Sprint Car Racing

Sprint car racing is a popular sport in the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. The races usually take place on dirt or clay tracks and provide the crowd with close wheel-to-wheel action with speeds exceeding well over 100 mph. V8 engines power the cars.

Wings

There are two main types of sprint cars: Non-wing cars and winged cars. The difference is that the non-wing sprint cars do not have wings and the winged sprint cars do. Non-winged sprint cars tend to put on an excellent show of racing with slides through the turns and thrilling side-by-side racing. The more popular of the classes is the Winged Class of sprint cars. There are two wings one on the top of the sprint car above the driver's head and the other on the front of the sprint car. The duties of the top wing is to supply the car with down force to keep the car on the track and it also acts as a safety feature absorbing the impacts of crashes. The front wing or the nose wing is used to help keep the front wheels anchored to the track.

Tires

Another feature of sprint cars is called stagger. Stagger is having the right rear tire is larger than the left rear tire. The reason for the larger tire is to help the drivers through the turns on the track. The amount of stagger used depends on the track's features such as the size of the track, banking, and the condition of the track.

Crashes

Sprint cars are designed to go fast and are open wheeled racing cars therefore being the perfect equation for crashes. Crashes are part of what makes Sprint Car Racing so exciting. Although the crashes seem quite violent, the safety history of the cars is good. With the required safety equipment, the chance of injury is greatly reduced. The cars are also designed to be able to take on heave impacts, the wing as stated earlier is able to act as a cushion to reduce injury as well.

Tracks

There are different types of surfaces for tracks including dolomite, dirt, pavement, and clay. Clay is the most popular of the types because when prepared just right it is able to provide a high level of grip. If the track is prepared poorly such as too much water on the track or too little it can cause the track to be impossible to race on or it can turn into a "tire Shredder."

Tracks are known to have different "personalities" changing frequently throughout the night of racing. Tracks typically being the night with a well prepared track with plenty of moisture; however, by the end of the night the track often becomes dry and slick.

Common Crashes
	Riding a Wheel	The most common version of this accident is when a driver tries a big outside move, all it takes is for the car down low to move up track, just slightly, and you have wheel-to-wheel contact. The front end of the car attempting the pass is usually lifted into the air, the result being one expensive repair bill.
	The Wheel Stand	When a Sprint Car pulls a wheel stand, the driver, of course, has no steering, so guess what does the steering? The stagger! Therefore, if a driver keeps his foot on the pedal and pulls a monster wheel stand the car can often turn hard on the left rear tire and flip the car or turn the car into a competitor.
	Hooking a Rut	A track with a lot of moisture can form huge ruts and if a car is not setup to ride the ruts the consequence is often a huge crash. What happens is that the car hits the rut and instead of traveling over it, the tire catches the rut; all of the car’s weight is then transferred to the right rear, causing it to roll.
	Contact with the Wall	This usually happens when a car is driven too hard into a turn and drifts up to the wall on the loose dirt that has been thrown up there by the other cars. If you hit the wall with the front end of the car, it can cause the right front tire to climb the wall, and before you know it, you are upside down. If you hit the wall with the right rear tire, it can then transfer the car’s weight to the left, tipping the car over.
Images courtesy of World Sprint Car Guide.