so, its not boring anymore

[jzilla]

I really enjoyed last year's season and this year has been so and so... until i see this!

http://msn.foxsports.com/other/story/9867406/Schumacher-to-make-comeback-to-replace-Massa

[Spark!Plug]

Schumacher coming back is nice.... but this is all still very screwed up. Massa got hurt REALLY bad, and i doubt he'll ever be back in an F1 car again. the safety of those cars have hit critical. the point where things need to be redesigned for safety. Nascar implimented "soft walls" after a death. this is damn near a death, im greatful Massa survived. i guess untill someone actually does DIE, they'll keep their head exposed. its obvious helmets wont protect you.

:facepalm::facepalm:

[streetlegend]

Schummy's back! I hate the circumstances in which it happened, because Massa is one of my favorite drivers. I can't wait to see Hamilton, Alonso, Vettel, and Schumacher on the same track.

Best of wishes for Massa. I'm sure in light of the recent injuries in motorsports, there will be serious discussion on the matter of safety...

Then again, imagine the odds of that injury happening.

[sharkythesharkdogg]

I wasn't really expecting this. Last I heard he was just enjoying himself racing in some German superbike series. I guess it is hard to refuse people who are basically family.

[Otto]

Schumacher coming back is nice.... but this is all still very screwed up. Massa got hurt REALLY bad, and i doubt he'll ever be back in an F1 car again. the safety of those cars have hit critical. the point where things need to be redesigned for safety. Nascar implimented "soft walls" after a death. this is damn near a death, im greatful Massa survived. i guess untill someone actually does DIE, they'll keep their head exposed. its obvious helmets wont protect you.

:facepalm::facepalm:


critical? how many times has something like this happened? it was a freak accident.
id be willing to bet a canopy strong enough to withstand a serious hit like that has about the same chance of getting stuck closed and also risking the driver's life. about the only thing that will work is one seriously reinforced windscreen

[Spark!Plug]

i dunno call me a safety freak. things like this always ways in my head. i mean look at the side bolsters on both sides of the men's helmets. they're there b/c people were taking hits to the head from cars going under eachother. its no different than racing a motorcycle, and i understand that. in the american daytona series i think its called, stock bikes.. a guy lost part of his pinky when he went wide and lost the front off the back tire of another guy. and it always worries you when you see a rider just ragdoll slumped over not moving...

a canopy can be made to withstand a hit like a spring. your prolly ganna hate me for bringing this up.. but look at nascar. i've seen everything under the sun, including full beer cans hit the windshield of a car.. or a spring after someone hits the wall.. or a tire, or even an entire car like earlier this season when carl edwards got spun, got air, then was punted off the front of another car into the fence. the driver that drove into the underside of edwards had no intrusion problems. and that was a whole car hitting the green house of another car.

dont get me started on restrictor plate racing.. so far this season if your in the lead on the last lap, your going to hit the wall at 170+ driver side on concrete. one of these days its ganna get someone killed.

i look at it like they're just lucky. i remember watching the video when massa got hit in the face with the spring... i didnt see a car infront of him so it was still bouncing in the air like a missle and he just so happend to take it to the face. lets see one of those F1 cars get sideways on a street curcuit with a blind curve and the carbon fiber nose go right through the side of the car and kill someone.. its nearly happend before in big pile ups in open wheeled racing. F1 is supposed to be so sophisticated but its no different than a guy strapping himself a rocket with his head sticking out and other guided guys strapped to rockets all around them.. its madness. im glad they're able to put massa in a coma, reconfigure his skull, and i've heard he can open his left eye and still see. a doctor has even gone far enough to say that he may still race, but not this season. all it takes is bulletproof lexan and he wouldnt have taken a spring to the face.

but all in all i love racing and im glad they keep idiots off the track that could cause MORE of these problems. and the men that drive those chariots are inhuman. but i'd rather admire a racer while he's racing and doing things i could only wish to do.. while he's alive.. an not have to remember such a great driver in memory and mourn the death. just b/c massa survived doesnt mean he couldnt have seriously been killed. like taking a bullet a mm from an artery IMO.

[Otto]

for side impact just look at the zanardi crash, you will never make these things as safe as you want.
i never said a canopy couldnt withstand a hit like that, but with a canopy you run into a chance that the canopy can get stuck or otherwise not be opened and whether or not that risk is any better than debris hitting the small exposed portion of a driver. Racing is dangerous and i support advances in safety but i think Ross Brawn said it right after this crash.

"We need to keep a perspective on it. From what's been seen last weekend and this, we need to have a proper study to see if we need to do anything. We need to digest what's happened and understand it properly.

It is time to look at the whole thing and take a balanced approach. You can have covers or canopies, but you have to be able to get at the driver and extract him if there is an accident – and you don't want anything that collapses down on a driver.

It is something we will look at. In the history of F1 it is a fairly rare occurrence, but we must take it seriously and see what we can do. If there's a need to react, I'm sure F1 will promptly – but we must make sure we don't do something that makes the situation worse.”

