''Crashes still an occupational hazard'' Tracy source: thestar.com
In many ways, racing is a lot safer now than it was when I first started competing in the Champ Car series more than a decade ago. But as Patrick Carpentier's spectacular accident in the race at Surfers Paradise in Australia two weeks ago shows, crashes are still an occupational hazard for drivers. No matter how finely engineered your car is or how skilled you might be behind the wheel, if something goes wrong at high speed the results can be nasty. Fortunately, Pat survived more or less unhurt and he and I and Mario Domínguez will all be trying hard to clinch third place in the championship standings tomorrow at this season's last race in Mexico City. Two weeks ago that three-way scrap for points was the furthest thing from my mind. Though I could see the remains of Pat's car in the runoff as I circled past, I didn't know what actually happened until well after the race was over. The race organizers themselves were pretty tight-lipped about the whole thing for the first little while. Once I was back in the hotel room, I saw the crash on TV and realized just how bad it was. Pat's survival says a lot about how much safer the cars are now than when I first started racing in CART in 1991. In fact, the Champ Car series has been relatively free of serious accidents for about the past five years or so.
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