Don’t Work with the Southern Poverty Law Center

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Minimum wage facts and fantasies

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No, Separating The Cars Is Not Safer

This was initially published July 7, 2015, and has been periodically updated as of August 2018:

The Austin Dillon crash at the 2015 Firecracker 400 and the last-lap tumble at the MAV-TV California Indy 500 at Fontana a week earlier have renewed criticism of "pack racing" and "restrictor plate racing" and how the cars should not be as bunched up as they are. This criticism was renewed in 2017 after two-thirds of the field at the Rainguard Indy 600k at Texas crashed and Sebatstain Bourdais exploded in anger at "b******t racing...we can't race like this." The argument has always been "We have to separate the cars, because it's safer."

No, it isn't......

.....and Sebastian Bourdais' own crash proves him an idiot and hypocrite.


We've seen it at Atlanta on the old oval layout with the Steve Grissom crash tearing open the concrete, while the new layout hasn't lacked big crashes as seen in March 2015 and the most infamous one of all, when Carl Edwards turned into an assassin on Brad Keselowski, not only at Atlanta, but then in even more savage form at Gateway. The most celebrated Atlanta race of all - the 1992 Dixie 500 - also tore up a bunch of cars.

We've also seen it at Charlotte in this compilation of recent wrecks and also in these two wrecks from the 1994 All Star race and also the Ricky Craven melee in 1996 and also the even more vicious Ernie Irvan melee that same year. Charlotte melees never seemed to stop.

And the beginning at Texas Motor Speedway became infamous for its wrecks, lowlighted by October 2000's O'Reilly 400 for the Trucks that included Derrike Cope's enormous melee. Texas also saw the famous 2008 Michael McDowell tumble.

And it isn't limited to places like that, as Bristol is famous for crashes, as seen in this cheesy compilation,  in Mike Bliss's crash that sliced open the fencing on the frontstretch, and David Green's melee.  Bristol's history with big wrecks has been pretty long as evidenced by this 1998 disaster and the track's most celebrated finish.

Most people remember Austin Dillon plowing into the fencing at Daytona in July 2015 - forgotten is Ben Kennedy trying to slice out fencing at Kentucky a week later.  

Some have suggested running the Daytona road course instead of the oval - except it isn't a good idea. Heck, running road courses isn't a good idea as shown here and also with yet another self-important Ryan Newman soliloquy after 2014's melee.

Fans go gaga over the kind of road course melees they whine about on superspeedways - and with far lower incidence of passing than on superspeedways


NASCAR isn't the only one with this myopia about the dangers of pack racing versus non-pack racing. Indycar at Toronto for one sees melees that are really vicious with the Jeff Krosnoff melee the most infamous. The 1995 running saw a lot of nasty melees and RC Enerson recently saw a vicious melee there as well.

Toronto isn't the only such venue where bad crashes have happened - one of the worst was Dario Franchitti's career-ending melee. Franchitti also got into the air in a big way in Kentucky's non-pack race in 2007.

Serious driver injuries hit again in late August 2015 at Indycar's ABC Supply 500 at Pocono, a disaster that claimed the life of Justin Wilson in a crash he otherwise wasn't even involved in - the Sage Karam crash.

This cheesy compilation shows multiple bad Indycar wrecks, only one of which shown here can be called a "pack" crash.

The dark days of 2000-2001 saw the deaths of Adam Petty and Kenny Irwin (both at New Hampshire), Tony Roper, Dale Earnhardt Sr., and Blaise Alexander.   2002 was slightly better, except for a near-fatal crash for Sterling Marlin and a huge crash for Tony Stewart at Darlington.

And in April 2017 at Doington Park in England, F4 racer Billy Monger lost both legs in a savage crash.



By now I think the message is clear - There is zero correlation between size of wrecks and actual risk to drivers.

What these and other melees all showcase is this - the cars are separated as they ostensibly are not in "pack" races - yet the enormity of the crashes is not in the least reduced by being separated; if anything it has only given cars a running start before impact.   The reality is separating the cars is just dumbing down the racing.

