British racing driver Henry Surtees was killed Sunday during a Formula Two race when a stray tire coming loose from a separate wreck bounced onto the track and collided with his head. Henry, who was 18, died instantly.
“Henry had followed his heart from the time he first sat in a kart,” said [John Surtees,] the 1964 Formula One world champion. “He treated seriously the balance between motorsport and school, having just finished his A-levels. The world beckoned and he was thriving on the freedom to concentrate on his motorsport.
Johnathan Palmer, chief executive of MotorSport Vision:
“On Sunday morning my 18 year-old son, Jolyon, and Henry were sat together, amidst all the F2 drivers, joking and signing autographs for fans. In the afternoon race Henry was just half a second or so behind Jolyon, trying to move forward after an earlier spin. As they both dived down towards Sheene, the bouncing wheel just missed Jolyon, but hit Henry, who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. via.”
Video of the original crash and Surtees’ collision with the tire was captured on video, which has been posted after the jump for viewing at your discretion. I didn’t post this to bum everyone out as much as recognize an athlete who was taken from us too soon. And I guess this is where I’d say something profound about the frailty of life or offer sympathy that too often comes off as emotionally empty rhetoric. But this is truly sad. Read the rest of this entry »
I was pretty disappointed that with David Carradine’s untimely stanglebation suicide over the weekend (or whatever it was) that there wasn’t more attention given to Carradine’s Ulysses, the dystopic cult classic Death Race 2000. The Transcontinental Road Race was the national sport in the canon of the film, where the drivers ran over pedestrians for points. Carradine’s Mr. Frankenstein, a cyborg that may have been a precursor to George Lucas’ Darth Vader, could allegedly shift gears in 1/20th of a second. And no one had ever seen his face. Except for his navigators. Who are all dead.
Death Race 2000 was released in 1975 and was clearly ahead of its time. The whole film was in pieces on YouTube at one point, but it appears to have been pulled. But you can see Carradine tonight on FOX’s show, Mental, which is probably a terrible show, yet suddenly semi-significant now that Carradine is up in that big Thai whorehouse in the sky…
Indy racer Danica Patrick is in the Swimsuit Issue for the second consecutive year, and this year’s spread is way way better than last year’s. Last year she was crawling out of a firesuit on a beach and wearing a bland white bikini. Now they’ve got her all glammed up, wearing a fancy bikini and high heels while she’s draped across a sports car. Science says that high heels and fast cars make any photo shoot 50% sexier, and science is never wrong. Science also says she could have gotten the extra 50% if she were pictured eating fruit provocatively and submerging herself in a tub of motor oil. Eh, maybe next year.
Today's riddle: What's 14 times better than one rally car crashing?
