Out of All the Other Sports NASCAR is the Only One that Puts Safety as Top Priority

With the recent rule changes NASCAR, has made, some fans have said NASCAR doesn’t listen to or care about the fans. While that’s a different conversation for a different time. I must give NASCAR credit for doing something most professional sports don’t do. That’s putting safety as their number one concern.

Right now, the sports world is in a changing of the guard of sorts. The Super Bowl this Sunday between the Atlanta Falcons and the New England Patriots will end the NFL season. Three weeks later, the Daytona 500 will kick off the NASCAR season.

Many NFL fans, right now, are wondering “how is the New England Patriots back in the Super Bowl after the Deflate gate fiasco two years ago?” Yes, you thought it would go away but guess what, it won’t. As I said, it was two years ago when it was first reported.

It’s wasn’t like what NASCAR, where the NFL did an report and/or suspend people responsible. Wait? NASCAR had a deflate gate?

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Yes, you read right. NASCAR had their own deflate gate. In fact, the first reports about NASCAR’s deflate gate happened just a couple of months after the New England Patriots was accused of deflating the air out of the footballs.

The 2015 NASCAR season was a full month into the new season. The season was finally acting normal after what happened to the Busch brothers to start the season. Then the March 30, Martinsville STP 500 race rolled around. After the race, it was reported that NASCAR confiscated race used tires from some of the drivers. The reason behind it was NASCAR thought the drivers team was poking little holes in the tires way the driver had better tire durability and gave the driver a better grip on the track. It is also known as bleeding. ABC/ESPN learned not only did NASCAR confiscated the tires after the Martinsville race but also it the third time in the season that NASCAR confiscated the drivers tires after a race. They also learned what drivers had their tires confiscated.

According to the report, the only two drivers that had their tires taken away twice was Kevin Harvick and Joey Logano. Both had their tires taken away at Phoenix. Kevin second set was taken away at Auto Club along with Paul Menard, Kurt Busch, and Ryan Newman’s. While Logano’s second set was taken after that Martinsville race, along with Matt Kenseth, Martin Truex Jr., and AJ Allmendinger’s.

In the end, NASCAR found Newman’s team manipulated with the tires at Auto Club. Ryan Newman was deducted 75 points, NASCAR fined his crew chief Luke Lambert $125,000 and suspend Lambert for six races, plus suspending three members of Ryan crew. RCR lost the appeals, Luke Lambert paid his fine and did the six races, and Ryan made up the 75 points to get into the playoffs. Even though most said it would be like the NFL and drag on all season. With NASCAR, it only lasted a couple of months, probably not even that long.

The reason being, NASCAR wanted to send a message. The message wasn’t about cheating, it was about not messing with the tires. After this incident, has anyone heard anything about tire bleeding? No. The message was received.

Some will probably call out NASCAR for being on the penalty. When you’re dealing with a sport like NASCAR you don’t take second chances on safety. And tire bleeding is a safety issue.

Now flash forward four months later to the Coke Zero 400. You know the race where Austin Dillon went up into the catch fence at the end of the race. What I find chilling about that race is, right before the 2015 season even started NASCAR mandated all seat belt systems will be attached to the seat themselves. Instead being attached to the car or chassis. Having that small of a change just might as well saved Austin’s life.

Now of course this hasn’t happened over night. This took years for NASCAR to become as safe it is. As Bob Pockrass explained in one of his articles on ESPN last year titled “NASCAR Safety has never been better, but it’s a Moving Target“.

He’s right. While he used Dale Earnhardt Sr. and Kyle Busch wreaks at Daytona as an example. I’m going to use another example and that is Ricky Rudd and Dale Earnhardt Jr. Everyone knows that Dale Jr. didn’t race the later part of last season due to concussion symptoms. The reason why he didn’t come back for the rest of the seaon, he didn’t want to be involved in a crash or be the reason for the crash. With Dale Jr. being a big advocate on concussions in all forms of motor sports, Fans to the crews know that driving a race car at 200 mph with a concussion is not the best idea.

Well, now we do. When Ricky Rudd had that bad crash in the 1984 Busch Clash, we didn’t know it then but he suffered a concussion in that race. Rudd eye’s, being swollen, wouldn’t stay open for the Daytona 500 the next week. To solve this problem, he put tape on his eyes way they could stay open during the race. Rudd ended up finishing seventh in the Daytona 500 that year. This is the incident, after they learned what Rudd did, NASCAR made a policy of checking the driver(s) after they have an accident.

After the 1984 Daytona 500, the policy of checking drivers after a crash they have been in. That’s the same policy Matt DiBenedetto went through after his crash in an Xfinty at Texas this past November. After being evaluated, he wasn’t clear to race next day in the Monster Energy Cup series race .

With the information that we now have on concussions, I’ll use Ricky Rudd as example again. If he did what he did back in 1984 today, he wouldn’t have able to race until probably the second Daytona race.

Reason behind the policy is way drivers don’t have to worry about their fellow competitors if they have an injury and race right after. Over the past couple of years NASCAR have changed some rules to make the drivers safer.

NASCAR vs. the big-four sports: Winner hands down is NASCAR

Some fans, and I have been guilty of doing this, like to joke that the only thing NASCAR is consistent on is being inconsistent.

My fellow writer Christopher Olmstead wrote posted an article the other day on how NASCAR does a good job having access to the drivers for the fans. I think, however, there is another area that NASCAR is on top of 100% and consistent on. That is safety for their athletes.

There are sometimes that fans question why NASCAR make the rule changes that they do. Out of the professional sports, I think NASCAR is the only one that puts safety as their number one priority. Now, understand I’m not saying all sports except NASCAR don’t care about their athlete’s safety. I’m saying NASCAR puts safety as a top priority while other sports put it off as a secondary priority. If you disagree, I will be more than happy to debate this topic all day.

Need more examples than the ones listed above? A perfect example is what sport saw more safety improvements in the past sixteen years?

The NFL hasn’t done anything about the helmets designs. Though they have said many times they will. Body checking in the NHL still happens even though if a player does a body cheek they sit out. The helmets in the MLB don’t protect the players head like the other helmets in other sports do. The NBA don’t even have concussion baseline test that all the other sports have.

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Sure, you can complain about the lug-nut rule or a rule change that NASCAR makes. Before you do however, think “does this involve safety?” Knowing NASCAR, it probably does. Just don’t complain too much as safety won’t be their top priority any more. In any type of Motorsports, safety should be the top priority. Or everyone knows what will happen.

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NASCAR Prioritizes Safety More Than Any Other Sport

By Kayla Gipson | Feb 14, 2017

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NASCAR vs. the big-four sports: Winner hands down is NASCAR