That Will Power and Ryan Newman speak out against these races reflects poorly on them.   Racing needs to increase competition while improving safety; it should not dumb down a sport that has foolishly been dumbed down with inferior competition at too many venues.   NASCAR should let its drivers push-draft again to increase passing, while Indycar found the right formula at Fontana and needs to expand on it - 80 lead changes is a lot better than the 22 Daytona saw - a 22 that needs to be 44 and above.

Robert Wickens' crash at Pocono in 2018.



So no Will Power, and no Ryan Newman et al - separating the cars is not safer, it's dumbing down. 


Addendum May 17 2016: The biggest wreck of 2016 so far was at Dover.    While the wildest open wheel crash was this Formula 3 melee at - ironic track name - Spielberg.

More road race nastiness at Road America 2018. 



Worth noting are successful drivers in NASCAR who've never won a Winston Cup draft-pack/restrictor plate race as of October 2018 -


Rusty Wallace
Ricky Rudd
Geoff Bodine
Martin Truex
Kyle Larson
Carl Edwards
Kasey Kahne
Alan Kulwicki
Juan Montoya
Marcus Ambrose
Kyle Petty
Ricky Craven
Steve Park
Jerry Nadeau
Johnny Benson
Jeremy Mayfield
Joe Nemechek
AJ Allmenidnger
Lake Speed
Elliott Sadler

John Esposito Excuses Islamic Savagey

John Esposito heads the Oxford Islamic Studies Series and has spent his career excusing Islamic savagery. Among his worst excuses is defending the Muslim law of oppression known as Sharia.

The Fraud Of John Brennen

Former CIA chief John Brennen lost his security clearance and there's been the expected huffing and puffing about it - but the reality is he never should have gotten a clearance to start with, because he is a liar.

Santa Monica's Money For Nothing

A California town repeats the mistake made by governments forever - they want price controls.

Hungary Says No To Islam

Hungary's prime minister, Viktor Orban, vows his nation won't submit the Islam.

Germany Admits Renewable Energy Doesn't Work

Amid the brouhaha of Donald Trump abandoning the Paris Agreement was an admission by Germany's energy minister in June that sustainable energy can't work -

"Even if we did manage to get enough electric cars, we wouldn't have enough renewable energy to keep them on the road."

Trump abandoning the Paris Agreement was a big first step toward realism on energy and the environment.

Not All Cultures Are Good

Part of the moral relativism of "progressives" is that "all cultures are equally good and equally valuable." The fact is some are barbaric.

Israel's Nationality Law

A new "nationality law" in Israel as expected is under fire even though it merely institutionalizes "the 70-year-long reality of Israel’s existence as a Jewish state."

Weaponized Politics

Weaponized politics are debased politics and weaponizing words comes with a price.

Government To Make Homeowners Bail Out Pension Ponzis?

Two pieces indicate homeowners will be made to pay for pension ponzi schemes.

Shape Up Or Step Down Brian France

The DWI-drug possession arrest of NASCAR CEO Brian France serves as a vindication of the late Jack Flowers.   Before his death in 2009 Flowers had covered NASCAR for Grand National Scene and from 1980 to 2005 he covered racing for Speedway Scene.  He became very critical of NASCAR and the France family in that time and before his death he published a slim book called The Dirt Under The Asphalt where he examined how NASCAR had wronged him and several others - his primary target was Brian France and Flowers went into some detail about Brian France's drug use and how the France family covered it up.   Brian worked at Tuscon Raceway Park in the early 1990s but was moved, and Flowers' reportage indicates it was to prevent arrest.   France also had a DUI in Daytona in 2006 where police were unable to prosecute.  Years back France supposedly was also checked into the Mayo Clinic under an assumed name.

So Brian France's drug use and drinking have been an open secret effectively ignored by the Race-Stream Media outside of the late Jack Flowers.   The immediate question one should ask is - why was the France family enabling a relative they knew was a drunk and essentially an addict to take over the racing sanctioning body they'd run so well for decades?

