Saw this on another site , I can't believe he wasn't Killed!

http://www.hotroddersauctions.com/fo...orld-vt30.html

thats why every track should safety tech every night. It scares me sometimes to go test at the local test and tune night. Its amazing the pieces of shiet people will drag race

Alan,
Union Grove comes to mind immediately!

That one was shot at Fremont. The guy driving the car is a neighbor of mater member Eathon Landfri.

At the moment I was going to post that the place looked like Fremont, someone else confirmed it.

But regardless, Alan Reinhart is absolutely 100% correct.

If you race anything from slot cars to Top Fuel, you, as a competitor, should be insisting your track connduct strict technical and safety inspections because for all you know when you pull to the line, a car like Renfro's could be in the other lane.

Two more points: When you go to an unfamiliar track, particularly for a night race, do yourself a favor and go down to the top end to check both the shut-down area and the return road. I've been to tracks where the shut-down narrows to one lane a couple of hundred feet past the lights, and that's not something you want to discover at speed!


Last point: Don't ever let your need for speed get in the way of your better judgment. Make sure there's a professionally trained ambulance crew on hand before you strap on your helmet, because your wife, girlfriend or buddies don't need to find out the "ambulance" is a 70s vintage converted hearse that won't start when you're lying on the ground with broken bones. And the "crew" consists of two high school dropouts who weren't smart enough to handle the cash register in the concession stand!

Jon Asher

This was at a bracket race at Fremont Dragstrip, close to the end of the last year ('83 I think). Since they knew the track was going to close, tech inspection was getting pretty loose.

As a friend of mine said, "every horror story in the garage is coming out for a last shot at the track".

I can briefly see my black Malibu getting ready to pull in to the bleach box behind them. I was actually paired up to run against the '56 until another car pulled out of line.

The drivers son was standing right by my car while his dad did the burnout. Unfortunately when the '56 pulled out of the water and started heating the tires, only one tire spun and got hot, they must have had a posi with worn clutches. Or maybe the car broke an axle during the burnout, that actually is probably more likely and caused the crash.

The son was yelling at the dad to try to tell that something was wrong during the burnout, but the dad didn't hear and pulled up and staged the car.

After the car flipped nobody realized the driver had flown out of the car and had stood up. The safety vehicle (well, the tracks ratty Ford Ranger) went flying down to the crash, and as people watched I remember people saying-

"Hey, whats that guy doing there standing on the track, he shouldn't be out there. And why does he have a helmet on? Hey, wait a minute, that's the driver".

I looked at the car after the crash, and you could see that the seat, which was a later model GM stock bench seat, had just been tack welded to the sheet metal floor. The driver had ended up flying out of the front windshield. My memory is that he was banged up and twisted his back some, but didn't have any long term injuries.

Wow, a miracle of the internet, I never thought I'd get to watch that crash again.

Paul T.

Ejection seat seemed to work to perfection, if he had only remembered to bolt the belts to it... Otherwise the car came apart as designed... Right?? I saw no other problems other then pilot error, from start to finish...
That was Fremont around mid 80 something... And that is when they were running the Golden Gate Nationals, those guardrails...

__________________
theDARKSIDE- TOP ALCOHOL DRAGSTER*

Wasn't this car the prototype for the current Top Fuel chassis?

Believe it or not... Modern day Pro Stock...
Amazes me that the ejection seat idea never took off...

__________________
theDARKSIDE- TOP ALCOHOL DRAGSTER*

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a.k.a. 98percentnitro

http://www.myspace.com/relentlesslightingdesign

Have caught this before, I just don't get why he got back in it after he was already loose and in the other lane... big driver era there. What can I say he's a lucky guy!

Mike

thats probably the only time you will ever see a driver up and walking around while the car is still tumbling.

it looked to me like he went out the drivers side door exactly where he landed though. not the windshield. look closely.

I was there when that happened, it was amazing that he wasn't killed!
Good old Fremont drag Strip one of the best tracks in the country back then!
Good find Joe.

Alan, I've seen over a dozen Rollovers such as that one. And the Cars didn't come apart like that, either way he should've Never got back in it after drifting across the Centerline.