Bankruptcy

NASCAR Sacrifices Safety for Ratings

By mcbride

In a move right in line with its new marketing campaign, NASCAR officials declined to issue a severe punishment to driver Carl Edwards for his intentional and life threatening ?bump? of fellow driver Brad Keselowski.  Although some think the move was a deserved pay back for Keselowski?s own aggressive tactics on the track, the fact remains that Keselowski?s moves have been unintentional whereas Edwards? bump was clearly and admittedly intentional.  The incident in question occurred at Atlanta and the result was that Kesklowski?s car went airborn before hitting ground in a huge crash.  Again, the result of this ?bump? could easily have been the loss of the life of one or more of the drivers or the folks in the stand watching the ?show?.  However, while his actions may have been criminal, some might see it as intentional assault or perhaps worse, NASCAR took the ?boys will be boys? approach and sent everyone on their way with a big ?go get ?um boys.?  The new NASCAR marketing campaign clearly emphasizes the possibility of crashes and encourages such behavior.  The blatant effort to sacrifice safety for ratings is deplorable.  ??Boys, have at it and have a good time,? Nascar?s vice president for competition, Robin Pemberton, said in January. If drivers wanted to use their fenders to bump others on the track ? ?Rubbin? is racin,? ?as they say ? Nascar would not necessarily penalize offenders.

An inevitable result of that approach came Sunday during a Sprint Cup race at Atlanta Motor Speedway, where Carl Edwards drove his No. 99 Ford deliberately into the rear quarter panel of Brad Keselowski?s No. 12 Dodge. The hit sent Keselowski?s car airborne in a wreck that could have injured not only the driver but fans as well. No one was hurt, but Keselowski and the former driver Kyle Petty called for Nascar to penalize Edwards.?

Here is a link: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/09/sports/autoracing/09feud.html

Michael

Full post as published by Texas Lawyer Blog on March 12, 2010 (boomark / email).