"Crashing a race car successfully"
Tips from a master at reducing the 'ouch' factor
By Bill Borden
Special to ESPN.com
"Crashing a race car successfully" -- sounds like the perfect oxymoron doesn't it? Perhaps a more correct way to say it would be: "How to lose control of your race car while operating at maximum speed in traffic either through your own fault or that of a competitor's and then minimize the damage afterwards by not hitting anything hard or expensive and by not seriously damaging your race car or getting hurt in the process."
"Crashing a race car successfully" is obviously a lot easier to say even if a successful crasher such as David Pearson, upon hearing the article's title, questioned: "Oxymoron?! I don't know about the 'oxy' but I do know about the 'moron!' What 'moron' came up with that title?"
"Me," I told him.
"Well that explains it," he said. It should be noted here that "Mr. Pearson" and I have had our share of "debates" over the years. And, while his winning percentage is better than mine, I have won my share of them. But I did not choose to pursue the "Moron" debate past the above exchange.
I had called Pearson to get his opinion on how to crash a race car successfully because he is the only driver I know who never had to ride in an ambulance during his entire racing career. David had 105 wins in the Cup series and has had the highest winning percentage of any driver for many years. He competed in 572 Cup races during his career and finished in the top five 301 times! He won the Cup Championship in 1966, 1968 and 1969 -- three out of the four years that he ran a full race schedule.
Richard Petty has said Pearson is the best driver he ever competed against during his career. Together they accounted for 305 total wins during their era in NASCAR.
We can safely assume that no driver wants to crash his race car deliberately [unless, for example, you are Dale Earnhardt Jr. and you do it at Bristol to create a caution. And, you are then dumb enough to get on the radio -- which NASCAR monitors -- to tell your crew what you just did]. Sorry Dale, but I had to point that one out because Pearson had the temerity to call me a "moron."
The facts are that most drivers will experience more crashes than they will visits to Victory Lane during their careers. Again, Mr. Pearson disagrees with me on that point -- claiming he had fewer crashes than he had wins during his career. I [reluctantly] might have to agree with him on his personal record because he was so good at avoiding crashes. Plus I don't want to spend five days researching the records just to prove him wrong. However, I still contend that "most" drivers will have more "crashes" than wins during their careers.
"Crash" -- for our purposes here -- simply means the driver has lost control of his race car for whatever reason. In some cases the driver becomes a passenger with absolutely no control over the outcome. But, in many cases, the driver can affect the outcome of the crash by what he does after he has lost control.
I guess this would be the appropriate time to define what a "successful crash" means.
If you are a driver then any crash where you minimize or avoid damage to your car and can then drive or walk away unhurt would be considered a successful crash.
If you are a car owner then any crash where there is little or no damage to your race car would be considered a successful crash.
If you are a crew chief then any crash where you don't have to work on the car to repair or rebuild it would be considered a successful crash.
If you are a sponsor then any crash where your name appears prominently on TV and the commentators talk about your car would be a successful crash.
If you are a race fan then any crash with a "wow" factor or degree of difficulty in the landing is impressive. And if nobody gets hurt it would be a successful crash.
If you are another driver then any crash where you can avoid becoming involved either by hitting the crasher or by being hit by another driver while attempting to avoid the crash would be a successful crash.
If you are the track promoter then any crash that wows the crowd, does minimal damage to the competitors, their equipment or your track and creates a caution so you can sell more beer and hot dogs would be a successful crash.
See! There can be a lot of instances where a crash can be successful! Moron indeed!
So how does a driver crash successfully?
"You try to keep your car going in a predictable direction so other competitors can avoid you," Pearson said. "You can do that by braking or steering or gassing the throttle to influence where the car goes. I always tried to keep my side of the car away from the oncoming traffic if I was spinning to avoid being hit directly in the driver's door.
"Race cars are set up to turn left on an oval track. They will naturally go to the bottom on a banked track so don't fight it and let it slide down out of the groove." There is an old racing adage that it is not good to turn right on an oval track at any time since the tires might suddenly get a good bite and snap the car back head-first into the wall.
