H
Happy29
Guest
Gary Nelson was in his Concord, N.C., office Thursday putting the finishing touches on a technical bulletin which will allow competitors to use a roof escape hatch. "My goal is to get this bulletin out by the first of next week," Nelson said. "This will be optional this year, at least, that's the direction we're headed." The first use of the hatch in competition will likely be the EA Sports 500 at Talladega, scheduled Sept. 28. Nelson, NASCAR's managing director of competition, said the hatch design passed two critical tests over the last two weeks. Nelson and his engineering staff at NASCAR's Research and Development Center have spent a year designing and testing the hatch. A stock car outfitted with the escape door was crash-tested at the University of Nebraska two weeks ago and the hatch retained its integrity. "The car flipped six times and the escape door worked just fine after the car came to a stop," Nelson said. The final test was performed by driver Michael Waltrip and his #15 NAPA/Coca Cola/RitzKlaussner Chevy during a two-day tire test at Daytona International Speedway earlier this week. "We wanted to do a high-speed track test and see if the aerodynamic forces caused it to flutter or leak air into the car or anything like that," Nelson said. "The report we got back from the team was it was steady. It didn't move at all. To me that was a key test." Nelson said he was scheduled to meet with engineers at Dale Earnhardt Inc. for a final debriefing to "make sure they didn't find any negatives." "In an early conversation with them, they had no negatives," Nelson said. "They were all very high on the design. We're getting very close." Waltrip, who stands 6-foot-5, is one of the drivers eager to have an alternative escape route from the ****pit of his car. This will be the fifth major safety improvement introduced to NASCAR competitors this season. Other safety measures include the placement of a fire extinguisher near the fuel cell; stronger tether supports on hood; an extra air deflector to keep cars from going airborne; and the recent installation of SAFER barriers at Richmond and New Hampshire.