iNSIDE SCOOP: It Never Gets Easier

The death this week of 37-year-old Jason Leffler in a sprint car race at Bridgeport is a stark reminder that racing is and always will be a dangerous undertaking.

Leffler was a long-time open-wheel racer, starting in California and moving to the Midwest to race with USAC’s national series. He knew what he was doing, had all the proper safety gear and was competing on a track where sprint cars run all the time.

But sometimes…it just doesn’t matter. 

It’s all about physics and inertia and angle of impact. Throw in structural stability and velocity, and any crash can be fatal. 

That doesn’t make it any easier to take, does it?

Jason Leffler’s death from blunt force trauma to the neck is a tragedy, not only for the people who knew him as a driver, but most especially those who were closest to him. His five-year-old son Charlie Dean was the world to his father, and vice versa, by all accounts. His world was unalterably transformed on Wednesday night.

NASCAR and IndyCar, both organizations for which Leffler raced, have been forging ahead with improvements to keep drivers alive while they do their work, and it is a far cry better than it used to be even 30 years ago.

Soft walls save lives, and the HANS Device has improved driver safety more than anything ever has, save the introduction of the seat belt. But I’ve seen a lot of drivers die in race cars, at Indianapolis, short tracks all over the country and at NASCAR tracks. 

It can happen.

New materials, better engineering and a lot of technology gains have helped, and we are a far cry from the 1950s and 1960s when drivers died all the time, but technology is not fool-proof.

Leffler, coming out of California, was one of the shining stars of the open-wheel ranks. He teamed with Steve Lewis to win USAC titles, and Lewis was the Roger Penske or Rick Hendrick of the day in that discipline. He and Tony Stewart were friends, and Leffler took over the cars that Stewart drove when he went to Indy Cars and eventually NASCAR.

Reaction among his NASCAR peers was swift and sorrowful, and that just tells you how much they liked the young man. He wore a faux-hawk a lot of the time, was a joker and a good guy to hang around with.

Leffler had been out of the top ranks of NASCAR for a season, having lost his ride in the Nationwide Series. He drove at Pocono in the No. 19 machine, completing just eight laps before he parked it. Working on getting back to the top NASCAR series is what he was doing, and he raced open-wheel to keep sharp and make a living. 

I didn’t know him well, just enough to nod to in the garage and occasionally talk to if the situation warranted it.

But it makes me hurt that he won’t be around to nod to, if you get my meaning.

Racing is a dangerous game, and you can die doing it or even watching it. It’s sad and it hurts and robs us of men and women who are heroes for doing what they love, all out and feet on the floor. 

Godspeed, Jason Leffler. You left the world behind a bit better than you found it, and that’s all anyone can ever ask.