Motorsport: Safer tracks put IndyCar out in front

The margin of error for IndyCar drivers is tiny. Photo / AP

All diehard motorsport fans will have had their wishes fulfilled a couple of weekends ago when the Formula One season kicked off on the Sakhir circuit in Bahrain.

Personally I found that race about as interesting as watching grass grow.

I had my eye firmly fixed on Brazil, and in particular the streets of Sao Paulo, where the first race of this year's IndyCar championships roars into action.

The added incentive for me is that we have a Kiwi in Scott Dixon in that event. And boy, right from the first lap it got interesting with a big crash.

One thing has always puzzled me with IndyCar, and oval racing in particular. When an open-wheeler race car smacks into a concrete wall at 250km/h plus, how on earth does the driver walk away?

I realise the cars are designed to fly apart and the chassis is a cocoon specifically made to protect the driver from serious harm.

But thumping into an immovable object at such pace would normally reduce most things to their smallest constituent parts.

After a bit of digging, it transpires that former Indy Racing League CEO Tony George announced a safety innovation that would revolutionise the sport. In 2002 he introduced the Steel and Foam Energy Reduction barrier (SAFER) in all four turns at that year's Indianapolis 500.

In a major technological leap, the IRL and the University of Nebraska (also Lincoln's Midwest Roadside Safety Facility since 1998) put their heads together. The result is one of the most effective safety measures to be incorporated in track design today.

Unlike a road course or a conventional race track, there is no run off area, or the room to introduce one, on oval circuits. This makes the racing more interesting as the slightest of mistakes results in the biggest of messes.

Unlike a race track where a car can fly off the tarmac and regain the circuit later after bouncing over a few ripple strips and a bit of grass, in oval racing there's only the wall.

The original SAFER barrier was made in 6m units, each consisting of four rectangular steel tubes, welded together, to form a unified element. The units are connected with four internal steel splices.

Bundles of 5cm thick sheets of extruded, closed-cell polystyrene are placed between the concrete wall and the steel tubing modules.

After much research with version one and intensive study, a newer, improved designed was developed by the same team who came with the first idea.

The second version incorporates improvements that further minimise damage to the system on impact, allowing one configuration to be used for both open-wheel and tin-top cars.

This now meant the barrier could be fitted at virtually any race track regardless of corner radius or banking.

Since late 2003, the improved system has become the standard for motor sport in the US and has been installed on the majority of racetracks putting on open-wheel and saloon-car racing events..

All ovals on the IndyCar series schedule now have the system installed in all four turns. The 1.4km Iowa Speedway oval in Newton, Iowa has installed the Alternative Backup Structure for the SAFER barrier into its track design.

Up until now, the system has been retro-fitted to the existing concrete walls (mainly in the turns) of racetracks. Iowa Speedway is not only the first track to ever have barrier system around the perimeter of the track, it is the first to have installed the new system, which does not have a concrete wall behind it.

Since its introduction, the SAFER barrier has earned four major awards.