[sharkythesharkdogg]

It's all calculated risk. How fast do you want them to go, and how safely do you want them to do it? People love the speed until situations like this occur, and then there is the inevitable uproar. Then the governing body has to create and enforce new mandates to improve safety standards. It's never clear what the balance of safety to speed should be. I remember when they stopped forced induction and I thought that was crazy. I remember when the stopped allowing slicks and I thought that was crazy, too.

While the sport is not completely safe, it's actually still very safe. Freak situations, while traumatic and devastating, are still few and far between. The helmet Massa was wearing was some newer carbon-fiber composite material that was substantially stronger than the old design. That probably kept him alive. It may sound cold, but drivers strap themselves into the car knowing the risks involved. These athletes are payed LARGE amounts of money to do what they do. I don't want them driving unsafe cars, but those situations are part of the nature of racing that type of vehicle. Further more what's my opinion of safe compared to someone else's? Who's option is more qualified? I think we should leave it up to drivers to decide. If they feel the car is that unsafe they won't get in it. Once again it's the drivers taking a calculated risk.

[JDM88]

This crash was a freak of an accident, honestly what seethe odds of a spring falling off a car and bouncing into someone's face? The safety standard in formula one is already incredible, all it takes is a quick look at some of the crashes over the last few years to see how many lives have been saved. Don't lose sight of the fact that Massa went straight into a tire wall and that didn't cause any injuries, or even kubica's insane crash from las season where he was back racing within a couple of weeks. I bet it's safer for them doing 70 blistering laps than it is to spend an hour on i285.

[jester911]

Jack, I totally agree. The safety is better than ever and still improving.
Most of the safety features built into street cars came from racing as well.

It is still a dangerous sport but driving in general is as well.

[Spark!Plug]

well i know it comes down to this:

if i may; we as racers accept the chance everytime we strap into ANY race car, that death is a possibility. and we accept that to get in the car and run like nothing like this will ever happen. freak accident is something thats a possibility. all of these things are something we must accept to be competitive. to run hard, to make passes, to run the car as hard as possible, we have to put ourselves in very dangerous situations. the calibure or drivers in very high. they're hand picked with very extensive racing careers. im not calling anyone in F1 stupid, or ignorant to safety. but i still think every circumstance should be thought about and something should be done to prevent these things. the sadest part is we will not know what to expect to be the next big safety hazard.

as far as a canopy possibly causing problems extracting a driver incase of serious injury. look at canopies on fighter jets. im not talking an ejector seat type deal, but a canopy can be built to react to a crash. be sealed for fire safety, and at a predeturmined time (to take in the account of the car may be in the wrong place to get hit over and over needing the safety feature in place) it can be very safe. F1 has the brain power with all of their designers to come up with a solution. my solution might not be feesable, the whole canopy ejecting could cause problems with fans or safety officials. but i believe F1 and FIA will figure something out. we just have to wait and see what they do for the 2010 season if there will be one. i pray they do something to prevent this situation from happening again. thats really all i ask. i dont care how bad a crash is, i want the driver to walk away. thats what it all comes down to in the end. making sure these talented drivers are safe.

[jzilla]

im more excited to see if Shcumi can make ferrari rise back. It be interesting if its driver or technology.

[mustangtomiata]

everyone seems to have forgot about henry surtees getting killed by a tire bouncing down the track in an almost identical incident, but again these are freak things that occured near each other, I really don't the FIA an F1 are going to do much about it. I believe it would have more influence if they had happened 3 or 4 months apart.

[Otto]

everyone seems to have forgot about henry surtees getting killed by a tire bouncing down the track in an almost identical incident, but again these are freak things that occured near each other, I really don't the FIA an F1 are going to do much about it. I believe it would have more influence if they had happened 3 or 4 months apart.
now tires have ALWAYS been a sore spot for safety, crazy amounts of energy and they usually hit whatever at whatever speed they happen to have come off the car at, that is really something i wish could be improved

[mustangtomiata]

Small bombs could be put inside every tire, and when someone sees it get free they could blow it into ashes and keeps everyone safe.

[Spark!Plug]

i dunno about that, i bet in that circumstance the hub broke out of the center of the wheel and a tether would have been useless but thats something they could look at. if it was the center of the wheel braking causing the wheel to leave the car a tether would be useless, but nascar has a mandate where tires and suspension connected to the wheels must be tethered. you still see tires leave cars after extreme impacts with the wall. i've also see the center of a wheel break, and the tire luckily just rolled down the outside wall not bouncing and then with the banking it rolled to the inside to the grass and just flopped over. im not a huge follower of F1, i watch nockout qualifiying (my fav part) and i record the races usually a 3am and watch them later.

this year is a hell of a lot better than last year, more passing. if its racing i watch it, but i dont get into the stuff said off the track in F1, just the action. and i really ignored it for the longest time being ignorant.

[streetlegend]

aww... so it's confirmed that Schummy's not returning. Bummer.