The other question to ask is - how can anyone justify letting Brian France keep his job?  As more than one wag has observed, Brian France should be getting the Jeremy Mayfield treatment, yet instead he is getting the Harvey Weinstein treatment - "rehab" and eventual return to normality, albeit without the loss of fortune Harvey Weinstein is now suffering.

Dave Moody notes the crossroad the sanctioning body now faces. That the sanctioning body faces this crossroad stems from the widespread coverup of France's drinking and drug use and resultant enabling of such behavior, and from the utter lack of credible debate as to whether Brian France ever should have been considered for the job - his successor, his uncle Jim France, by all evidence has far greater grasp of the nuances of racing than Brian ever has.

It is no accident that next to Roger Goodell, Brian France is the most hated CEO of a major sports sanctioning body in the US, and the hatred of both is for essentially the same reason - they are PR hacks lacking credible understanding of the inner workings of teams or the sport.   Brian France's ignorance of the inner workings of racing has shown in his hands-off approach, his lack of interaction with racing people (his blow-off of Martin Truex at the 2017 awards banquet was the most egregious example), and in his bad decisions -


The top-heavy TV deal has not worked - Brian was a key in the centralization of NASCAR's TV deals beginning in 2001; the two deals negotiated over the last seventeen seasons amounted to billions of dollars, yet the net result is the sport is poorer relative to everything else than it was before centralized TV deals - "if there is such thing as too much money, we had it," the late Robert Yates noted of the dodgy business economics of DiGard Racing, and it's obvious Brian France's TV deals have made for the same result - more money, but far more overspending.  

The reality was the old "hodgepodge" system where the tracks themselves negotiated their own media deals was fundamentally more effective for racing and was already netting ever-more money for tracks and teams.   Brian's approach has kept out networks the sport now needs more than ever - notably CBS, once the strongest network covering racing.   A revamped TV deal that decentralizes back to giving the tracks some more negotiating autonomy would allow CBS, MAVTV, and others into the sport, not limit it to just FOX and NBC.

This also relates to the absurd lack of TV money spent on NASCAR's lower touring series like Xfinity, Trucks, the Mod Tour, etc.   Allowing more networks in will allow more money to go to the lower series and thus make them more viable, for the long-term benefit of the sport.


The Chase concept is a failure - This is the signature Brian France decision and the one decision above all that has harmed the sport's long-term popularity.   The concept of playoffs in racing has corrupted the season, and the fact eight of the fourteen "Chase" championships to date - 2004-17 - would have seen a different champion in a season-long title format shows how the playoff format has crowned the wrong champion on a consistent basis.


The Car Of Tomorrow - Just one view of the car - a squat-looking top-heavy sedan body with a wing and grotesque gapped airdam - was enough to prove the concept would never work, and once it was shoved down the sport's throat it didn't work - it was dubbed The Quick Brick and instead it was the Sick Brick that wasted years of the sport's existence chasing a sham.


Moreover, areas where Brian France gets praise don't hold up -

He gets praised for making the sport safer - as if the sport's inevitable technology evolution was not already doing so.

He gets praised for pushing Diversity - a concept that is never anything but a dead end, shown in the failure of Danica Patrick, shoved down racing's throat for one reason - because she is a woman.

"But what justifies diversity? Nothing but unsupported assertions, repeated endlessly, piously, and loudly."

No one has ever made a credible argument that the sport being an all-male sport waving Confederate flags was ever relevant to anything and ignores how unmolested market forces create real mixture - Bubba Wallace success with Richard Petty illustrates unmolested market forces working.


In short there is no credible reason why Brian France should not step down.   He's an addict - that's been known for a long time and quietly enabled by everyone.  He's not qualified for the job he was given - he's proven that.   There is no way around it - Brian France needs to step down.

CFL 2018 Week Eight Argonauts At Redblacks

The Toronto Argonauts stun the Ottawa Redblacks after trailing by four scores.