Less than a week after announcing he’d be stepping out of his 330-plus mph Top Fuel dragster at the end of the current NHRA season, yielding his seat next season to wife Leah Pruett, Tony Stewart endured one of the scariest crashes he’s ever had in his racing career.
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The 54-year-old Stewart has endured countless crashes in NASCAR, IndyCar, sprint cars, and other series. But few were as chilling as Sunday’s crash during the second round of eliminations in the 40th NHRA Nationals at Maple Grove Raceway in Reading, Pennsylvania.
Stewart was in the left lane, alongside former NHRA Top Fuel champ Doug Kalitta. The race down the 1,000-foot racing surface was uneventful, with Kalitta (3.787 seconds at 335.73 mph) edging Stewart (3.609 seconds at 326.71 mph) for the win.
That’s when everything went squirrely:
After he crossed the finish line first, Kalitta’s dragster drifted across the center line, making contact with Stewart’s car, sending Stewart’s car sliding into the retaining wall before it righted itself and landed on its wheels. Kalitta’s car bounced off Stewart’s ride and slowed to a stop.
Stewart was visibly shaken up and needed assistance to climb from his TSR Dodge/SRT Direct Connection Top Fuel dragster, with several members of the NHRA’s Safety Safari helping Stewart steady himself. While there was some initial concern that Stewart may have suffered a concussion from the impact and the sideways slide along the racing surface, he was checked out by the on-track medical center and released.
“I’ve got one hell of a headache and banged my left hand up,” Stewart said, according to Motorsport.com, “But I’ve been through sprint car crashes way worse than this, I’m pretty sure. We’re good. We’re good. We’re fine. I promise we’re fine.”
As for what happened, Stewart was as mystified as anyone.
“I don’t have a damn clue, honestly. I don’t remember any of it. The first thing I remember, they’re waking me up here. Not sure what happened. It appears to be pretty massive. I’m as curious as everybody else is to what happened. I just know that we’re not where we’re supposed to be at the end of a run here. So, just confused.”
To both drivers’ credit, as soon as he got out of his damaged car, Stewart was quickly met by Kalitta, with both men hugging each other to confirm that they were both fine.
“This was definitely not the weekend we were looking for,” Stewart said in a team post-race media release. “We got through first round against Tony Schumacher and lined up against one of the best with Doug (Kalitta) in the second round. I wish I could tell you what happened (during the accident), but what I saw on the video is the only thing I can go off of.”
“It looked like his front wheel failed, and he came across into my lane. I’m just glad he’s alright. I was worried about him, and he was worried about me. The silver lining is that everyone around us (in points) had problems in the second round. Even though Doug took over the points lead, we’re all close to each other in points heading into Charlotte, so we can rally from there,” added Stewart.
In a post-race interview, Kalitta wasn’t sure what caused his car to veer to the left, theorizing it may have been a left rear tire that went flat. “The left rear is down or blew or whatever,” Kalitta told FOX Sports. “It was just so unfortunate. Really, it happened so quick that there was nothing I could do. Fortunately, Tony and I are good, so that’s really the main thing.”
The incident didn’t seem to hamper Kalitta, as his team pulled out its backup car for the semifinals and eventually to the final round, where he lost to race winner Shawn Reed.
In over 20 years of NHRA competition, Kalitta has been one of the most fortunate drivers in the Top Fuel class. But Sunday’s incident definitely left him shaken.
“That’s probably the worst one I’ve had,” Kalitta said of the incident. “We’ve been very fortunate over the years, and that’s all part of it.”
Kalitta took over the top spot in the Top Fuel point standings, but Stewart—who was the previous points leader—is only 18 points behind him heading into next weekend’s second race of the six-race Countdown to the Championship, the Carolina 4-Wide Nationals at zMAX Dragway in suburban Charlotte, North Carolina.
