Kevin Harvick’s qualifying round for Stewart-Haas Racing didn’t meet his expectations as he ended up crashing his car into the wall, cutting short his run. Despite the incident in Chicago, Harvick faced questions about driver safety in the sport during the driver’s press conference.
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The question arose from the previous incident of Ryan Blaney in Nashville. The Team Penske driver had impacted a wall right at the end of the pit road, where, for some reason, NASCAR had not placed a SAFER barrier. This resulted in Blaney suffering one of the hardest hits of his career.
Harvick criticized NASCAR for its apparent carelessness toward driver safety during the discussion about safety lapses. He compared Blaney’s crash with a previous accident involving Kyle Busch at the 2015 Daytona race in the Xfinity Series.
Kevin Harvick Criticizes NASCAR for Neglecting Driver Safety
In the driver’s press conference, a question was posed to Harvick about Blaney’s incident with a concrete barrier. They asked him if he felt frustration or understanding that cars could end up in different spots and it’s not possible to safeguard every area according to NASCAR’s assertion.
Harvick responded, “I don’t think that’s a good excuse. I think that spot should have been covered. We’ve gone to some of these new racetracks and had bare walls. I think that probably needs to be done a little bit more aggressively in order to make those situations right. It’s just a firm reminder that we can hit anything anywhere. You’re not guarding for the everyday accidents.”
“Obviously, it helps them. But you’re guarding for the weird incidents like we had with Kyle Busch at Daytona and Ryan’s was very similar to that. That’s really what you’re looking for. So definitely needs to be a little bit more thorough on erring too much, not enough.”
Even last year, Harvick was well known to publically criticize NASCAR regarding safety issues after he had his car catch fire during a race. Therefore, once again talking about issues surrounding driver’s safety, Harvick was the best person to comment on the recent Blaney issue.
What was the similarity between Ryan Blaney’s and Kyle Busch’s wreck?
Back in 2015, while driving in the Xfinity Series, Kyle Busch had a massive moment during a big one at the Daytona International Speedway. Busch had veered off into the infield grass, before uncontrollably hitting the wall at breakneck speeds.
Just like in the case of Ryan Blaney, that section of the wall did not have SAFER barriers in place.
However, unlike Blaney, who impacted at a much lower speed, Busch suffered a compound fracture of his right lower leg and a left mid-foot fracture following the wreck. He was then put on a stretcher and taken to a hospital, in the process missing out on key races.
What’s baffling is that NASCAR chose to add SAFER barriers at that point only after such a devastating wreck. Knowing that cars could crash at spots like that, shouldn’t they have installed safety barriers in Nashville too?
Unfortunately, it seems they waited for another similar incident to occur before deciding to make a change.
