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ghostrunner wrote:Can't see much excuse for revving the engine though. My guess is he was trying to throw mud up at him, but that's still on him. Criminal negligence maybe? The guy who was killed also put himself at risk. I kept thinking each of those cars was going to hit him.

As a former dirt track race car driver my wife was glued to this story Saturday night when it came out, and my wife said the same thing. It looked to her like Stewart was trying to kick mud up at him and mid-judged where his rear wheel was (because you CAN hear him blip the gas) and when the tail kicked out just a hair it clipped the kid & sucked him right under the wheel. While obviously it was incredibly careless for the kid to get out of the car, but she said this isn't completely out of the ordinary. Tony Stewart hasn't had a very a stellar Sprint car career (which he just started doing a few years back, in fact he doesn't even race in the top class of Sprint cars)...Three years he was the main car which started a 15 car accident where a girl ended up paralyzed. Last year he had an accident where he broke his leg & missing the rest of the nascar season & has still had issues w/ his leg.

She understood the kids frustration, it looked as though Stewart intentionally put this kid in the wall, causing the wreck. While the kid is obviously a hot head, how would you feel if some guy that owns his own race team, has more money than he knows what to do with, decides he wants to wreck you and put you into the wall wrecking your car that you're doing everything you can to keep it on the track every week & have limited funds for repair (I don't know for sure if this is the case). So I'm sure he was pissed off & wanted to get his money worth and lay into Stewart. On wrecks that happen on the outer wall & a yellow flag is out it's pretty common knowledge that these guys are to go low to avoid any wreckage or debris. When watching the video it was pretty clear that most cars followed the rule & avoided the kid by ample room (most were barely visible). The car before Stewart actually came pretty close & swerved to avoid him, then Stewart came by and definitely didn't look to try avoiding him & as many saw actually hit the gas (likely to spray him w/ mud).

Now can any of it be proven, likely not...and I'm sure Stewart wasn't trying to hit him. But my wife was pretty confident that his intention was to scare the kid, and let him eat some mud and unfortunately mis-judged where his tire was at causing the accident. He probably won't be charged w/ manslaughter because the kid should've never been out of his car, but probably should be.

cardinalkarp wrote:
As a former dirt track race car driver my wife was glued to this story Saturday night when it came out, and my wife said the same thing. It looked to her like Stewart was trying to kick mud up at him and mid-judged where his rear wheel was (because you CAN hear him blip the gas) and when the tail kicked out just a hair it clipped the kid & sucked him right under the wheel. While obviously it was incredibly careless for the kid to get out of the car, but she said this isn't completely out of the ordinary. Tony Stewart hasn't had a very a stellar Sprint car career (which he just started doing a few years back, in fact he doesn't even race in the top class of Sprint cars)...Three years he was the main car which started a 15 car accident where a girl ended up paralyzed. Last year he had an accident where he broke his leg & missing the rest of the nascar season & has still had issues w/ his leg.

It's not really entirely true to say that what this kid did isn't out of the ordinary. I've seen drivers jump out of cars. I've seen them throw things. I've seen them point and yell. I've seen them run up to cars that were stopped on the track. I don't recall seeing anyone run up to a car that was still making laps on the track.......... even caution laps.

cardinalkarp wrote: She understood the kids frustration, it looked as though Stewart intentionally put this kid in the wall, causing the wreck. While the kid is obviously a hot head, how would you feel if some guy that owns his own race team, has more money than he knows what to do with, decides he wants to wreck you and put you into the wall wrecking your car that you're doing everything you can to keep it on the track every week & have limited funds for repair (I don't know for sure if this is the case). So I'm sure he was pissed off & wanted to get his money worth and lay into Stewart. On wrecks that happen on the outer wall & a yellow flag is out it's pretty common knowledge that these guys are to go low to avoid any wreckage or debris. When watching the video it was pretty clear that most cars followed the rule & avoided the kid by ample room (most were barely visible). The car before Stewart actually came pretty close & swerved to avoid him, then Stewart came by and definitely didn't look to try avoiding him & as many saw actually hit the gas (likely to spray him w/ mud).

I think it's a REAL stretch to say that Stewart intentionally put the kid into the wall. They were both racing hard. Stewart had position in front of the Ward. Ward tried to pass high, but there really wasn't room to pass high............ so the kid ended up in the wall.



The part about Stewart possibly trying to spray the kid with mud may be true......... but his back end barely fishtailed. The kid had to be REALLY close (way too close) to the car, obviously, or the tail end of the car wouldn't have wrapped him up.

I'll take my wife's word for it when she says it's not out of the ordinary for guys to get out of their car confronting another driver when there's a caution or red flag. She grew up around racing watching her dad, and she raced herself & has watched more races that I can imagine so I'll have to believe her when she says it's not out of the ordinary.

And maybe it wasn't intentional to put him into the wall and Stewart did have the inside position, but you can see how Stewart goes from having the inside position to sliding right into Ward's lane/path (which was the outside lane). Ward had nowhere to go. He was on the outside, and Stewart (who had the inside lane could have kept it, but decided to slide in & try to take Ward's lane....Stewart initiated contact & put him into the wall).

And no one other than Stewart knows his intentions, but IF it were to spray him w/ mud the fact is....Ward was wrong for being on the track & sure, he was too close to the other drivers but the fact that Stewart even blipped the gas w/ Ward right next to him it added to the potential dangerous situation because instead of the car moving in a straight line it caused the cars rear end to slide out & clip Ward. Both made bad decisions & led to the death of Ward.

cardinalkarp wrote:I'll take my wife's word for it when she says it's not out of the ordinary for guys to get out of their car confronting another driver when there's a caution or red flag. She grew up around racing watching her dad, and she raced herself & has watched more races that I can imagine so I'll have to believe her when she says it's not out of the ordinary.

And maybe it wasn't intentional to put him into the wall and Stewart did have the inside position, but you can see how Stewart goes from having the inside position to sliding right into Ward's lane/path (which was the outside lane). Ward had nowhere to go. He was on the outside, and Stewart (who had the inside lane could have kept it, but decided to slide in & try to take Ward's lane....Stewart initiated contact & put him into the wall).

If anything, I think the second circumstance happens FAR more frequently than the first.

Again, I'm not saying it's unusual for drivers to get out fo cars and yell, point, etc. That's a far cry from running up to a moving racecar, though. I've been going to dirt track races most Friday nights for quite awhile, and I've never seen anything remotely like what Ward did. I've tried to Google video of something simliar, and can't find anything.

I'll agree w/ you there...the aggressiveness of Ward towards a moving car on the track was irresponsible behavior at best.