"If I flat-sided it or scraped the wall," Pearson continued, "then I would try to hold it up there until it was clear then steer it down off the wall.
"I always tried to keep as much metal [car chassis/body] as possible between me and the impact point so the car would absorb most of the hit. But whatever you do, try to keep from hitting head on into the wall or slapping the wall with the driver's side or you could really get hurt," he said.
Pearson almost always ran a higher groove than most of the other drivers to minimize any potential damage or pain if he crashed. Richard Petty adopted the same driving style in his later years for the same reason. Once, after I had teased Petty about his change in driving style, he looked at me and said; "I don't reckon I heal as fast as I used to." The shorter distance between the car and the wall minimizes the amount of momentum the car can build up before it hits the wall, reducing the "ouch" factor considerably.
As for avoiding a wreck happening in front of him, Pearson noted that he always kept his car going straight, slowed down under control and then avoided the wreck when he got to it. Buddy Baker's philosophy was to aim for the spinning car because it would be gone when he got there. Darrell Waltrip's philosophy was to hold the steering wheel steady and briefly close his eyes so he would not flinch and go the wrong way.
Every driver has his personal preference on how best to avoid a wreck but most of their philosophies are similar simply because they reflect what the drivers have learned about the "physics" that are involved when a car crashes and they are reacting accordingly. Baker tells the story about him being way ahead of the pack on a superspeedway when he lost it coming off a corner and spun to a stop just as the pack caught up to him. He had stalled the engine and could not get going quickly so all he could do, Baker said, was close his eyes and whimper because he knew it was going to hurt.
Pearson believes today's drivers don't look far enough ahead to avoid an accident."Now they wreck 10 or 15 cars behind the first wreck," he noted.
His philosophy is a driver can tell where to go better than a spotter unless there is smoke or something blocking his view. "I never relied on a spotter to tell me where to go," he said. I could not resist pointing out to him that they very seldom had spotters back when he raced and that current drivers are much more restricted in their vision in today's cars. Therefore spotters play a much more important role today.
Being a former spotter, I had to defend our value to the current drivers. Naturally, Pearson did not agree with that philosophy. But he did admit he would not particularly want to race the current car today because of all of the safety restrictions that impede a driver's ability to see and move around inside the car. The rules are definitely different between the two eras.
Above all, a driver needs to remain calm and focused to crash successfully and minimize any damage or pain. Pearson is known as the "Silver Fox" because he had complete command and focus in a race car. He always knew where he was, what was going on around him and what he needed to do to win a race.
Eddie Wood of the Wood Brothers told a story about when Pearson was driving for them many years ago and Eddie was sitting on the pit wall watching the race when he saw smoke rising in the air in turn four at Charlotte. He immediately radioed to Pearson that there was a wreck in turn four. Pearson calmly radioed back that he knew, he was involved in it and then proceeded to give Eddie a play-by-play rundown of who as hitting who. Eddie said it was surreal to watch their race car getting bounced all around as it came into view off turn four while Pearson sat there and calmly told him who was about to hit him and what they might need to do to repair the damage, etc. Eddie noted that, during it all he could hear David revving the engine and shifting gears as he tried to avoid being hit by other cars in the wreck. Now that, to me, is trying to crash a race car successfully.
When Pearson and I operated the "David Pearson Performance Programs," we conducted driving schools around the country. I was constantly amazed and impressed at what he could do with a race car. He is the smoothest driver I have ever seen behind the wheel of a stock car. It's a good thing he was so impressive because he used to make me do the classroom lecture and then sit in the back and be totally disruptive. I have complete sympathy for all of his teachers who had to put up with him when he was growing up around Spartanburg, S.C.
When asked during this interview if he would like to be driving today his quick answer was "Hell no! Not the way they're operating things these days! But I'll tell you this; If they were paying back then what they are paying now I'd be able to go out to eat tonight! Might even be able to order some lobster, too!" Vintage Pearson. I love him.
Bill Borden is a former championship winning crew chief who operated David Pearson's Racing School for many years.
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