud between Joe Gibbs Racing's Matt Kenseth (#20 Dollar General Toyota Camry) and Joey Logano. Before that, in 2013, he was also involved in another feud with another Joe Gibbs driver in the form of Denny Hamlin (#11 FedEx Toyota Camry), who ended the feud wrecked by Logano at Autoclub Speedway, injuring his legs in the process. The feud first started in Kansas when Logano spun Kenseth out from the win. He went on to score 3 wins in the first rounds of the Chase, until the Martinsville race came up. Kenseth was all over Logano during the course of the race, with him and Penske teammate Brad Keselowski (#2 Miller Lite Ford Fusion) swapping first and second place. Keselowski later tagged Kenseth at the exit of turn 2 with Kurt Busch (#41 Haas/Monster Chevrolet SS) as the collateral damage. The opportunity presented itself when Kenseth, limping around the track was about to be lapped by leader Logano, and at the entrance of turn 1, he hooked the right front bumper of his #20 Camry into the #22 Ford's left rear and drove them straight into the outside retaining wall much to the fans' delight. That crash would cost Logano a chance of winning the 2015 Sprint Cup in the later stages of the chase, which was ultimately won by Kenseth's teammate Kyle Busch (#18 M&M's Toyota Camry). Kenseth was later suspended for two races.

Two drivers in the heat of the battle (usually for the win/championship) can also cause a crash or a mistake that would lead into a crash. Lucas di Grassi (Team Abt Sportsline FE) was in desperate mode heading into the final race of season 2 of Formula E against Sebastien Buemi (Renault eDams). Held at Battersea Park, London, going into turn 3, Di Grassi hooked his front wing into Buemi's rear end, sending them into the wall. Buemi later clinched the championship by scoring the fastest lap of the race. In NASCAR, during a playoff elimination race last year at Charlotte (First year with Roval configuration), Martin Truex Jr (#78 Auto Insurance/Furniture Row Toyota Camry) and Jimmie Johnson (#48 Lowe's Chevrolet Camaro of Hendrick Motorsports) was battling tooth-and-nail coming into the final lap. The battle was even until the final chicane sequences of turns 15, 16, and 17. Johnson locked his wheels, spun out and collecting Truex in the process. Team Penske's Ryan Blaney (#12 Pennzoil/Menard's Ford Fusion) took the win as the result of the incident.

Let's face it, we attend races and watch those events on TV and various streaming services for exciting racing, great battles, nailbiting finishes and of course, the wrecks. Many fans will say that every race has to have at least one accident (don't take my word for granted, I was just paraphrasing Bernie Ecclestone's respond to Jeremy Clarkson's question during an episode of TV show Top Gear). We can't say for sure that motorsport is 100% safe, but with all these safety measures in place, these daredevils can at least breathe a sigh of relief knowing that the safety standards being implemented today is constantly improved. And I'll end this by stating my deepest condolences to Munandar and Hubert families. These young racers had big potential, but gone too soon.