Dan Wheldon 1978-2011

This is the most painful post I have ever and probably will ever make. It's also the one I most want to write.

This post is in memory of racing great Dan Wheldon.

Today, during the final race of 2011 IndyCar Series at Las Vegas Speedway, Dan Wheldon suffered injuries as a result of a 15-car crash on lap 13. He was flown to the local hospital, and about two hours after the crash, IndyCar CEO Randy Bernard made the announcement that Wheldon had passed away.

Less than five months prior, Wheldon won his second Indianapolis 500 Mile Race when rookie J.R. Hildebrand crashed on turn four of the final lap. Today, a crash tragically ends his life.

BELOW IS THE REPLAY OF THE CRASH! BE FOREWARNED, THIS IS A SEVERE CRASH AND IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO SEE THE RESULTS, PLEASE CONTINUE BELOW!

 

Dan Wheldon joined the IndyCar series in 2002, taking part in two races with Panther Racing. The next year, he performed amazingly in his rookie year, including a great performance at the Indy 500 before crashing late in the race, and ending the year winning Rookie of the Year. That was just a sign of things to come for the newcomer.

Two years later in 2005, Wheldon became one of the most forgotten 500 winners in history. That was the year of Danica Patrick coming into the IndyCar Series.  Dan and Danica battled back and forth over the last thirty laps, but Dan's car was just a little bit better and had just a little more fuel in it. His win was the first Indy 500 victory for his owner Michael Andretti, who could never win one as a driver. Wheldon would go on to win the IndyCar Series that year, the year in which everybody "forgot" who won the biggest race of the year.



The following season, he tied in the points standings with Sam Hornish, but lost the championship based on the tie-breaker of races won. During this time, he was offered a part-time gig with Formula One team BMW Sauber, but declined because of the lack of a consistent ride.

Wheldon's move to Target Chip Ganassi Racing led to more victories, performing solidly again in every race, including his 15th career IndyCar race win at Iowa in 2008 on his 30th birthday. That would be his last win for a long time....
 

The 2009 and 2010 seasons had Wheldon back with Panther Racing, where he performed best at the Brickyard like he always has.  He finished 2nd in both the 2009 and 2010 Indianapolis 500, where he was catching a fuel-saving Dario Franchitti on the final lap before the yellow flag came out due to a crash in turn three.  With many top five finishes over the two years, Wheldon finished in the top 10 in points both seasons.

2011 began with the great racer out of a job, probably due to his lack of a victory in his two seasons with Panther Racing. He joined forces with a former teammate, now team owner Bryan Herta, in a dual effort with Sam Schmidt Motorsports, to field an entry for the Indianapolis 500.  No Indy 500 race had been won by a team other than Ganassi, Penske, or Andretti since 2004 when Buddy Rice won for Rahal Letterman Racing. No IndyCar series race had been won by somebody other than the big three teams in nearly four years. Yet Wheldon did the impossible.

On the final lap, Wheldon found himself in a familiar situation: second place, a few seconds behind the leader: rookie JR Hildebrand of...Panther Racing. Coming around turn four, Hildebrand has to go high around a car out of fuel, and he gets out of the groove and hits the wall. In the chaos that followed, hardly anybody realized that Wheldon passed the crippled Hildebrand car on the front stretch before crossing the start/finish line. It was a beautiful moment for Wheldon and his former teammate, and was easy to see and hear during his victory lap in the pace car.

Even after winning the 500, Wheldon couldn't get the sponsors and couldn't secure a ride for the rest of the season. My ten-year-old niece, who absolutely loves and adores Dan, asked me why he wasn't racing after Indy. Try explaining that to a ten year old....I remember tweeting back and forth with him a few weeks after the 500, saying that my niece and I wanted to see the Indy champ back on the track soon! He responded saying that they were close and trying extremely hard to get everything in order. ...Now I have to explain to my niece why she will never get to see her favorite driver on the track ever again...

Wheldon spent four races in the Versus broadcast booth following the 100th anniversary of the Indianapolis 500, giving great driver insight that no regular color commentator could ever provide. Even though he wasn't on the track, Wheldon did provide a pivotal role in the IndyCar Series the rest of the year. As the reigning Indy 500 champ, and having no current ties to any of the teams and having no ride, Wheldon was selected to run the tests for the new 2012 chassis. He was able to provide IndyCar officials and teams with great baseline data for the next season, and now how sad it will be to go through that data for the teams.

Fast forward to the end of the season, where Wheldon has secured a ride with Sam Schmidt Motorsports for the $5 Million GoDaddy IndyCar Challenge. Starting last, if Wheldon can charge to the front of the pack and win the race at Las Vegas, he and a lucky fan get to split $5 Million.

After a test race in Kentucky in Alex Tagliani's car, Wheldon is ready for the race in Vegas. 33 other cars will join Wheldon in the race on the 1.5 mile oval, including a few inexperienced drivers. For comparison, only 33 start on the 2.5 mile Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The race went really well, especially for Wheldon who had gained 10 positions in the first 12 laps before the mayhem erupted.

As the commentators are focusing on Wheldon's early march through the field, contact ahead left Wade Cunningham sideways. Cars began to slow down to try to avoid the incident, and an accordion effect was the result. 15 cars are involved in the incident, only 14 are able to walk away from it. Wheldon along with Hildebrand and one or two other cars ended up airborne when they literally ramped off the back of the car in front of them. Wheldon's car, by looks of the replay, lands on top of another car, possibly E.J. Viso's machine, and this causes a huge problem. Instead of smashing into the SAFER barrier, Wheldon's car is elevated four or five feet. He never hits the wall, but smashes into the catch fence, cockpit toward the fence.

Wheldon was transported to the infield care center, and you knew things were bad when Paul Tracy came out of the center saying that he was alright, but that there were "20 doctors around Dan." When a helicopter took off from the care center, we didn't need reports to tell us that Wheldon was on board. Ashley Judd, wife of series champion for now the third straight year Dario Franchitti, tweeted that there is "No update on Dan yet except unconscious but vitals are good."  so there was some optimism. Sadly, the pictures of drivers' and crew members' faces over the next couple of hours were not convincing, and fears were confirmed two hours after the red flag as Bernard announced that we had lost Dan Wheldon.

In another classy move by the IndyCar Series drivers and directors, the race was called. (Franchitti had won the championship as Power was one of the 15 cars in the crash, and James Hinchcliffe clinching the Rookie of the Year award with Hildebrand a part of the carnage, so nothing was to be gained.  The drivers decided to give Wheldon a five lap tribute. The 19 remaining cars lined up in rows of three and drove to a standing ovation in honor of their friend and fellow competitor. Tears filled the eyes of nearly all of the 19 drivers out there, including Danica Patrick and former teammates Tony Kanaan and Dario Franchitti. The driver tweets that keep pouring in tell what an amazing driver, man, and friend Dan Wheldon was. He will be missed.

HOW SAFE IS AUTO RACING?

The fact that IndyCar is so safe makes Wheldon's death even more disturbing.

Early in IndyCar's history, there were numerous fatalities, almost all during the Indianapolis 500, the basis of the IndyCar series. Cars weren't safe (some at the beginning didn't even have proper seatbelts) back then, and the tracks just lacked technology to maintain safety. This was a major concern when cars were traveling at over 237 mph over a 2.5 mile average at the Indianpolis Motor Speedway in 1996. Even more disturbing is the fact that the polesitter who ran that great lap, Scott Brayton, less than a week later passed away when he crashed in practice. It looks like a harmless crash, yet the safety features of the car and track just were not good enough. (Video of the crash is below, again, warning)

After that, cars were adjusted and made safer, with pole position speed the following year reduced to 218 mph. It just wasn't safe driving that fast with 33 cars on the track.

In 2003, multiple incidents including Mario Andretti and Kenny Brack led to more modifications to car and speedway safety, including the introduction of the SAFER barrier that is now standard in just about every speedway in the country. Andretti hit debris in a practice session and does a triple backflip, while Brack gets into the catch fence and survives a crash with the highest recorded G forces ever. Supposedly, after Brack's crash, they told cameramen to keep their cameras off of Brack's car because "he's probably dead."

In 2006, Paul Dana passed away after he didn't slow down quickly enough when a yellow flag came out during the morning practice before the opening race of the season. He smashed into another driver, and sustained unrecoverable injuries. 

Fatalities aren't limited to IndyCar. In 1999 during the season finale of the CART championships (when CART and IndyCar was split), Greg Moore was tragically killed when he lost control of his car and slammed into the infield fence. And most everybody remembers the tragic loss of Dale Earnhardt in the 2011 Daytona 500, another crash which looks harmless at first but shows the danger of racing at such high speeds. Earnhardt's crash led to the requirement of the HANS device developed in the open-wheel series in NASCAR, as well as better lapbelts for driver safety. (Both crashes available below)

But with all of the "issues" that come about with such a dangerous profession, you have to commend the great feats of the safety crews and the tracks of today.

First, lets look at a crash from the 2010 Indy 500. On the last lap, Mike Conway touches wheels with Ryan Hunter-Reay, and Conway ends up airborne and into the catch fence, much like Brack in '03, much like Wheldon did today. But what you have to love about the crash is that the car disintegrates upon impact, dispersing energy, saving Conway's life. He suffers a broken leg, out for the year, but comes back and wins in St. Petersburg the following year. Great story, the way you wish they all would end.

Next, an incident featuring Dan Wheldon during his rookie campaign in 2003.  Late in the Indy 500 that year, Wheldon gets loose in turn 3 and hits the wall. He flips and skids into turn 4 on his head before coming to a stop. What I love about this though is the safety crew around the track. My family and I sit in the Northwest Vista, the entrance of turn 4, for the Indy 500 each year. I tell you what, the response of the safety team was impeccable. As soon as he hit the wall, the safety truck was moving. And within 30 seconds, THIRTY SECONDS, the crew has Wheldon's car right-side-up yet again.  The safety crew travel with the series to each race, and know each driver and their history and everything about them. It's a great luxury to have. Instead of possibly a serious injury, Wheldon races again within a couple weeks and two years later is winning the 500.   (START THIS VIDEO AT 6:20 AND SEE FOR YOURSELF HOW QUICKLY THE SAFETY TEAM GETS TO DAN'S CAR)

And I'll end you on that note. It's such a dangerous sport, yet each year it gets more and more safe. I hope I never have to post on something like this again, but it is part of the sport. My thoughts and prayers go out to Dan's wife, children, and the rest of the Wheldon family. RIP Dan.